Hi Audible Audiobookphiles!

Where to start… When I started listening to Audible books several years ago, I ran across Bobby Adair, and I generally enjoyed his dystopian books. He does a great job of bringing a natural sense of humor into his stories and they often take place in locales I am familiar with. So if you’re a bit of a smart@ss (or a lot) you will invariably read or hear a line and laugh because you have said or would have said the same smart@ss, yet funny (at least to you/me) thing. Bobby does that well. What he doesn’t do well is write a long book. I’ve become a bit biased towards longer audiobooks, and I’m running out of options for quality books that have enough time to develop characters and the story, at least in the genres I enjoy. I often ask myself why should I burn $25 bucks/1 credit for a 6-hour book when I can spend the same for a 14-16 hour book? Saying all that, when I saw 55 hours and 16 minutes of zombie smokin’ Bobby Adair fun, I couldn’t pass it up. The story was engaging, but at times predictable, which seems to ebb and flow when you’re listening to 55 hours of the same author/same story, but this story has “character” and was very enjoyable. Even in the zombie/dystopian genre the story seems alive and really wanted to draw me into this well-written saga of zombies, action, love, and SPAM. I don’t have much criticism for the author, because he writes enjoyable books. I almost always enjoy reading a dystopian-type story that takes place in my backyard. Reading or listening to the roads, most of which I’ve driven up and down numerous times, the places, buildings, and restaurants, Bobby mentions, I have been to. The next time I’m at that the Ranch Rd. Rudy’s enjoying some pretty decent BBQ, I will enjoy it from a new perspective. The only couple of criticisms I do have are that several of the chapters and even the books are very abrupt in their ending. It shows when you cannot distinguish the end of a “scene” from the end of a chapter or the end of one of the books. But the fact there are a gazillion books in this set, (Ok, actually 12 books, not a gazillion) tends to make that not quite as noticeable, or I just got used to it. The other point I’d like to make is that I wish Bobby would have someone with the knowledge/experience to do a technical review of his books during the editing process to ensure he’s applying proper usage of military terms, acronyms, and tactics. That criticism is a perfect segue into one of the two other issues I have with “Slow Burn” and that is with the narrator, Mr, Phil Thron. Mr. Thron is no doubt a very capable narrator, but before I get to those two issues, allow me to get this off my chest. Let me just say that across the board, I wish the individuals who narrate books that utilize military terminology would do their due diligence to understand how to pronounce military terms and acronyms. As a previous reviewer stated, Mr. Thron absolutely slew the military terminology in ALL 12 books, and that slewin’ ain’t in a good slaying kind of way. (The writer of this review does not endorse the slaying of anything except good BBQ and zombies and/or evil aliens. And vampires.) But back to my point – how hard would that be – to ask the author if they are using military terms or non-standard terms so they could learn proper pronunciation? I’m not referring to words like Worcestershire sauce where it’s more or less acceptable to butcher that up a bit, but for terms that are integral to the story and to those listeners to whom it really do care about getting it right. Using incorrect pronunciation is a distraction, and it has the potential to detract from the story in a significant way. While I can’t speak for every soldier, veteran or military buff, the mispronunciation drove me nuts. It absolutely drove me nuts. Pronouncing “molle” (Molly) as mō-lay and treating it like a French dessert in some swanky French cafe was pretty irritating for me. Unfortunately, as with this book, the mispronunciation of non-standard terms, specifically military jargon, the norm and not the exception. . It’s no different than any author not understanding the correct context, or misusing terms, tactics, or strategies in their books because it sounds cool or is popular.

My biggest ‘detractor of enjoyment’ with this saga was that for 55 hours and 16 minutes of my life, I listened to the voices of characters many of whom were apparently born, raised, and educated in the fine Republic of Texas who had not even the remotest trace of a Texan accent. In truth, if it were not for all the locations and highways that I am very familiar with, I would have thought I was listening to a story that took place on the East Coast of the United States. It made it challenging to engage with the characters because the characters lost a significant sense of realism, even in a Zombie slayin’ book. It was akin to listening to a story that takes place in the UK, with English characters that sound like they are from the Valley, or Kalifornistan. It takes something away from the story that starts with the first sentence and continued all the way through to the last sentence. I don’t doubt that finding a narrator with a believable drawl is an easy task, but even if it were a slight accent it would have been better than a zero connection between character and their voice within this story. I don’t regret spending the money for this book, I just wish that in this book (and all others) the narrators did their due diligence to learn how to say the words that mean something to the reader and that whoever chooses the narrator for a book would understand the importance of connecting the character to their location in one of the few dimensions we have – their literal voice. I recommend this book to all dystopian/zombie genre fans, but especially if you are a CENTEX Texan. You’ll never look at Fuzzy’s or Rudy’s the same again! I hope you find this review helpful, I really did try to keep the rant at bay. 🙂