The Lost Door

By: Marc Buhmann

Narrated by: Michael Gilboe

River Bend. A peaceful scenic tourist town in rural Wisconsin. To outsiders it is a little slice of heaven, but to those who live within its borders a darkness lies in wait.

Four broken strangers are unwittingly tied to a tragic accident that happened more than 50 years ago. Stavic is the small town deputy investigating a series of grisly murders. Willem is still haunted by the disappearance of his abusive father when he was eight. Claire is an alcoholic mother who is hiding a terrible secret. And at the center of it all is David, an elderly man who has returned after a 20 year absence.

The Lost Door strategically weaves their four stories, culminating in a shocking final confrontation.

©2015 Marc Buhmann (P)2015 Marc Buhmann

Too many characters

Just way too many people to keep track of. This will make a great TV movie but as a book it is too drawn out.

The Lost Door

The Lost Door is a good read. Actually I listened to Michael Gilboes narration from Audible.He did a great job with the characters he was given.Set in the small town River Bend, Wisconsin, it follows the lives of 4 strangers who are connected by one demonic man named DeMarcus. It starts out with a kidnapping.We don't know how everyone is connected until well into the book.It is a bit confusing,but comes together in the end.
This audiobook was provided to me at no cost for a fair and honest review

different flavor of science fiction/fantasy

The Lost Door weaves the stories of four strangers who as the story progresses turn out not to be strangers afterall. All four are in the rural town of River Bend for different reasons. The first characters introduced are Claire and her daughter Emily. But that is not strictly correct. The first few paragraphs leave the impression that someone/something else was sharing Claire’s soul. The story progresses quite a bit before that mystery gets revealed.

David is an older man returning to finish his life in River Bend and be buried next to his wife Lily who he lost years before. Nick Stavic came from Chicago looking for a slower pace. Willem is a sixty-four year old police officer. Claire, David, Nick and Willem are all tied to David’s dead wife Lily and a very evil person named DeMarcus. A good portion of the book has each character’s’ plot line developing separately until they finally begin weaving together towards the end. The end pulls all the seemly separate threads together to form the underlying story.

Several other reviews have described this book as being Lovecraftian. I have only read one or two short stories by Lovecraft so I cannot say whether it is in his tradition or not. It is definitely a different flavor of science fiction/fantasy that the normal. In that aspect, it was refreshing. It is more subtle in it’s approach to the big reveal at the end. Until this point the reader is not quite sure where on the genre radar the book falls. I cannot pin it down any better than science fiction/fantasy. It is a unique read. I never really found myself invested in the characters though. I think I spent so much energy trying to keep everyone’s plot line straight that I missed any emotional attachment. I may do better on a second or third listen through but on the first one I found it hard to keep everyone straight.

Michael Gilboe did a very nice job narrating. The production values were great. No issues with outside sounds or echoing. Mr. Gilboe’s voice is rich. He pitched his voice slightly higher for the women but not too high. He handles the emotional parts well. The only part I was not wild about was the villain’s voice. It did not sound particularly threatening. I would be willing to listen to another audio book narrated by Mr. Gilboe.

Audiobook provided for review by the author.

Please find this complete review and many others at my review blog

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great book

"I was provided this audiobook at no charge by the author, publisher and/or narrator in exchange for an unbiased review via AudiobookBlast dot com"

really good listen

I like the premise, but not the execution...

Is there anything you would change about this book?

Editing. There were some glaring errors that immediately turned my mild amusement into dislike. I powered through the last half of the story without enjoying it simply because the book wasn't edited well and certain things not researched well enough.

What could Marc Buhmann have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

Research. A non-spoiler example: The Marvel Comic "X-men" did not publish until September, 1963. A character in the story references the comic as extant and known in 1961. There are other things that might require a little research and finesse like vehicle models, drug references, and the like. I think that a good editor should have found some of these mistakes.

Which scene was your favorite?

There is a scene in a basement about two-thirds of the way through the book that I thought was decent. The writing seemed more like a screenplay than a story, though, but I appreciated the way things went.

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

Maybe, but only if the screenwriter does sufficient research to correct errors and oversight.

Any additional comments?

There is at least one problem in the read: A sentence or two seemed to have been skipped in Chapter 6 (2:05:27). The other problems I noticed were either a failure in writing or in audio editing, but there seemed to be three missing sections. A character would describe seeing something that we had not been told about, and seemed to have huge implication on the story. While I do understand allusion, this seemed more than that, as if and entire chapter had been skipped. I will say that Michael Gilboe's performance, though lightly overdramatic at times, was very well done. There is something to be said for consistent and precise pronunciation, and he does indeed have that. His read is the only reason I was able to finish this story. I did like the premise of the story, but I think a lack of research and sub-standard editing made it less than enjoyable.