The Hunted

The crude writing of this insufficiently plotted thriller is perfectly matched by the poor quality of the recording. As a little girl, Lucky's testimony sent her father to prison for murdering her mother. Twenty-one years later, he's been paroled and is seeking his daughter either to reconcile with her or to rape and kill her--he can't decide which. Meanwhile, Lucky is proving herself as brutal a murderer as her father. Reader Mark Deakins manages to acceptably voice the dialogue with appropriate pitch and accent changes; however, his narration is stiff, choppy, and unengaging. In addition, the audio has a pronounced tinny, echoing sound, as if it had been recorded at the bottom of a teakettle. A.B.G. (c) AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine


After his fortune is stolen by the KGB and he's falsely accused of multiple crimes, Russian building magnate Alex Konevitch and his wife flee to the U.S. and rebuild their lives. But eventually, patterns in Alex's old life in Russia resurface, and the pair find themselves caught in the American legal system. Scott Brick channels Mikhail Gorbachev, the Communist Party leader at the time the story takes place. His deep, rich vocals and deliberate pace add to the dramatic tension that draws the listener into the story. Male and female character transitions as well as varying accents--Russian, American, and Southern regional--are smooth. Listeners will find Brick's performance of this thriller, based on actual events, highly engaging. A.L.B. (c) AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine

June 1, 2009
Based on a true story, this absorbing stand-alone thriller from bestseller Haig (Secret Sanction
and five other books featuring army JAG lawyer Sean Drummond) charts the incredible rise and fall of a Russian multimillionaire. The brilliant, hard-working Alex Konevitch amasses a fortune in the building trades in the early 1990s only to have it stolen by a cabal of KGB men led by the KGB’s deputy director, who not only takes Konevitch’s money and control of his company but also frames him for assorted crimes. Pursued by assassins, Konevitch and his wife go on the run. The couple make their way to America, where they begin to prosper, then fall afoul of a venal FBI director out to enhance his own reputation. The reality aspect of the tale will remind readers of the repressive regime that Russia was and may be again—and of the perfidy of individuals in our own government when greed and ambition are put before democracy and justice.