The Dismantling

A Novel

De: Brian DeLeeuw

Narrado por: Robbie Daymond

How much of yourself are you willing to sell?

At twenty-five, Simon Worth is a med school dropout, facing the grim reality of failure and massive student loans. Left with few options, he becomes an organ broker for a black-market organization, matching cash-strapped donors with recipients whose time on the transplant list is running out.
Tasked with finding a donor for Lenny Pellegrini, a severely depressed ex-NFL player who’s been drinking himself to death, Simon’s luck appears to change when he’s contacted by Maria Campos, a young woman desperate for cash whose liver happens to be the perfect match.

The transplant goes according to plan . . . until soon afterward, when Maria disappears and Lenny makes a cruel and destructive decision. As Simon’s world becomes increasingly dangerous, he learns of an unspeakable secret from Maria’s past and must decide, against his better moral judgment, that the only way he’ll survive is to trust her.

Chilling and fast-paced, The Dismantling questions the meaning of atonement and asks how you can reconcile the person you once were—and the person you want to be—with the person you are today.

Not very exciting

What did you like best about The Dismantling? What did you like least?

The reader does a good job breathing some excitement into this story but there isn't a lot to work with. A story of a sad dull man who makes some bad choices, who meets up with a sad dull woman.

Well-Written, Sad, … and Unfinished

DeLeeuw has given us a beautifully-written, well-plotted, disturbing tale that leaves us a bit unsatisfied at the end. It tells the story of two young people who are dealing in opposite ways with the dark tragedies buried in their pasts. DeLeeuw keeps us intrigued by revealing these tragedies to us in small, measured doses throughout the narration, while simultaneously recounting the accidental intersecting and entangling of the protagonists’ lives. In a way, DeLeeuw almost succeeds too well with "The Dismantling", making us care about these characters so much that, at the end, we want to know what becomes of them … The story feels a bit truncated.

Narrator Robbie Daymond has a nice voice, and does a good job narrating this Shakespearian-style tragedy, distinguishing all the characters from one another clearly. I recommend "The Dismantling" to anyone looking for a well-written, well-narrated story, but not to people looking for light escape fiction or an action-packed thriller.

Eloquent, gritty thriller. Terrific narration.

I'm writing this review because the previous raters left only a few stars no explanation. The Dismantling deserves a written review because is something of a chimera. I don't know if I would call it "genre straddling"-- it's more like a thriller with a touch of realistic horror written with the craft of a fluent, artful writer. I took a risk on this book and was surprised by how well worth the credit it turned out to be. I listened to it in a few sittings, propelled by the brisk story development, riveting action, and delightful narration performance by Robbie Daymond.

Fair warning, this book contains unflinching, graphic descriptions of medical procedures including an extensive blow by blow of a medical school cadaver dissection. These descriptions are not gratuitous, in fact, they add to the humanity of the struggles of the characters and provide symbolism for deterioration, exposure, and vulnerability in their lives and personal stories. The characters in this book are morally ambiguous, conflicted, and very real. Just as the vivid descriptions of violence, injury, and dissection may be too raw for some readers, so may be the behaviors and motivations of the characters. But if you can get past moral outrage, you will be rewarded with richly developed, complicated characters acting in an engrossing medical/ crime/ revenge thriller written by a skilled novelist and performed by an entertaining and talented narrator.

The greatest reward of this novel, for me, was I got to indulge my page-turning thriller thirst for something accessible and action-packed, but without sacrificing the art of something well-constructed and meaningful.

DeLeeuw needs to be discovered

The best thing about this book is that all of it was unexpected.
Based on the description, I thought I knew how the book would go, it didn't.
Based on the first chapter, I thought I knew how it would go, it didn't.
Based on 3/4 of the book, I thought I knew how it would end, it didn't.
But there also weren't shocking twists or disingenuous turns, just really, really smart writing that kept me on my toes and completely invested in everything that happened next.
I liked the book from the first few sentences. I was thrown in to the lives of the characters and was interested from the start.
I also loved the ending. I stopped and said "wait, what?" I was surprised that's how it ended, but it also seemed just right.
The character development was intense. The characters were all so perfectly flawed that they seemed like people I knew, they were very real.
The narration was great. Daymond's female voice may be the best on Audible.
DeLeeuw doesn't seem well known yet, I hope he is discovered. I will be watching for his next books.
I highly recommend this book.

Highly Underrated

Simon is in the business of locating and matching organ donors to organ recipients for Healthcare Solutions, a very for-profit and private Healthcare company. This novel has some great moments of suspense, and the storyline is original.

Narration was excellent and character consistent.

It is well written, well narrated, and hasn't received the recognition it deserves.

This kept my interest throughout the entire book.

I liked the narrator a lot. I thought the story was possible, even though far fetched. With such a need for organs, I feel sure there is a black market for several such events involved in the procurement of organs

Chilling, fast-paced drama?

No suspense or chills and slow, slow, slow. I kept waiting for the book to get good. And I kept waiting for the suspense. It was lackluster, at best. And the reader sounded like he was 15 years old and made the story even harder to get through. The only good part, was when it was finally over!

Couldn't finish

Myopic and dull. I would not recommend. I ran out of patience for the boring story and the lame performance. Probably not his fault though.

A below average medical thriller

I wanted to like this book because the premise sounds so promising, but alas, this book is fairly lacklustre. I found the characters to be rather blasé and uninspiring, which in turn, makes the book boring and tiresome. Simon, the protagonist, is a med school drop out that continuously struggles with guilt over his sister's death. He accumulates a great deal of student debt, and opts to broker organs to pay off his loan and to make a bit of money. That’s all there is to it. Next, there is Maria, the young girl that sells her liver for a good amount of money, but her story is equally as mundane as Simon’s; her mother was an addict, then she goes into foster care, and then, shockingly, she needs a great deal of money to change her life around.

The liver transplant goes awry because of the poor choices of the recipient, and then Simon and Maria go on the run due the illegality of the organ transplant business coming to light. That sounds like it should be thrilling, but the characters are just so incredibly drab that it brings down the story line. The narration is great, though, so I did listen to the whole book, but overall I was not impressed.