A Time of Dread

By: John Gwynne

Narrated by: Damian Lynch

Length: 15 hrs and 31 mins

Publisher's Summary

Acclaimed epic fantasy author John Gwynne with the first book of a new trilogy.

The Ben-Elim, a race of warrior angels, once vanquished a mighty demon horde. Now they rule the Banished lands. But their dominion is brutally enforced and their ancient enemy may not be as crushed as they thought.

In the snowbound north, Drem, a trapper, finds mutilated corpses in the forests - a sign of demonic black magic.

In the south, Riv, a young, tempestuous soldier, discovers a deadly rift within the Ben-Elim themselves.

Two individuals with two world-changing secrets. But where will they lead? And what role will Drem and Riv play in the Banished Land's fate? Difficult choices need to be made.

In the shadows, dark forces are gathering, waiting for their time to rise....

©2018 John Gwynne (P)2018 Hachette Audio

Dose not disappoint

I often worry when authors revisit worlds whose stories have finished. The results of these trips are generally nostalgic but not particularly good. This was not the case with this book. Time of dread takes the existing world of John Gwynne and rather then exploit it, builds on it, giving us a view of the world the heroes of Faithful and The Fallen fought for. It builds on rather then exploiting the source materials, taking the story in a new exciting path that is still accessible to a new reader unfamiliar with the previous story. The success of this book leaves me hopeful that mr Gwynne other books will all soon be available on audible.

3 people found this helpful

Good story but lots of too long pauses in the narration

I mostly enjoyed Damian Lynch’s narration but there are lots of places where pauses go two or three beats too long and it makes it really hard to listen to in places.

1 person found this helpful

Story jumped around too much too often

Really could not get a grasp of the story and characters because the race names and character names were not well defined early on and then every chapter the story jumped to a different character so it was really too hard to follow and took a lot of work to understand the story.

4 people found this helpful

Another compelling Gwynne book- and I don’t get the negativity directed at Damiam Lynch

I found this to be a compelling start to a new series, for which I am grateful. I loved the first series, so this delving into the same world 130 some odd years later is great.

I almost held off due to critical comments from some reviewers about Damian Lynch’s performance, but as he read the first four books, I figured I’d put my faith in him. Glad I did. As always, he was superb. For those who complained about pauses, my advice would be to speed up the book in settings if you find it so bothersome. I certainly did not, and enjoy his talented readings.

Horrible narration

I didn't even finish listening to the first chapter. This narrator is horrible. The cadence is jerky with big pauses that ruin the immersion. I'll be returning this immediately.

1 person found this helpful

Distracting awkward pauses in narration

I was excited to start listening to this, especially once I realized the sequel is going to be released soon. Unfortunately, I will need to switch to written books as the narration has extended pauses between sentences? paragraphs?

I tried adjusting the speed of the playback, but it does not help.

awesome read or listen.

loved this almost as good as his first series. it was quick and fast paced thru characters are nicly developed look forward to next installment.

Gripping story!

Okay, so personally, I was a big dumb-dumb because I didnt read the first series before this one...But, luckily I was able to catch on quickly with what was going on!
I didnt think I would get through this book because of the length, but I found myself not be able to put it down! The characters were so well developed! My personal favorite was Drem, he just seemed like a character that I could relate to better than the others, so his chapters really stuck out to me! All in all, fantastic book!

Not a bad Read

Even though this was a very imaginative world these characters were hard to embrace.

Dr A

Missing Words, Exposition, and Tense Shifting

The narration here is good, but the writing style is really rubbing me the wrong way. I've only listened to the first 45 minutes or so, but I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to finish this one. If I pick this book up again, and finish it I will update my review. If I don't, then you know that it was a DNF title.

This is supposedly written in the past tense, but every 2-3 sentences the author shifts to present tense. There are also lots of missing verbs (namely was) that makes the writing sound pretentious and grammatically incorrect. This is murdering me via OCD. Pick a tense, stick with it, include all the words in your sentences. This should be common sense, but it isn't so here. Top it off with occasional bursts of exposition and... ugh... It pushed me to stop listening and move on to a different title.