An aging Bob takes up the sword, and becomes a master swordsman...? It's actually pretty good, and well narrated... but it was strange listening to a..Show More » story of BLS in which he isn't peering through a scope for paragraphs at a time. The action was good, and a rather detailed account of swords and their history in Japan is given (I can't vouch for accuracy). Enjoyable.

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Hunter retired from the Washington Post last July. This book feels like it was dashed off from notes found in the bottom drawer while cleaning out his..Show More » desk. There are glaring editorial mistakes (e.g., in the first paragraph, the gun is knocked from the bad guy's hand and lands several feet away; in the next paragraph, the officer takes the same gun out of the bad guy's hand). Since I do not have a hard copy of this book, I cannot tell for certain whether this reading is truly unabridged. At several points the plot skips, or characters disappear without explanation, never to return. As a result, the book sounds like a poor abridgement. Of course, it may just be poor editing. This book has none of the immediacy or sharply-drawn characters of Hunter's best work, "Point of Impact" and "Black Light." The Bob Lee Swagger of this book is but a faint, false apparition of the BLS in "Point of Impact." Read POI and see whether you can imagine that character hanging out at a NASCAR race. Hunter should have allowed BLS to retire after "Time to Hunt" and invented new characters or continued to flesh-out Earl Swagger instead of subjecting the noble BLS to such humiliation. Buck Shirner was the wrong choice to read this book. I do not know Shirner's ethnicity, but his voice has a distinctly Native American intonation and cadence inappropriate for southern good ol' boys like BLS and the Grumleys. This is not intended as a criticism of Shirner as a reader. His voice is mismatched to the material. (Imagine, say, Burt Reynolds reading Patrick O'Brian.) Will Patton or Jay O. Sanders would have improved the listening experience, but neither could have saved this book from itself. It pains me to criticize Hunter's work so harshly; he has been one of my favorite authors and I have all of his books. This one should never have been released.

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Hunter has gotten away from the Bob Lee in Point of Impact as a real world character with plausable scenarios and gone to turning him into a cross bet..Show More »ween Sherlock Holmes and Superman. Still exciting but getting out of the original realm.

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Much of the action that takes place near Camp Lejeune is described as taking place in SOUTH CAROLINA!??? What's up with that Mr. Hunter? ---
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As Marine centric as all your stories are I would have thought you'd get that right. Glaring error. Camp Lejune and Jacksonville not "Jackson" is in North Carolina on the coast. Just north of Wilmington. Some other place names are referred to as in SC also although they are only a few miles off base. ---

You also refer to former Marines as "ex-Marines", a big no no as you should know. ---

The antagonists in this story are cartoon clowns and not the professional hitman one would expect Bob Lee to have to overcome and defeat. Seems like you're just pumping out BLS stories for the heck of it without any real attempt at a good story. ---

Also tell Buck Schirner to cut back to a pack a day. He often runs out of breath trying to finish sentences or say certain words and sounds like a smoker who doesn't have full lung capacity. ---

Hate to do this because I'm a fan of all your previous stories, but only 3 stars for this one. ---

- Jesse in Virginia.

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I am a little old lady and love Stephen Hunter and Bob Lee, but we have a problem now. Bob Lee is 66 years old: too old to do what he does best, so t..Show More »he story takes another path. I liked this book as a stand alone story, but it is not about our Bob Lee. Unfortunately the author has tied his books to a timeline and we have gotten to the last stages of Bob Lee's life. I would like to see the author go back and give us more adventures in years past. I did not care for the narrator. He did a decent job, but his voice does not fit my mental scenario that I created when reading all of Mr. Hunter's books through the years. I know Bob Lee is from a humble background, but he is a master, an artist in his field. He is the best. Narrator should be reading Mickey Spillane - needs to be more like Gary Cooper - smoother.


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