Payback

The Assassin Series, Book 1

By: David Nees

Narrated by: Kevin Scollin

Length: 9 hrs and 29 mins

Publisher's Summary

A new thriller from the number one best-selling author of After the Fall: Jason's Tale.

After the mob destroys his restaurant, killing his pregnant wife in the process, Dan Stone has nothing left to live for except...payback.

He unleashes a series of devastating attacks on the mob designed to destroy their operations before exacting his final revenge. Using his skills as an experienced army sniper, Dan methodically sets out to assassinate those responsible and take down the Brooklyn crime family involved in killing his wife. However, his reign of terror and killing leads to a dead end. There seems to be no way out after his mission of revenge is completed. His activities attract attention of an unusual group, and they offer an exit path. As events draw to their exciting conclusion and Dan's options close down around him, will the devil's bargain he's offered prove a way out?

In Dan Stone, we have a new thriller hero. A blue collar kind of guy who'd rather not play the role he's now called to play, no matter how good he is at it.

©2016 David Nees (P)2018 David Nees

Really enjoyed this story!

This was a welcome surprise, really enjoyed this story. Dan's character was perfect as the damaged soldier on a mission. Felt like I was reading a punisher novel, which is a good thing since I love the punisher. Looking forward to reading the next installment. If I can't comment on anything, some of the female voices the narrator used were a little bland compared to the male ones. But overall an awesome story and narration.

I recieved this copy for free in exchange for an honest review.

More to come I hope!

After listening to so many books about heroes with unequaled powers it was refreshing to see an average every man with an attainable skillset meet a challenge with bravery and smarts. David Nees set the ground work for a series that I am looking forward to. This is a credit worthy effort that I hope will return for many more volumes. I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review with appreciation.

Debut novel, good listen.

At first look I thought this book may turn out to be a bit simple or juvenile. I am pleased to say that this is not the case. The story is well-written, developed characters with many twists and turns that keep the pages turning. The plot is quite believable and the situations well-conceived. Since this is the debut novel I’ll look for future volumes to the series. I have no problem recommending this book for an enjoyable listen. This audiobook was given by the author, narrator, or publisher at no cost in exchange for an unbiased review via Audiobook Boom.

So many wonderful twists

From the opening chapter to the very last, this book took some wonderful and delicious turns into a mob story that involved said mobsters, the FBI, local police, and a good guy who was pushed too far.

I had a bit of situational ethics when it came to the resolution. Yes, the good guy turned bad did some bad things but to bad guys. That doesn't count. Does it?

The narration was incredibly well-done.There was a definite cadence to this listen, hectic and chaotic at times, slow and determined at others. The narrator made the transitions with ease.

I'm glad this is the first book in a series. I definitely want to know what happens next.

great book

This was a great mob story of a good guy turned assassin. Wonderful narrator as well!! I really enjoyed the way the story played out with Joey getting what he deserved. I liked Vincent so I'm glad his story worked out the way that it did even if he got off easy. I'll be on the look out for the next book in this series. I received this book for free for an honest review.

Not a very good sniper

I expected an action packed sniper thriller, with a professional killer out for revenge. Instead, I got boring dialogues between a lot of boring characters, quite a few beginner's mistakes from our sniper, and the emotional depth of all characters of about a teenager or young adult.

However, narration was terrible and took away from the story - it even made me wonder if I should have bought the ebook instead. He made some voice acting choices that simply did not make sense, seemed to ignore all cues from the text ("he growled", but narrator read it like a whine) and his females sound so annoying I wanted to snipe them myself.

All in all, now that this relatively boring origin story is over, I'm willing to give part 2 a try in hopes of our MC finally having gained some professionalism by his (now) CIA training. I mean, it is a series about an assassin, surely the sequels can't be boring anymore. Here's to hoping...

