The Burning Wire: 05/20/13

The Burning Wire by Jeffery Deaver is the 9th of the Lincoln Rhyme mysteries and the first one I've attempted to read. Rather, let me say, listen to. I borrowed the audio book from a friend. His tastes and mine usual match up but couldn't be farther from the case here.

The book opens in a control room where the power grid in and out New York City is being monitored. One after another substations begin to fail, leaving the last one up and running and threatening to overheat. The man in charge there has the option to go for a rolling blackout and chickens out. Instead he calls the CEO who for reasons that only serve the plot but don't otherwise make sense (unless he was paying of the bad guy under the table) orders the power be kept on. Then there's an arc flash and a man getting onto a bus is killed.

But mixed in with that plot, there's a whole bunch of repeated details. Just imagine a 1950s film strip announcer proclaiming: BEHOLD THE POWER OF ELECTRICITY. Then imagine Sergeant Friday pontificating about the ways of forensics, and you'll get a feel for the investigative side of the book.

Either or both of those problems, I might have been able to deal with. The final detail, though, that made me give up after four discs of a twelve disc book was the narrator. There are actual audible YAWNS at the start of sentences. If the person PAID to read the book is bored, what does that say about the book?

One star

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