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Bering Strait

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Bering Strait

By: F X Holden
Narrated by: Lyssa Browne
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Without warning, Russia starts an operation to seize control of a vital arctic waterway off the Alaska coast. For hot-wired naval aviator, Karen 'Bunny' O'Hare, it's about to be a bad day at the office. Not everyone takes impending nuclear Armageddon as calmly as O'Hare. From an airfield in Russia, Major-General Bondarev, is leading a war he doesn't understand against machines instead of men. Under the US Embassy in Moscow, Ambassador Devlin McCarthy discovers she can follow her conscience, or the orders of her Secretary of State, but not both. And staggering through the rubble of Saint Lawrence Island, teenager Perri Tungyan learns how far his country is willing to go to protect its national interests.

"Realistic and original. A fast-paced thriller packed with action and suspense." - PUBLISHERS WEEKLY BOOKLIFE©2018 FX Holden (P)2020 W. F. Howes Ltd Action & Adventure Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Suspense Technothrillers Thriller Thriller & Suspense Technology Russia Fiction War
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This is an author channelling Clancy and his Cold War thrillers while giving them a thoroughly modern overhaul with fascinating technology in an intriguing near-future scenario which made quite chilling sense as the motivations for the key actors were revealed. Set in the 2030s it's full of action, contains lots of details about weapons especially missiles and drones and some strong characters, with females taking very powerful leads. I see that another reviewer was not so impressed and I definitely understand where that view is coming from because there is a fair amount of tactical, political and technical description. I certainly wasn't gripped immediately but Holden seems to be a patient author and those characters do come shining through as things develop.

Narration of course is vital for any audiobook, many will feel that this kind of book would be crying out for someone like RC Bray but with so many important characters being women Lyssa Brown makes a decent choice. Clear, eloquent and with good turns of emphasis and slight changes of pace she carries the story well though I chose just to give her a bit of pep and played this at 1.05x speed. However, there are also a broad range of accents required for this story and this isn't a strong point. I'm a normally tolerant reader, as long as I can tell who is talking that's most of what I need either through text or the actor's voices. But if you do like authentic sounding accents you could well have some issues listening to this but with the Audible refund options it's worth giving it a try, you should pick up quickly whether it will be an issue or not. Unfortunately I checked and the sample doesn't contain any examples.

Having gone through it though, I'm a happy customer. An exciting book with plenty of action that marries technical detail with one or two original, to me at least, political ideas. 20 hours of very good listening that completes a full story arc while hinting at more to come, I'll be donning my earphones to enjoy the next instalment.

Holden in There for Techno-War-Thriller-Goodness!

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This was a really bad choice and I am disappointed . Suffered to end chapter 3 and it still sounds like the shipping report all numbers and coordinates. Sorry really boring and impersonal who is it actually about? I give up!

I love adventure but this book has none!

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