Mystery/Thriller Reading Friends discussion

Another slow month with mostly audios again. Here are my May reads:

Good Reads

Riptide
Douglas Preston& Lincoln Child
Pure brain candy that mixes a mysterious island, buried pirate treasure, and a deadly curse. Loads of action though not much character development. Listened to the audio read by Scott Brick.

Vagabond
Bernard Cornwell
The second book in the Grail Quest series covers quite a bit of ground and does a great job of weaving The Battle of Neville's Cross and the Battle of La-Roche Derrien into the plot. Another very enjoyable historical fiction tale.

A Murderous Procession: Mistress of the Art of Death Series, Book 4
Ariana Franklin
While the plot was not quite as good as in the previous books in the series I still loved the characters and will miss catching up with their adventures. Listened to the audio version which was read by Jill Tanner who did a good job though I did prefer the two previous narrators a bit better.

The Chicago Way
Michael Harvey
A pretty good debut PI novel set in the Windy City. The author was the creator of the A & E TV series "The Cold Case Files" and the plot centered on an old rape case. The audio was read by Stephen Hoye whose tone I did not care for at the beginning of the story but did get used to.

OK Read

Practical Demonkeeping
Christopher Moore
This was supposed to be a mix of horror and humor but the whole thing fell a bit flat for me. I've enjoyed the author's work before but this, his first novel, just did not really come together. Listened to the audio version which was read by Oliver Wyman who did a great job and kept me listening.

Lower number, but looks like most were good, so not a bad month!

ahhh, audio books - they keep us going don't they, Sandi! You touched on several points that affect us as listeners.
A narrator who keeps you listening even though the book doesn't quite compel us.
A narrator who you begin to tolerate after a bit, and 'get used to the reading style'.
A narrator who comes in mid stream and replaces a previous narrator of a series or of a specific author's work.
A narrator who reads many many different authors and can be a favorite, but who can sometimes jar loose a memory and lead us fleetingly into thinking we are listening to something else.
As always, I got several tips from your list!