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Long Beach, California homicide detective Danny Beckett is pouring the weekend's first shot of vodka when the call comes in: Elizabeth Williams, a teacher at nearby Warren High School, has been brutally murdered in her classroom. When Danny arrives at the school, the blood-spattered crime scene turns even his veteran stomach. What could this young woman have done to make her the target of such a violent attack?
For 16 years, Ben Shepard loyally served the Long Beach Police Department. Then he took a bullet to the head, and his life was shattered. No one expects much of anything from him anymore - except his father, an old man receding into a fog of his own. And except maybe his tenant, Grace, who's been a warm and friendly constant in his and his father's bleak lives. Until the day she vanishes. After an official investigation stalls, Ben moves forward on his own. But stepping into Grace's past - and all she was hiding - is a dangerous move for a man who can't trust his memories from one day to the next.
When the world's most notorious cartel bosses get arrested, they call Benn Bluestone. A drug lawyer sharp enough to exploit loopholes in the system, Bluestone loves the money, the women, the action that come with his career...but working between the lines of justice and crime has taken its toll, and he desperately wants out. He's convinced himself that only an insanely rich client can guarantee him a lavish retirement.
Abby Donovan’s decade-long dream of partnership at her prestigious Chicago law firm is just months from fruition. But it’s all about to change because of one misstep. One step onto a late-night train headed in the wrong direction. Headed into Chicago’s west side, where gangs and violence and drugs fill the streets. In this engaging debut, E.C. Diskin, a former Chicago attorney, takes us on a fast-paced thrill ride with a believable and flawed heroine. Listeners will relate to her, fear for her, and get a glimpse inside Chicago’s best and worst.
When LAPD detective Michael Gideon and his police-dog partner, Sirius, are assigned to the Special Cases Unit (SCU), Gideon knows their work lives will be anything but ordinary. SCU gets the cases no one else wants, the unusual and bizarre crimes that need special handling and special investigators. When a high-school student is found crucified in a local park, Gideon and Sirius must face up to the gruesome tableau and the motivation behind the murder. Complicating matters is a nightmare from their past, the scars of a terrible fire that nearly cost them their lives.
A decade ago, fourteen-year-old Suzanne Lombard, the daughter of Benjamin Lombard - then a senator, now a powerful vice president running for the presidency - disappeared in the most sensational missing-person case in the nation's history. Still unsolved, the mystery remains a national obsession. For legendary hacker and marine Gibson Vaughn, the case is personal - Suzanne Lombard had been like a sister to him.
Long Beach, California homicide detective Danny Beckett is pouring the weekend's first shot of vodka when the call comes in: Elizabeth Williams, a teacher at nearby Warren High School, has been brutally murdered in her classroom. When Danny arrives at the school, the blood-spattered crime scene turns even his veteran stomach. What could this young woman have done to make her the target of such a violent attack?
For 16 years, Ben Shepard loyally served the Long Beach Police Department. Then he took a bullet to the head, and his life was shattered. No one expects much of anything from him anymore - except his father, an old man receding into a fog of his own. And except maybe his tenant, Grace, who's been a warm and friendly constant in his and his father's bleak lives. Until the day she vanishes. After an official investigation stalls, Ben moves forward on his own. But stepping into Grace's past - and all she was hiding - is a dangerous move for a man who can't trust his memories from one day to the next.
When the world's most notorious cartel bosses get arrested, they call Benn Bluestone. A drug lawyer sharp enough to exploit loopholes in the system, Bluestone loves the money, the women, the action that come with his career...but working between the lines of justice and crime has taken its toll, and he desperately wants out. He's convinced himself that only an insanely rich client can guarantee him a lavish retirement.
Abby Donovan’s decade-long dream of partnership at her prestigious Chicago law firm is just months from fruition. But it’s all about to change because of one misstep. One step onto a late-night train headed in the wrong direction. Headed into Chicago’s west side, where gangs and violence and drugs fill the streets. In this engaging debut, E.C. Diskin, a former Chicago attorney, takes us on a fast-paced thrill ride with a believable and flawed heroine. Listeners will relate to her, fear for her, and get a glimpse inside Chicago’s best and worst.