Good - but a bit tacky

I didn't dislike the novel, but it is laying a lot of groundwork for next book in the series, therefore I will carry it on, it just felt a little forced at times, like the author really was trying to convince you of the story and why the protagonist is doing what he's doing but it was cool to have the story be relatable in terms of location/setting - and brings a lot of real spots/locations out for the reader. I look forward to the next book.

Payback Review and Comments

Overall, enjoyed the book. When a car burns after an hot round hits the gas tank. The rubber, and other combustibles burn and the windows explode out. Therefore, it would be hard to tell .22 rounds blew the tires and as glass would be everywhere that the window was hit by a round. Depending on where the rounds ended, it would be difficult to assess the caliber. The gunfight in the woods was not thought out very well. A trained sniper would know to have a dull colored rifle and a scope the caps and cowled lenses. The sniper might intend to do it to draw in a target. In that case he would have a ambush set up to cover all contingences. The new romance for the hero seemed rather contrived. Putting it in later books as the story moves forward might be better as the two people got to know one another. Like I say I enjoyed the book and would like to see the story move forward.

Good start to promising new series

Although the plot is somewhat trite and predictable, (Dan Stone gets injured and recovers too quickly, and of course, his "boss" is female with the obligatory sexual tension) this is an engaging, suspenseful thriller with fairly believable characters. Some of the dialog seems a bit stilted, but this may be due in part to the performance by Kevin Scollin. He makes an effort to give characters distinctive voices, but his female character voices are very strained and forced. All in all, this is an exciting introduction to a promising new series.

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

Barely okay book and bad narration..

I thought this would have our sniper kill a couple of mobsters for killing his wife and then he would be approached by the CIA but it just went on and on and they didn’t come to him until about 55% of the book. He knew the two guys involved with killing the wife but Dan just kept killing and robbing the mob. It did become boring after a while, but it did make the mob crazy.

Anyway, he never went to work for the CIA until the last page of the book. He and the CIA Handler only talked about it while he went on killing mobsters. I was a little disappointing. I wasn’t looking for a book where the hero just kept pecking at the mob throughout the story. I was looking for a CIA sniper.

So, there was no romance and the F-bomb was used 89 times.

As to the narration: Awful! Kevin Scollin cannot do a woman’s voice, it sounds just like a man TRYING to do a woman’s voice. AND so many men sounded like a doofus, and somehow I doubt that all mobsters sound like that. Think Barney Rubble and that’s what some the gangsters sounded like. And the women were worse. I could never listen to this narrator again. This is from 2018! Haven’t narrators learned anything yet? PRACTICE! AND learn how to pronounce things: PSUEDO is NOT pronounced sway-doh, for chrissakes.

This time it is personal

In many ways this book reminds me of one of those revenge-based action movies, you have a highly trained former military person out for revenge after his wife and unborn child are killed by the mob, but the author manages to elevate the story from this somewhat simplistic setup.

One thing that I am glad about is that the author didn't persist with the excessive listing of guns and ammo types that would have detracted from the actual characters and story while adding nothing to that story.

This book is mostly focused on a man named Dan Stone who used to be an army sniper and is now on a quest for vengeance against members of the mob that killed his wife and unborn child when they fire-bombed his restaurant. He basically declares war on an entire crime family, hurting them by destroying their operations prior to finally taking his revenge on the ones responsible.

Alongside Dan, there are a number of notable characters, some old school friends who get pulled into the fallout from his mission and of course a range of mobsters and law enforcement who are both trying to stop him, there is also one other person who might be able to offer him a purpose and to make use of his skills once he has finished his revenge mission.

With so many Italian-American characters featuring in this book it would have been very easy for the narrator to have given an over the top performance leading to caricatures rather than characters, but thankfully he refrained from this and went with more of a tone for these characters rather than a full-on accent and it worked well as they were suitably distinct without being a distraction.

Overall, this book was an interesting one that grew beyond the basic starting point into something more, it will be interesting to see if the main characters will remain interesting in subsequent books when the series will presumably move onto a less personal setting.

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