It’s a week off from A (Black) Gat in the Hand, as I am currently reading Pulp, but except for the constant revisiting of Norbert Davis’ Max Latin, I’m not listening to it (though The Continental Op is on tap).
I am constantly listening to audiobooks. I’m fortunate that my mind can multi-task, and I listen to them while driving, working, writing, when I go to sleep at night. It lets me get to things I wouldn’t have time to read. It’s often re-visiting something I read before. And I can fall asleep to something that isn’t new – no damage done. Here are some things I’ve listened to recently.
THE BLACK COMPANY – Glen Cook
A couple months ago, I scored a rare Q&A with the socially reclusive Glen Cook. It was mostly about his terrific Garrett, PI series, which I love. But it did touch on The Black Company. That series about a mercenary company is a foundation block for Dark Fantasy. I’ve read through the whole thing (expect Port of Shadows, which I haven’t gotten around to yet) three times.
And over several months this year, I listened to the entire series on audiobook. As when I read it, I definitely like some books more than others. But it remains an epic, gripping saga. Again excluding 2018’s Port of Shadows, it’s ten books. I simply didn’t have time to re-read it (especially after re-reading most of the Garrett series for that Q&A). Listening to the books worked great. At least a book or two had a different narrator, based on gender needs. I liked the four narrators, with Marc Vietor reading the majority. That’s a key part of the audiobook experience. Definitely recommended.
SPQR– John Maddox Roberts
I’ve talked about John Maddox Roberts’ terrific Conan pastiche, Conan the Rogue. It’s an homage to Dashiell Hammett’s hardboiled work, and a great read. Roberts passed away end of May. Folks have told me he was a nice guy, and he had commented on a couple of my FB posts. I liked him.
I had heard of his SPQR series of mysteries set in Ancient Rome, but had never read them. A friend mentioned them, and I decided I should check them out. Yeah, I was late to the party. Oh man, am I enjoying these audiobooks! There are ten novels (he was working on another when he died). I didn’t get all of them, but I have listened to four of the first six. It would help to have heard books two and three, but it hasn’t proven a fatal flaw.
Senator Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger solves a crime (murder seems to be common) each book. Usually the stakes are quite high, but the series has a nice level of humor interspersed. Metellus is an interesting protagonist. The stories are told in flashback, and there are intriguing tidbits dropped in.
Narrator John Lee is a PERFECT choice for the books. I am still listening to some of the ones I got during Audible’s Premium yearly super sale, and I’ll eventually listen to all thirteen, eventually. Roberts was working on a new novel when he passed away. Don’t know to what stage of completion it was in. If you’re into historical series, and like the idea of a mystery as well, I don’t know that you’ll do better than this. And the audiobooks are excellent.
SPQR stands for ‘Senatus Populusque Romanus. You can look up what that means. 
HOKE MOSELY– Charles Willeford
I’ve long been a fan of this Miami-based series about detective Hoke Mosely. Willeford was a respected name in the paperback noir field, and this is a rather dark-ish series. I listened to it at work, and it’s NSFW. But man, I like this series, which I’ve read a couple times. The narrator is good, and I enjoyed his reading. You know how some reads just seem to go fast? This one listens fast. I feel like I got through the four books pretty quickly.
I think this is a terrific ‘Florida crime’ series. It’s up there with John Leslie’s Gideon Lowry series, which I wrote about here. I highly recommend reading it. But the audiobooks work as well. Stephen Bowlby works as the narrator.
Side Note – Willeford wrote a fifth novel, but it was never published. It can be read at a library in Florida, though at the moment I can’t find a reference to which one. The description I’ve read of it is, it’s DARK! Like, Full Metal Jacket is a date movie compared to that book. Frankly, I’m glad it was never published. It would have turned me off the whole series. But as it is, these four books are worth multiple re-reads, and I enjoyed the audio versions.
