Judgment Call

The Exonerated, Volume 1

By: JC Ryan

Narrated by: Rhett Samuel Price

Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins

Publisher's summary

Andy Gibbons had been sentenced to life in prison for a crime he didn't commit. After 10 years inside, he had abandoned all hope, and resigned himself to the fact that he would remain there for the rest of his life.

But the fact that Andy has admitted defeat and thrown in the towel didn't mean his wife, Jamie, did.

Disillusioned and worn out by the justice system, the Honorable Judge Regan St. Clair was just about to pack in, too, when a letter from Jamie Gibbons arrived on her desk.

Before long Regan St. Clair and Jake Westley, a former Special Forces operator, stumble into a quagmire world of deceit and menace. A world where nothing is as it seems, and no one and nothing can be trusted.

Is Andy Gibbons really innocent? Can he be exonerated? At what price?

Judgment Call is a full-length audiobook, a crime suspense-thriller about a corrupt organization with a sinister agenda that exploits every weakness and every dark corner of the fallible justice system. This fast-paced suspense-thriller is the first audiobook in J C Ryan's Exonerated Series. Books in The Exonerated Series

• Book 1 - Judgment Call
• Book 2 - Damned if you do, Damned if you don't - June 2016
• Book 3 - The Ends Justify the Means - September 2016

©2015 JC Ryan (P)2017 JC Ryan

Lots of misdirection and twist & turns............

Judgment Call is the first in a legal mystery series that starts with a judge being tasked with proving that an innocent man has been in jail for 10+ years. The judge, Regan, has been suffering from some job burnout, and she is excited by the prospect of investigating the conviction of a man whose wife swears he didn't commit the murder for which he is serving a life sentence. After laying the foundation for the story, the author immediately starts the action as Regan is rescued by a former Delta Force soldier and current private detective named Jake when three thugs attack her. As Regan and Jake assemble a team of associates with varying skills, the threats and interference from some mysterious but obviously powerful source throw constant roadblocks in the investigation.

Throughout the story, the author writes chapters with the two people seemingly responsible for the original murder and all of Regan's troubles, but we never know how or why until the very last chapter. Although I had difficulty warming up to Regan - she is very entitled and unnecessarily snippy - I eventually grew to like her, and I really liked Jake and several secondary characters from the beginning. With plenty of misdirection and plot twists as well as lots of action and a touch of romance, Judgment Call is a terrific start to what promises to be an entertaining series.

The narration by Rhett Samuel Price is excellent. Unlike many male narrators, Price handles the female characters extremely well. He employs a slightly higher tone, so that the listener knows that a female is speaking but without coming off as overdone or squeaky. He has a deep, sonorous voice, so he is ideally suited for the male characters, and he speaks with several ethnic and foreign accents with great skill in this book. Judgment Call is an enjoyable story, but the narration makes it even better as an audiobook.

I received a copy of this audiobook at my request in exchange for this honest review.

Exciting Legal Thriller

Any additional comments?

When Judge Regan St. Clair receives a letter from Jamie Gibbons asking for help exonerating her husband Andy, she sees the flimsy evidence that convicted him and agrees to look into his case. With the help of private investigator Jake Westley, they soon realize that someone doesn't want them to find the truth.

Judgment Call is a fast-paced legal thriller with a lot of action and excitement. Murder, abduction, bombs, car chases and plenty of near misses kept me riveted. I also enjoyed the romantic element of the story. With the conspiracy to keep the truth hidden, it was difficult to discern the good guys from the bad, especially when some of the characters were a little of both. I like when not all of the characters are so cut and dry and it added another layer of intrigue. This was a long book but the narrator did a great job of moving the story along. I really enjoyed Judgment Call: The Exonerated, Volume 1 and can't wait to see what happens next. I would recommend this.

I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review. This review is my honest opinion.

Ok

The plot was very busy and a little convoluted. Lot of things happening. The resolution didn't really offer as much satisfaction as I had hoped. It was very confusing and muddied. Narration was ok. Not the best book but definitely not the worst.

I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review

I wanted to like this book!

This is a complex and convoluted thriller. I listened all the way through, but my husband did not stick with it. The plot is not all that easy to follow; It skips around without making clear connections. I wanted to like this book. I wanted to get to the end and find out the solution, but the end was just as confusing as the rest of the book.

There were a lot of characters, and they were difficult to keep straight. Few of the characters appeared to be clearly good or bad; everyone seems to be murky. The relationship between the heroine and her father was not clearly explained. Character development in general was superficial. What did we really ever learn about Andy?

The plot contrived to include it all---car chases, bombings, kidnapping, mugging, beatings, phone tapping, threats. As a consequence the plot was not very tight.