When LAPD detective Michael Gideon and his police-dog partner, Sirius, are assigned to the Special Cases Unit (SCU), Gideon knows their work lives will be anything but ordinary. SCU gets the cases no one else wants, the unusual and bizarre crimes that need special handling and special investigators. When a high-school student is found crucified in a local park, Gideon and Sirius must face up to the gruesome tableau and the motivation behind the murder. Complicating matters is a nightmare from their past, the scars of a terrible fire that nearly cost them their lives.
A decade ago, fourteen-year-old Suzanne Lombard, the daughter of Benjamin Lombard - then a senator, now a powerful vice president running for the presidency - disappeared in the most sensational missing-person case in the nation's history. Still unsolved, the mystery remains a national obsession. For legendary hacker and marine Gibson Vaughn, the case is personal - Suzanne Lombard had been like a sister to him.
A young woman is found brutally murdered, and the main suspect is the victim's fiancé, a hideously scarred Iraq War vet known as the Burned Man. But railroad police Special Agent Sydney Rose Parnell, brought in by the Denver Major Crimes unit to help investigate, can't shake the feeling that larger forces are behind this apparent crime of passion. In the depths of an icy winter, Parnell and her K9 partner, Clyde - both haunted by their time in Iraq - descend into the world of a savage gang of rail riders.
When a passenger jet crashes onto the beaches of Waikiki, bestselling thriller writer Ian Ludlow knows the horrific tragedy wasn’t an accident. Years before, the CIA enlisted Ian to dream up terrorism scenarios to prepare the government for nightmares they couldn’t imagine. Now one of those schemes has come true, and Ian is the only person alive who knows how it was done...and who is behind the plot. That makes him too dangerous to live. Ian goes on the run, sweeping up an innocent bystander in his plight - Margo French, a dog walker and aspiring singer.
Trust no one. Sam Callahan learned this lesson from a childhood spent in abusive foster care, on the streets, and locked in juvie. With the past behind him and his future staked on law school, he is moonlighting as a political tracker, paid to hide in crowds and shadow candidates, recording their missteps for use by their opponents. One night, after an anonymous text tip, Sam witnesses a congressional candidate and a mysterious blonde in a motel indiscretion that ends in murder, recording it all on his phone. Now Sam is a target.
Dr. Christopher Kellan spends his days at Loveland Psychiatric Hospital, overseeing a unit known as Alpha Twelve, home to the most deranged and psychotic killers imaginable. His newest patient, Donny Ray Smith, is accused of murdering ten young girls and making their bodies disappear. But during his first encounter with Donny, Christopher finds something else unsettling: the man looks familiar.
With money and hope in short supply, newly minted attorney Brigham Theodore decides it’s time to lower his standards. He joins a seedy fly-by-night firm in Salt Lake City out of desperation. After he loses his first case - a speeding ticket - he’s convinced his career is over. But to his shock, his boss hands him a slightly more complex case: capital murder.
A rising star at a preeminent political lobbying firm, Dag Calhoun represents the world’s most powerful technology and energy executives. But when a close brush with death reveals that the influence he wields makes him a target, impossible cracks appear in his perfect, richly appointed life. Like everyone else, Dag relies on his digital feed for everything - a feed that is as personal as it is pervasive, and may not be as private as it seems. As he struggles to make sense of the dark forces closing in on him, he discovers that activists are hijacking the feed to manipulate markets and governments.
In the deep woods of East Texas, Henry supports his family by selling bootleg liquor. It's all he can do to keep his compassionate but ailing mother and his stepfather - a fanatical grassroots minister with a bruising rhetoric - from ruin. But they have no idea they've become the obsession of the girl in the woods. Andoned and nearly feral, Eve has been watching them, seduced by the notion of family - something she's known only in the most brutal sense. Soon she can't resist the temptation to get close.
It's been five months since Special Agent Sydney Parnell survived a violent confrontation with a gang of brutal thugs, an encounter that left her physically and emotionally scarred. Deep down, Sydney fears she isn't ready for another investigation. But when a woman is murdered on the train tracks and a child goes missing, she knows she's the only one who can lead the hunt for the killer. While Denver police and the FBI chase down blind alleys, Sydney focuses on a single cryptic clue left behind at the crime scene.
After her journalist husband and infant son are brutally executed in a fire in their Florida home, photographer Harper McDaniel has nothing left to live for - except settling the score. When the local police fail to take the arson seriously, Harper takes the reins and discovers her husband was investigating some mysterious deaths at a cacao plantation on the Ivory Coast. Now she's convinced he was targeted in a corporate conspiracy to silence him.
