phungus's Full Review: Stephen Coonts - Stephen Coonts Compact Disk Colle...
When I found this Stephen Coonts Audiobook Collection in the bargain bin of my local Books-a-Million for just $9.99, I couldn't pass it up. It contains three abridged novels spread across fifteen compact discs. That's eighteen hours of audiobook goodness, narrated by John Kenneth and Guerin Barry.
This is a rather low budget bunch of audiobooks, but it bears a sticker price of $34.95. Given the nature of it, I am pretty sure it was always destined for the bargain bin. The quality of the discs is somewhat questionable, as each one has little more than black text printing and the CD's feel somewhat thin. Each disc has 80 or more tracks on it, with most tracks being less than a minute long. Because of this, my CD player would sometimes give me read errors the first time I tried to play the disc. Taking the CD out and putting it back in seemed to solve the problem.
Here's what you get in this collection:
America
I really enjoyed this novel about a submarine that was hijacked by former Russian soldiers. It was written pre-9/11 when Russians were usually the villains in books like this, so the story does seem a little dated. Even so, it's a solid thriller with lots of naval warfare and some twists along the way. Jake Grafton is the main character here, and he's the star of most of Coonts' novels.
For an abridged story, this one didn't seem like it was missing too much. There's a good balance of action and intrigue, and I also liked the technical details that made the story seem realistic. The plot of this book sort of puts a spin on the main story in Tom Clancy's Hunt for Red October.
Liberty
The plot of this book reminded me a lot of the ending to the first X-Men movie. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the screenwriters of that movie had not read this book. Once again, Jake Grafton finds himself dealing with Russians who have gotten hold of some nuclear weapons. This time, they plan to blow up the Statue of Liberty while a major political summit is going on with all kind of world leaders in attendance.
From the reviews I read of this book, it is supposed to be action-packed, so maybe the abridgment cut out a lot of the action parts. It's still a pretty good story, but the audiobook had a lot more dialogue and people running around than it did actual action sequences. It seemed like something more could have been done to give this one some more thrills.
Liars & Thieves
I was not too impressed with this book because it isn't much like the other two novels. This one has too much going on with politicians doing dirty stuff behind the scenes, and the main character here is Tommy Carmellini instead of Jake Grafton. Carmellini is usually just a supporting player in the novels focused on Grafton, and him getting center stage in this book turns out to be a bore. Nearly one whole CD of the five for this book covers a relationship between him and a wealthy socialite, and it's not even that interesting.
At the center of this story is the President thinking of nominating his own wife as Vice President. The couple are very similar to Bill and Hillary Clinton in a lot of ways, though the roles are somewhat reversed. For example, the First Lady in this story is the one having the affair. I thought this book was a little heavy on all the political stuff and really lacking in terms of action or espionage.
In the end, I'm glad I didn't pay too much for this collection. I listened to them in the order they were packaged, and unfortunately the best novel was placed first. America was really good, Liberty was good, and Liars & Thieves was kind of boring. This collection is still worth checking out if you are a fan of Stephen Coonts or are in need of some cheap audiobook entertainment. Personally, I found the abridgements to be a little too heavy with the cutting, and the last two books definitely seemed like they were missing some much-needed excitement.
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