THIEVES WORLD – Edited by Robert Asprin and Lynn Abbey 
I began reading Thieves World not long after the first book came out in 1980. It was a part of my high school and college years. I have a majority of the spin-off books (I didn’t keep up on Janet Morris’ Tempus books), and I’ve re-read the whole thing a couple of times. It’s one of my favorite fantasy series’. Many a thief in an online RPG game has been some variation of Hanse Shadowspawn. Including a Khajiit Nightblade, currently. Molin Torcholder has appeared as a cleric more than once.
In 2023, forty-three years after its debut, the series made it to audio. The first four volumes have come out so far, and I picked all of them up on the Super Sale. I enjoy short stories more than novels, via Audio, because I often re-listen to them. Especially before I go to sleep. The narrator, Johnathon Johns, is okay. He strikes me as a poor man’s version of Mackenzie Crook (Gareth in the BBC The Office; one-eyed pirate opposite Johnny Depp). He’s grown on me as I work through book three, and I’m about ready to upgrade him to good. Just something doesn’t quite hit right for me. Still not a bad pick.
And if you are a fantasy fan and haven’t done the shared-verse of Thieves World, you are SOOO missing out. It gets dark, but not Malazan dark. And like any short stories anthology spread over a dozen books, it’s hit and miss. But I am enjoying revisiting these. Again, something I can’t take the time to read these days, but I can listen to it. I’ll get future releases.
If you’re gonna ask me about Lynn Abbey’s reboot, I thought she took the original series, burned it to the ground, and then pissed on it. It’s a festering pile of crap and I wouldn’t re-read or listen to it, if you paid me. What, you didn’t ask? Well, I’m sticking with that answer.
AND….
There are more, which I might talk about in another post. I listened to a Keller novel, by Lawrence Block. I hadn’t read this one yet, and it was good to revisit the stamp-collecting hit-man. I’m not caught up, except for the most recent novella. I really like the Keller books, which are (with one exception) short stories combined into novels. Less hard-edged than Max Allen Collins’ Quarry series (which I read).
I am a big fan of F. Paul Wilson’s Repairman Jack series. I am behind on it – as I am with man series’ – so I snagged books 11 through 13 during the Super Sale. I just finished number eleven Bloodline, this morning. It was the first in the series which I didn’t really care for. I’m not into genetics and DNA stuff, and long speeches about them put me to sleep. I still like Jack, and I’m gonna move on to the next book, but this one didn’t do it for me. May partly be that I found Dick Hill a boring narrator and wrong for the character. Totally wrong.
I am occasionally listening to the ‘next’ Jules de Grandin story, from Seabury Quinn. I am on volume four of five. The books average about 25 hours each, so a LOT of listening. I like these horror/supernatural versions of Hercule Poirot. If you like those two genres, definitely worth getting. Paul Woodson voices four of the five books, and I quite like him. Maybe it was just the change, but I found Andrew Widen to be jarring, for book two.
What I’ve Been Listening To: September 2022
Bob Byrne’s ‘A (Black) Gat in the Hand’ made its Black Gate debut in 2018 and has returned every summer since.
His ‘The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes’ column ran every Monday morning at Black Gate from March, 2014 through March, 2017. And he irregularly posts on Rex Stout’s gargantuan detective in ‘Nero Wolfe’s Brownstone.’ He is a member of the Praed Street Irregulars, founded www.SolarPons.com (the only website dedicated to the ‘Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street’).
He organized Black Gate’s award-nominated ‘Discovering Robert E. Howard’ series, as well as the award-winning ‘Hither Came Conan’ series. Which is now part of THE Definitive guide to Conan. He also organized 2023’s ‘Talking Tolkien.’
He has contributed stories to The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories – Parts III, IV, V, VI, XXI, and XXXIII.
He has written introductions for Steeger Books, and appeared in several magazines, including Black Mask, Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, The Strand Magazine, and Sherlock Magazine.