On Detective Matt Jones's first night working Homicide in LA, he's called to investigate a particularly violent murder case: a man has been gunned down in a parking lot off Hollywood Boulevard, his bullet-riddled body immediately pegged as the work of a serial robber who has been haunting the Strip for months.
Dr. Annabelle Schwartzman has finally found a place to belong. As the medical examiner for the San Francisco Police Department, working alongside homicide detective Hal Harris, she uncovers the tales the dead can't tell about their final moments. It is a job that gives her purpose - and a safe haven from her former life at the hands of an abusive husband. Although it's been seven years since she escaped that ordeal, she still checks over her shoulder to make sure no one is behind her.
In a small town along the Mississippi River, separate but nearly identical attacks have left two married couples brutally murdered in their homes. A young boy—the lone survivor of the killings—now lies comatose in the hospital. And the police’s only lead is the boy’s terrified description of the assailant: a “monster."
On a sweltering September night, Long Beach Homicide Detective Danny Beckett is called to a grisly crime scene at the mouth of the Los Angeles River. A defenseless homeless man has been burned to death by three teenagers with gang ties. The suspects are already in custody, and the evidence is overwhelming - but when one suspect’s brother is targeted for murder, Danny starts to think there may be more to this seemingly clear-cut case. Obsessed with discovering the true identity of the victim, a gentle vagrant who may have been hiding a tortured past, Danny and his team start to uncover a high-reaching conspiracy that puts them all at risk - and threatens to open new wounds that could cut even deeper than Danny’s old ones.
I wanted to like this book but I just couldn't. The performance was stilted and the story just couldn't hold my interest. I kept going hoping it would get better. It didn't. The descriptions of Long Beach were pretty good. To be honest, I was about halfway through the book when I realized I didn't even know the name of the main character. The sad thing was, I didn't care.
6 of 6 people found this review helpful
as they wanted and then jump to going after the head boss behind crime. Narrator was very good.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
This Narrator had a laid back vibe that I wasn’t sure I could hang with but I’m so glad I did. The Characters were interesting and flawed but likeable and easy to relate to. The mystery and police procedure unfolds over the course of the book and I found myself dreading that it would be over. Would love a sequel with these characters and I think this Narrator fit the main Characters personality perfectly.
Seriously, I came to the end of this book and thought “really? That’s it? What a let down!”
I was expecting a good twist and at least SOME suspense. Nada.
I enjoyed the book it was easy to listen to. I will probably read/listen to more of his books.
The story was slow and anticlimactic. the reading was uninspired and left me zoning out.
I truly enjoyed this book
Narration was wonderful.
I recommend this book for anyone who enjoys law and order fiction.
I like the story line, the character development . I have listened to the other two books in this series and really enjoyed them as well. Since this book was published in 2014, I hope the next book in the series is coming out soon.
If you could sum up A Cold and Broken Hallelujah in three words, what would they be?
Kept me interested.
Did the plot keep you on the edge of your seat? How?
I enjoyed this book and the narrator did an excellent job. I didn't find too many surprises out of the book but it certainly didn't bore me at all.
After finishing this book, I felt like there were several areas missing very important backstory. It wasn't until I came to write a review of this book on audible that I learned it's book 3 of a series (amazon, where i purchased it, failed to mention that). I now understand why the author skirted past huge defining moments with a summary sentence. I'm sure the many questions that I had are probably answered in the first two books.
Either way, I can only write this review as if the book was a stand alone novel. I don't believe you need the prior books to follow the story. Except for the main characters, the plot line involves people that most likely exist only in this book.
Detective Danny had this obsession with knowing more about a homicide victim named Bishop. The author tries to explain a connection between the two which I didn't quite understand because I felt like I didn't really know Danny. I'm sure if I would have read the previous books, I would understand the decisions and emotions of Danny, but it seemed 2-dimensional. It's like the author assumed that I knew Danny's history (which would be a pretty good assumption).
The story isn't bad and the narrator does well. On the surface I believe the book is okay, but I think it would have been a better experience if I was already connected to Danny. I would understood some of the text better regarding his wife and partner, why he acts the way he acts and why he's in constant pain.
If it was a stand alone story, I'd probably rate it as a 3 star book due to poor character development, but knowing now that it's part of a series, I'll rate it a solid 4. I'm sure most of the questions I had are answered in prior books.
I would recommend this book,....after reading the other 2 first though! Lol!