I have mixed thoughts on this work. First off; the narrator does an excellent job of portraying the different character as well as filling in the rest of the plot which made the listen a rather easy one.
As for the work itself, and as my title alludes to, this is an important topic for a story and one that certainly bears telling. This particular title starts off with a ton of promise and it carries itself along to a satisfactory ending in justice finally being done for a man convicted in the most vile of crimes; crimes he did not commit. The story, although fictional. is one worth telling as it is a very real problem in our society today. The sexual abuse of children is a horrendous crime, and the false allegations and convictions (often out of vengeance) as a result of the public outrage makes it all the more horrible.
The problem I have with this work, and the reason I only gave it 3-stars is simply because the author strays off the story-line too often . . . goes down a rabbit hole. For example, although military dogs play a minor role in the story, I found the full chapter dedicated to how the rods and cones in the eye of the dog servetheir lack of color recognition to be a bit much. Also, there were several side stories involving the characters which really were not pertinent to the main plot. The characters were already well developed, complete with interesting backgrounds, to make the story work; frivolous inclusions (i.e. the side effects of a pregnancy on a 35-year-old woman) only served to prolong the listen. Frankly, I think this work would be all the more powerful after a solid editor trimmed it from 8:45 hours to about 8-hours and it would be a much tighter work, in my opinion.
It becomes apparent that this is a volume in a series of books, yet it is certainly capable of standing on its own. That being said, I will likely check out one of the author’s other works as the potential is clearly there for enjoyable reads/listens.
I would recommend this book with the caveat to have a little patience when the story seems to stray as it does come back around with some great drama in the closing chapters. A review copy of this audiobook was provided by the author, narrator, or publisher at no cost in return for this unbiased review. My hope is that this review helps in your decision to obtain this book.