Scavenger

By: David Morrell

Narrated by: Patrick G. Lawlor

Length: 8 hrs and 22 mins

Publisher's Summary

Frank Balenger, the resolute but damaged hero of David Morrell's acclaimed Creepers, now finds himself trapped in a nightmarish game of fear and death. To save himself and the woman he loves, he must play by the rules of a god-like Game Master with an obsession for unearthing the past. But sometimes the past is buried for a reason.

Scavenger is a brilliant, frightening hunter-hunted tale that layers modern technology over the dusty artifacts of earlier times. The result is a surreal palimpsest, one that contains the secret of survival for Balenger and a handful of unwilling players who race against the game's clock to solve the puzzle of the time capsule, only to discover that time is the true scavenger.

©2007 David Morrell (P)2007 Brilliance Audio

Critic Reviews

"Morrell has a reputation for smart, tightly written, genre-bending fiction, but here he exceeds himself, producing a superbly entertaining novel that will attract readers from multiple genres." (Booklist)
"Patrick Lawlor is highly appropriate as the no-nonsense Balenger. His reading is glib, but forceful....He ratchets up the tense moments and capitalizes on the excitement with ease. With his help, the author keeps listeners guessing to the end." (AudioFile)

Nice Sequel

Nice Sequel to Creepers without "cheating" Nothing worse then a sequal that uses cheap tricks, but this sequal actual stands alone from Creepers as a seperate story that happens to involve the same main characters.

Even Better on Audible

I read the book years ago, along with Creepers, and wanted to read them again but lacked the time. I enjoyed the story once again and it still gave me chills and terrified me... so glad it was available on Audible. I enjoyed the narrator and liked how they did the Game keepers 'voice' on microphone. Very well done.

Promises much delivers nothing

Oh you expected a big mystery that requires the characters to use their brains and strength to solve a scavenger hunt? Nope. Spoilers ahead possibly. What you’ll get is the worlds most elaborate scheme to commit suicide. There’s promise of time capsules but it’s just all talk. The whole point of the scavenger hunt is to anger the participants enough to kill the creator. The game wasn’t even smart or exciting. Just follow the GPS and try to avoid plot holes like an icy lake teaming with snakes on top of a mountain. You may even wonder why they don’t just leave the game at a certain point. They could but then their handheld GPS device would explode. Sure they could just toss them into the lake and follow the road home but no one thought of that. You may also wonder why our savior refuses to kill the rabid dogs that have attacked him and the other players multiple times when he has several opportunities to do so with his gun. He’s afraid he may wish he had that bullet back later one. Let’s ignore that he bought something 100 rounds and had used about 5 at that point. All the characters suck. They’re all flat and they all say exactly what they’re thinking at all times. No one evolves or changes at all. The very definition of one dimensions. The guy you hate is bad with no redemption or reason for existing. The only black character dies immediately. Do with that what you will. No one needed any sort of skill or intelligence outside of knowing how to plug in a few gps coordinates but the goal of the bad guy was to find someone worthy of killing him. That’s only part of the problem though. Everything else was just the MOST cliche. Ugh, I wanted this to be good! The premise is great!

Morrell needs better readers--this is one is BAD!

Is there anything you would change about this book?

It's either the reader or the recording or both--I tend to think it's the reader however. It's hard to listen to the story for any length of time as the

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Patrick G. Lawlor?

Phil Gigante has narrated

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

No, but that's based on the narrator of this one.

Any additional comments?

I put off making this review since I really don't like to say anything bad about people--least in a way it could affect their livelihood or to embarrass them, but after trying to listen to yet another short session of Patrick Lawlor, I decided I needed to vent my frustration.

I kept listening, but......

Although I finished it, I can't say the book was anything near great. The story never really roped me in - I could have stopped listening at any time, without a second thought. With this book, my mind kept wandering and I mentally needed to remind myself to listen. In addition to the lackluster story, the narrator (in my opinion), is just awful. His voice was annoying, there was very little emotion and he goes overboard with pronunciation of words. I wouldn't recommend using a credit. I did like one of the other books by the author - Creepers.

CREEPERS SCAVANGERS

creepers much better but stuck to the story line, was a good listen.