Beyond Reach

By: Karin Slaughter

Narrated by: Joyce Bean

Length: 13 hrs and 41 mins

Publisher's Summary

In a stifling jail cell in a hardscrabble Georgia town, Detective Lena Adams sits in stubborn silence: bruised, angry, and the only suspect in a horrific murder that left a woman incinerated beyond recognition. One hundred miles away, Police Chief Jeffrey Tolliver has gotten the call that his young detective has been arrested. Jeffrey's wife, pediatrician and medical examiner Sara Linton, has little patience for Lena or her dramas. Fighting a heartbreaking malpractice suit, struggling to pick up the pieces of a shattered career, the last thing Sara needs is to see Jeffrey playing Lena's knight in shining armor. Sara cannot guess that within days she herself will be at the center of a bizarre and murderous case.

Lena has fled back to the place where she grew up hard, careening back through the shadows of her past and into a shocking underground world of bigotry and rage. The man who raised her is slowly killing himself with drugs. The man who beguiled - and beat - her is reaching out from prison. And now only Jeffrey and Sara can free Lena from the web of lies, betrayal, and brutality that has trapped her - as this powerhouse of a novel races toward its shattering climax...and a final, unforgettable twist.

©2007 Karin Slaughter (P)2007 Brilliance Audio, Inc.

Well written, clever mystery...

Let me start this with a word about the narrator, Joyce Bean. I gave her 3 stars, even though she has a remarkable voice, especially for feminine characters. Her voice is naturally deep, but when she reads men her voice is so gravelly and rough they just aren't attractive characters. Nevertheless her performance does not get in the way of the writing. At times she is worthy of 5 stars, but the male characters dropped her score to 3 stars.

The mystery is well conceived and sadly accurate. This is because it deals with meth addicts. After finishing the book I googled "meth faces before and after" and the results were, well... Look it up for yourself. Suffice to say Slaughter couldn't exaggerate the effects meth has on a persons body if she wanted too. There's some clever writing that kept me hanging on tight till the end.

I think this is my 12th Slaughter novel in a little over 2 months. I am so lost in her fictional Grant County that I feel as if I live there. At the same time I became so frustrated with Lena, a key character in several novels, I was ready to stop listening. But this is the similar response most of her friends, coworkers and enemies have, so my hats off to Slaughter's character building skills.

This is a good book on its own, but honestly I purchased it because its a key cog in the entire Grant County/ Will Trent series.

11 of 11 people found this review helpful

Temporal Chaos

I regret giving this such a low rating, but the writing had serious problems. The worst is that the timeline skitters all over the place, way over the line of comprehensibility. You never know whether something is happening now or happened weeks ago. There are also odd grammatical errors that aren't enough to ruin the story, but mildly annoy -- given that she's among the rare few who know not to say "firstly" or "importantly," it seems strange she'd then misuse "comprise." The story is miserable, too. All of the major female characters have been savaged and brutalized. And the sex scenes are gratuitous rather than contributing to the meaning of the story.

AUDIO: Adequate, but there are noticeable misemphases and her low voices lose expression.

10 of 10 people found this review helpful

Can. Not. Handle. The Narration

How could the performance have been better?

I stuck with the story longer than I wanted to just out of curiosity for the storyline; however, I just couldn't handle the narration any longer. The original narrator for this series was so good that I got spoiled. I made it through the previous book with the narration change and hoped that this book would give relief, but the twangs and drawls seem over the top. The telephone conversation voices are grating. I finally googled spoilers so I could give my ears reprieve. :(

8 of 8 people found this review helpful

narrator very poor with male voices

This actress can not do younger male voices. The men in the story all sound like they are in their 60s. As a result, I didn't enjoy this reading as much as I did the others.

4 of 4 people found this review helpful

Bad narration

I did not like Jeffrey's voice in this one and the end so sad, i really cried

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Great story, narration notsomuch

What did you love best about Beyond Reach?

Very on-par with the rest of the series. My heart ached for Sara Linton. Infuriated with Lena as always. The character development with Dr Linton was excellent in this book.

What other book might you compare Beyond Reach to and why?

I love this series! Starting Will Trent next.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

She didn't have enough differentiation between characters so the conversations were hard to follow at times. Also, even some of the women sounded like men.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

The very end. I won't spoil it. it was heartbreaking.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Terrible narrator but OK story

This narrator should never try to do all the voices. The men sounded like they had smokers voices. Just awful.

This book answered many questions about Lena's life so that was good.

Sara was portrayed as a weak, sniveling wife. In the other books she is clearly a strong woman and that is much better since she is a physician and must be strong to endure all she has gone through.

Everytime Jeffrey made a move as a police officer and took a chance Sara squealed like a little girl that she was afraid he would get hurt. Good grief, he is a POLICE man not a librarian.

If you do not have anything else to read, then take a chance; if there is anything else in your library pass on this one.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

TERRIBLE NARRATION

Especially after Kathleen Early. I'm only on the first chapter but I'm not sure if I can bear listening to Joyce Bean for 12 hours.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Excellent wrap up.

In this final addition to the, "Grant County" series, Lena leads Jeffery and Sarah into a deadly situation and as usual she is in over her head. Jeffery knows that Lena took a trip to her home town to find out why she had been unable to reach her uncle who had in fact raised her and her sister. When Jeffery is unable to reach her days later, he and Sarah are off to the next county to see what gives. Upon their arrival they learn Lena is in the hospital and being held for questioning, her uncle is missing and the local bar he owns has been closed by the authorities. As soon as they are allowed to visit Lena, she starts acting more crazy than usual, begs them to leave town and promptly executes a desperate escapes. Shortly after her escape the local PD find a murdered woman who has been burned alive in a car. Jeffery will not stop until he finds out what deep trouble Lena has gotten herself into now. Secrets about Lena's childhood and her connection to a long running drug ring are revealed. Great characters, great narration, and a perfect jumping off story to start KS's next, "The Will Trent" series. One of my favorites.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Excellent!

I thought this was excellent with only one small caveat....the way that it's read makes it a difficult to ascertain where on the timeline some things occur. I'd imagine the book has italics or something making it easier to know if it's past or present but that's not the case with the audio version. Aside from that I found this to be another home run in the Grant Series!! I thought it was better than Faithless!

1 of 1 people found this review helpful