Dead Level

By: Damien Boyd

Narrated by: Napoleon Ryan

Length: 9 hrs and 23 mins

Publisher's Summary

In the early hours of Christmas Eve, the wife of parliamentary candidate Tom Perry is brutally murdered in an apparent burglary gone wrong.

With the by-election campaign about to start in earnest and the festive season in full swing, torrential rain brings with it flood warnings on the Somerset Levels.

Suspended on full pay and transferred to the cold case unit, Detective Inspector Nick Dixon is languishing on the sidelines as the investigation into Elizabeth Perry's murder unravels and the floodwaters rise.

Returning to duty, Dixon is convinced that the answer lies hidden in Tom Perry's political life, but why was Elizabeth the target and not her husband? The more Dixon uncovers, the further he is from finding the truth....

Dead Level is the fifth novel in Damien Boyd's addictive DI Nick Dixon Crime Series.

©2016 Damien Boyd (P)2016 Brilliance Audio, all rights reserved.

Overall a super series..

I noticed in this series that the first book had 173 pages and the page count got higher with each book, with this one having 354. However, it was like the author forgot how to use verbal expressions in this book, as he went along: no exclaimed, muttered, mumbled, yelled, replied, and the like. In this book he thought “said” was enough, since that one word was used 757 times. Don’t think for a minute that one word used that many times isn’t noticeable. It drove me nuts. And, since the next book, due out in October, is 352 pages long I’m not sure I’ll read it. To me, that’s just the lazy way to write, but that’s just my opinion.

Having said that, this was a pretty good mystery: who paid to have a pregnant Elizabeth Perry killed? And why? Oh, and that was just the first murder. And then there was the shooting by the police who are usually unarmed. Where the US refers to it as a “bulletproof vest” it’s called a “stabbing vest” in this series.

Needless to say, I was totally surprised to find out who paid for the killing of Elizabeth and why. WOW!

Again, no romance, no kissing, no nothing. These were all murder/suspense/mysteries NOT romances.

There was swearing and the F-bomb was used 12 times.

Over all, it was a quite the mystery, but not as good as a couple of the others’ from this series.

As to the narrator: I enjoyed every second of all 5 books because of Napoleon Ryan’s narration. He did so many voices, and they were all wonderful.

ALL 5 BOOKS WERE FREE READ & FREE LISTEN. IT DOESN'T GET ANY BETTER THAN THAT.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Outstanding detective thriller!

The DI Nick Dixon detective series Book 5 is the best yet. My only complaint is with narrator Napoleon Ryan. He does an excellent job with male and female voices, but he does some male voices too loudly and some female voices too softly. It makes the volume control difficult to set.

5 of 7 people found this review helpful

book interesting.. narraters are dreadful

Hard to stay with when the two main characters speak with sexy breathless tones. They sound like they just had a passionate encounter in between murders. irritating to listen to.

good story

narrator was very understandable! story was entertaining. enjoyed listening to this murder mystery. waiting for the next in the series.

Book Cleanse

After listening to a disturbing and depraved book by another author (J.A. Konrath), I needed a book that wouldn't cause me troubled dreams and uneasy sleep. Damien Boyd writes books that are easy listening and don't cause nightmares. I have read every book in the DI Nick Dixon series and have enjoyed them all.

Excellent police procedural

The best so far by Damien Boyd. What added to it was the Fantastic narration by Napoleon Ryan. WELL DONE !

Voices

Excellent story but didn't like the male voice interpretation. Female voice same each character, terrible.

4 of 4 people found this review helpful

Good listening.

Almost gave up on this book due to the annoying way that the narrator gave all his female voices the same voice!!!!

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

Dull

Worst narration I have heard. Caricature coppers and a dull hero. two female officers whose voice is never more than sultry whisper. and the continual he said, she replied, he yelled is just so unnecessary.

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

Dead level

The story line was a bit poor,and it was not helped by very poor naration.

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

Who are these people?!

Is there anything you would change about this book?

Firstly, let me make this clear; Damien Boyd is a great writer and the 'Nick Dixon' stories are really good. Better still if you know the area in which they are set. So; I have no truck at all with either the author or the storyline/characters etc.

However; who in the name of all that's holy picks the narrators for these things? This guy - Napoleon Ryan - seems to voice all of his characters in different joke voices. Nick Dixon for instance seems to be a mixture of Sam Spade and a local radio newsreader from the 1980s. The breathy voice of the female performer is almost indistinguishable between characters...

The voice of Harry Unwin actually made me laugh out loud; a 1950s 'B' movie villain seems to be the inspiration here!

All of this is terribly sad. It tempered my enjoyment of the book so much that I had to skip great swathes of it in order to stop listening to the truly terrible voices.

Damien Boyd - if you ever get the chance to a) read this review and b) choose your narrator, PLEASE choose a different one. And if you can't find a good one, I'll do the whole thing for expenses only. I can't offer a professional history in voiceovers, but I can promise one thing; I can DEFINITELY do a better job than this joker..

Seriously; Vladimir Putin and Pat Butcher ( yes I know she's not real ) would have done a better job...

Who might you have cast as narrator instead of Napoleon Ryan?

ANYone. Seriously. Ron Pickering would have been a better option. John Prescott could have done a better job.

Seriously? How about someone with a modicum of talent?

Was Dead Level worth the listening time?

Not at all. Read the book and get some actual pleasure from the story.

Any additional comments?

I wish I'd known I could return the book...

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

A great read - yet again!

An excellent story which builds up the suspense without revealing the conclusion until the final chapter. Hopefully, we will not have to wait too long for another in the series.

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

Another winner

Would you consider the audio edition of Dead Level to be better than the print version?

Not better, but a great alternative when driving or walking.

Any additional comments?

Another winner from Damien Boyd, great story line. I love his books, living in France it really reminds me of home, I love all the mention of local places. Damien writes great stories without over complicating and manages to keep your interest right the way through. He has not written a bad book yet, roll on the next one. This was the first audible version of his books I have purchased and was not disappointed! Napoleon Ryan read the book very well and got the characters spot on.

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

Half-decent story spoilt by narrator.

This is not the best story I've heard, by some way. It seemed a bit clunky in characterisations. However this was as nothing compared to the narrator. Napoleon Ryan has a rather deep voice which led to many of the male minor characters having what I can only describe as cartoonish voices. How he managed the female voices I'm not sure; either his voice was digitally altered, or a female narrator was brought in but not credited. Either way, it's a cheat.
The story had some potential, but the characterisations and narration will prevent me hearing another Boyd story or anything spoken by Ryan.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Narration really highlights the poor dialogue

What didn’t you like about Napoleon Ryan’s performance?

The intonation was frequently completely wrong and made some of the sentences meaningless. The women's voices (done by a female narrator) were all breathy and very similar to each other. None of this was helped by tedious and poorly written dialogue. I managed to skim over it in the book (the audio download came with kindle unlimited) but I had to listen to it in excruciating detail on the narration.

You didn’t love this book--but did it have any redeeming qualities?

The story rattles along at a fair old pace.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

brilliant

loved all of DCI Dixon's stories and especially the audio narrated by Napoleon definitely worth a listen/read

1 of 1 people found this review helpful