My folks bought me some books on tape from the used book store for my birthday. I listened to the first of them over the last couple of days. Sue Grafton's first alphabet mystery A is for Alibi was condensed to two cassette tapes. I haven't listened to very many abridged books. The last, John Grisham's The Runaway Jury on four cassettes, was over three years ago.
Mystery books are usually pretty tight. Sometimes meta data gives the mystery away. They don't introduce too many characters that don't play some role in the mystery. Often, the shortage of suspects will point to the obvious culprit. I can't believe that real life is like this too often. Abridging the story only makes it that much shorter a suspect list. All that said, the telling only felt rushed in the last half hour.
I have to admit, that the meta data really helped me pick out the bad guy this time. I knew that this was the first of a series. Therefore, the love interest was bound to end badly. Not hard to make the leap from there to pegging him as the bad guy.
Still, it was a breezy enjoyable diversion as I tripped back and forth between home and work.
Posted to Books at November 1, 2004 9:03 PM