Ramsey's Gold

By: Russell Blake

Narrated by: Ray Porter

Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins

Publisher's Summary

When a forgotten journal materializes decades after Drake Ramsey's father vanished in the Amazon jungle, Drake decides to follow in his footsteps and search for the legendary treasure of the Inca empire hidden in the lost Inca city of Paititi.

©2015 Russell Blake (P)2016 Audible, Inc.

Super fun listen

Great story, always exciting. I had a hard time pressing pause when I had to go back to work or sleep. It's an audio page turner, if you will.

61 of 62 people found this review helpful

Exciting book!!

I never wanted to put this one down. Some parts of the book took my breath away. The story provides many opportunities for speculation. Russell Blake did an excellent job describing the story's details thus creating great mental imagery for the reader. Lots of intrigue, some love tension and unexpected twists!

Ray Porter, awesome!

51 of 52 people found this review helpful

Entertaining, but very cliched and derivative

Would you try another book from Russell Blake and/or Ray Porter?

I would definitely listen to another Ray Porter narration. As for another Blake novel ..... maybe. But not at full price.

Would you ever listen to anything by Russell Blake again?

Maybe. But not for full price. If there was a sale and I just wanted some fluff adventure time, then I would pick up another of his novels.

What about Ray Porter’s performance did you like?

Porter is amazing. I can't believe that I've never come across his work before. His voices are great. Timing is perfect. His female voices are good and not falsetto. All around a great narrator.

Was Ramsey's Gold worth the listening time?

Yes, but barely. And largely due to the incredible voice of Ray Porter.

Any additional comments?

This is obviously a set up novel for a continuing series that takes a young, handsome, intelligent and restless adventurer and sends him on an adventure where he will find a treasure worth BILLIONS and thereby be able to fund his future Dirk Pitt-style escapades.

Of course, he also meets up with a beautiful, young archaeologist arm candy and a world-wise, gruff, former special forces badass who I'm sure will be his companions in future books.

While the book moves along at a good pace and can be quite fun at times, there are some ridiculously over-used tropes that keep showing up:

~ The hero has a photographic memory
~ He's also very good at martial arts
~ And becomes an expert marksman in about 24 hours
~ He's oh-so-handsome
~ Stunningly beautiful 24 year old archaeologist
~ Said beauty falls into quicksand .... seriously, QUICKSAND
~ The hero's father left him a cryptic treasure map
~ That the Russians want to get back from him
~ Said Russians are right out of central casting's "Russian Thug" lineup.

I could go on, but I think you get the picture.Blake is a former self-published author who rights about 10 novels a year and is very proud of his prolific output. That volume is very clear from the lack of any real character development and his overuse of adventure cliches that we loved during Saturday morning cartoons, but which have lost their punch and thrill-factor.

164 of 170 people found this review helpful

Great story fantastic narrator

Enjoyed the book. Excited for next one. Writer has a good style. Kept me interested through to the end. Watch out Scott Brick because Ray Porter's performance was outstanding. Each character had a distinctive voice where most of Scott's are repetitive. He made audible a great way to enjoy this book. Time to get the next Blake book

45 of 46 people found this review helpful

From hesitation to enthralled

First off, I have over 40 titles in my library, listen to a book a week roughly. I have favorite authors but have never felt compelled to writing a review... Until now. Ramsey's Gold was a great book, good characters, story, pulled me in quickly. What really set it apart was the narration, never have I heard such an incredible reading. It came to life. I would have to write a short book on how perfectly this was done. I will be listening to any book by this author and without question I will listen to anything I can find read by this narrator- even in a genre that isn't typical of me- with his skill I'm sure even then I would enjoy it and be able to relate. Most excellent work all around!

79 of 84 people found this review helpful

Great narration of excellent suspense mystery!

Ramsey's Gold is Book 1 in the Drake Ramsey series by Russell Blake. The novel is a lot like Clive Cussler's books including especially those Fargo Adventures series novels coauthored by Cussler and Blake. My favorite Russell Black novels are those of his JET series and his Black series. For those who like the post-apocalyptic genre The Day After Never is also excellent. Ray Porter's narration of Ramsey's Gold is superb!

10 of 10 people found this review helpful

A Cussler Protege hits a homer ....

I knew Blake had co-written a novel w/ Clive Cussler so I felt pretty safe going in. And with Ray Porter as narrator I was doubly safe. With due respects to Scott Brick, Dick Hill et al .... RAY PORTER is my NumeroUno audible narrator.

Yes, this is "intrepid young man sets out to follow in adventurer father footsteps".... teams up with pretty girl with spunk and a mysterious "guide".... battle Amazon jungle, Russians who sound like Boris Badenov (of course), etc etc etc .... use Indiana Jones -ish metaphors.

1/3 of the way through I was hoping Blake will consider a series.... He is .... now I'm on to Emerald Buddha.

38 of 41 people found this review helpful

Fun Read ....

What did you love best about Ramsey's Gold?

I thought the entire story was fun. It wasn't rocket science and I read it to be entertained, which I was.

Would you recommend Ramsey's Gold to your friends? Why or why not?

Sure. I liked all of the characters. I liked the storyline. it was fun.

What about Ray Porter’s performance did you like?

It's Ray Porter. He narrated a book to me. I love Ray Porter.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Nothing extreme. I go out of my way to listen to Ray Porter because I love the Joe Ledger series and I love the sound of his voice. This was nowhere near that series. But it was entertaining and it was Ray Porter reading it to me.

27 of 29 people found this review helpful

Lite Adventure

This story is half a notch above Young Adult level. Completely predictable, no surprises, and the hero achieves his goal of finding an absurdly fantastic treasure within days. Of course, no one else could do it and there has been 500 years of searching. Not only does Our Guy find the ridiculous pile of riches, he may be the record holder for the number of times he is knocked unconscious. Maybe the author keeps knocking him out to avoid story-telling. Whatever. This is for readers and listeners who can tolerate only a tiny bit of violence, no sex, minimum suspense, and happy outcome. This particular narrator is always good, however.

26 of 28 people found this review helpful

Overly stereo-typed characters.

Nothing special here. Neither story or characters are believable. Had to speed it up to get through it.

6 of 6 people found this review helpful

Unremarkable

Have you listened to any of Ray Porter’s other performances? How does this one compare?

Ray Porter is one of the best. His narration on the Raymond Chandler books is brilliant. Nothing wrong with his performance here but he can only elevate the story so far

Any additional comments?

I wanted to like this, I really did. Ray Porter is really good, but there is very little excitement in the story. If you read the books synopsis, you know what is going to happen. It is all pretty much telegraphed the whole way through. Despite the prerequisite life or death moments, it all seemed a bit easy.

However, I give up on books quite easily if they don't grab my attention and I finished this so there's that.