Narrated by: Ray Porter
Length: 10 hrs and 52 mins

I was reading reviews for books that were recommended to me as part of my ‘suggested list of books’  and Peter Clines came up.  The Ex-Heroes series came up and I thought I’d have a go, after-all the reviews were great.  As I was listening to that… and kind of bored to be honest (read my review here) I started reading about Peter Clines, to figure out if it was just Ex-heroes that was boring, or if his other books were actually good.  All the reviews of ‘14’ and ‘The Fold’ looked amazing.

The Publishers summary caught my attention for the Fold though, so I figured… let’s give the author another go, With audible’s Great Listen Guarantee, I can always return it if it’s crap, but I don’t want to discount a potential great story just because I didn’t like one of his books.

So Plot line?

I really don’t want to give too much away, because the genre of this book is also a thriller.

It’s Sci-fi, thriller, and a bit of horror, which is a surprising new genre for me to listen to.

Let me just give the Publisher’s summary, because after all…that’s what dragged me into it.

https://www.audible.com/pd/Sci-Fi-Fantasy/The-Fold-Audiobook/B00W47P4D0  [also click on the link if you wish to hear an audio sample]

Think Sherlock Holmes (not the pricky character, but the awesome detective skills), Event Horizon, & The Mist.

Narration & way of writing

I really appreciated the thriller genre in book form, having previously only watched thriller movies, but this was fast-paced the whole time, which made it a pleasure to listen to.  Ray Porter, the narrator, kept the excitement and the intrigue alive.

In fact I didn’t even know the book was narrated by Ray Porter until he said the name of one of the characters ‘Bob’.  It’s then that I realised, oh this is the guy that narrated We are Bob, We are Legion: The Bobiverse  and that book was amazing.   He actually said the name Bob, in pretty much the same way.

Ex-heroes, the previous Peter Clines book that I didn’t like at all, was narrated by Jay Snyder, Khristine Hvam, which I think shows that having the right narrator really can bring something special to a book.

Any time there is a slightly sexual scene though, the narrator goes into a sort of monotone voice… but I’m really not sure if that’s the narrator, or just the way the book is written.

The way that the story is told for the characters is a little strange for me, it was actually the same as Ex-heroes in that way.  There is a main character, but the book doesn’t ‘follow’ him, Mike is the really smart guy with the eidetic memory, (perfect memory recollection) and amazingly fast comprehension.  We often see how Mike views things, how he understands things and pieces things together, which is all very interesting;  – described by little ants sorting through everything, cataloguing, bringing pieces of info out for reference, theory generation, etc. And we hear people talking to him, it’s kind of like seeing things through his eyes, but also not quite, it’s a bit weird to describe.

Also, although it’s better that Ex-Heroes in that way, you still don’t really feel THAT connected to the characters.

The book is really written like a movie, except that its 10 hours 52 minutes long.  The start is exactly like a movie, it reminds me of a Michael Crichton kind of start… and that really got me intrigued.

I was honestly thinking…wow, I must be near the end, but still had 4 hours to go.

I also started looking for a movie version of this book, as I would recommend it to a few friends, but amazingly it hasn’t been turned into a movie yet.

Got to say though, the ending takes a weird turn, thriller, you should be expecting that… but at the same time, I’m not sure if it was just because I was tired (I was marathoning it) but in my mind it kind of jumped from 1 direction to another.  Still, the direction it went in was interesting enough, and it even set up the potential for a sequel.

This book was apparently a prequel for 14, which of course means that 14 is the sequel to this book… but after reading the publishers summary for that… and it sounds a little dull.. I’m really not sure it is.  Either way, because of this book I’ll definitely be checking out 14.

Recommendations?

Definitely worth a listen.

Narrator is pretty damn good.

And my expectations were exceeded for sure.

It’s pretty long, but the excitement keeps up all the way through.

The fact that I’m instantly getting the book ‘14’ which is set in the same universe should be a strong hint that this is a worthy listen.

I also starting listening to it again as soon as I finished, as the start made a whole lot more sense.

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Happy listening!

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