The slight romantic element in the book was disappointing; it was so non-explicit as to raise the issue of anything happening at all!

The narration was okay, but the heroine’s voice was not convincing. She always sounded so wimpy; not at all like a judge! This was supposed to be a very bright and intellectual woman. I know it cannot be easy for men to do convincing female voices.

This book was given to me for free at my request in exchange for an unbiased review.

Drags on. Needs to be cut short.

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

This story was somewhat reminding me of the tv show 'The Night Of", just because of the "wrongly incarcerated, or is he?" angle. Bad sadly, that's where the similarities end. Where the show had a gripping story and extremely realistic legal procedural depiction, this book lacks both. In fact, there are some cliche sequences. Beyond that, it is pretty straight-forward story.

Do you think Judgment Call needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

As mentioned in the synopsis, this is part of a series and there are two more books in the series.

Any additional comments?

I received this book for free from the author / narrator / publisher, in exchange for an unbiased review.

Intense Legal Thriller!!

The book was fast-paced and complex, well-developed characters. I was on the edge of my seat from start to finish. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who likes a tingling, Legal thriller.

Who to trust?

Judgement Call is a fast paced book with characters that are not always predictable This is a novel of a husband and wife who have a good marriage. Andy is not perfect, but when after 10 years in prison, for a crime he says he did not commit, his wife Jamie sets out to prove his innocence with the help of the Honorable Judge Regan St Clair . Regan, with the help of Jake Westley, a former Special Forces operator stumble into a world and organization where nothing seems as it is and find they can trust no one. The story has plenty of suspense and plot twists that kept me guessing to the end. The narrator did a great job and I would recommend this audio book.
"I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review."

Great book.

If you love legal thrillers plus mayhem this is the book for you. The main characters in this book are fun, snarky and all around "normal". I want to read another. I received this audio book for free at my request and voluntarily reviewed.

Interesting concept, but can be refined

Is there anything you would change about this book?

This book is a basic mystery, it's not bad, but there are some problems. I found the overall conspiracy to be a bit convoluted. The story was okay and the characters could be interesting, but the dialogue and descriptions sometimes distracted me. There were a lot of cliches and there was a bit of telling one character or another a backstory or a view versus showing them. This was not all the time, but it broke up the rhythm for me.

What did you like about the performance? What did you dislike?

I thought the performance was workable, but I had issues with some of the characters. They just sounded... Odd. The voices were a little weird to me and didn't seem to fit. Especially ethnic characters and those with accents. I'm not even sure why a couple of them had accents. It wasn't terrible, but it did make it tougher for me to get immersed.

Any additional comments?

I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

It took me awhile to get through this listen

Any additional comments?

I love a good mystery and this listen definitely falls into that category. It had twists and turns aplenty with several whodunnits. Always good in this genre.

The narrator had a very compelling voice and it worked well with the subject. There were some exciting car chases, and kidnappings, and bombings, and romance, and it was all handled extremely well.

I think this listen was too long though. A couple of hours could have been shaved by eliminating huge chunks out of the middle of the book. I kept putting the listen aside because yet another unsavory character came into the fold. The big reveal was taking too long. The narrator kept me coming back though.

There will be a book two and if the same narrator is involved, I will check it out. The formation of the new "cell" (no spoilers) is intriguing. Just maybe, cut to the chase quicker in book two.

A game of chess

Any additional comments?

An excellent narration by Rhett Samuel Price keeps this story vibrant and intriguing. and even gave it a feeling of possibility. Ten years after the conviction and imprisonment of Andy Gibbons for a murder he claimed not to have e committed, his wife persuades Judge Regan St.Claire to re-investigate the case. There seemed to be several irregularities but after several months nothing decisive had been discovered. Then, with a new investigator, she starts to make progress - and attract opposition, beatings and threats to her life which simply make her more determined to discover the real killer, who Framed him, and get Andy released.

There are numerous and good characters, excellently portrayed by the narrator who gives each a clear and distinct voice making this more of a play than a simple reading: the communications effect was particularly impressive. The excitement is tense, the conversation realistic and the story mysterious. Sadly, the conclusion seemed very unlikely and far fetched, but it was an interesting idea, if horrifying.

This is definitely a book to hear rather than read, carried, as previously mentioned, so well by Mr.Price. I was fortunate in having been gifted a complementary copy of Judgement Call by the rights holder, via Audiobook Boom. Thank you. I was completely involved within it, carried along by the excellence of the narration and thrilling intrigue of the story even after my suspence of disbelief had started to fall apart. Would I recommend it? I'm not sure, but I will certainly be looking out for anything else narrated by Rhett Samuel Price.