Written by Brian Freeman, narrated by Joe Barrett, twelve hours of listening, Book 1 in the Cab Bolton series. This is an unabridged audiobook released in 2011 by Blackstone Audio.

Cab Bolton is a detective with a bulldog mentality of seeking truth. The opening salvo to the series is the story of a precocious, oversexed teenaged girl that gets murdered. Mark Bradley, a happily married male high school teacher with a past suspicion of teenaged girl abuse, is the suspect. Clues traverse the pages through Cab Bolton’s efforts to prove or disprove Bradley’s guilt or innocence.

Who-done-it if not Bradley? There are other suspects including a boyfriend, a dance coach, etc. Thus is the thrust of The Bone House.

Why I like the story? The murder mystery is fun. The ultimate doer is well concealed by the author – I couldn’t guess, and I usually can – which is great! The setting is Chicago and Door County, Wisconsin. I live in Chicago and have traveled several times to Door County. They do lake salmon fish boils with cherry pie for dessert, neither of which are in the story, but whatever.

Why I didn’t like? One, as mentioned above, I’ve been to Door County many times and have never heard Minnesota-type-Swedish accents – some of the character voicing is just a bit too ethnic in that direction and doesn’t work with the geography as I remember. Two, although the ending is a surprise twist, it was a little more twisted than necessary. I’ll leave it at that and give no spoilers – you may find it just peachy.

Finally, the narration was a little slow for my taste, bumped it up to 1.5 speed. The narration beefs are minor – Joe Barrett does a fine job; this is an easy listen. No trouble discerning who’s talking to who, male and female voices are okay.

No language issues, no gratuitous sex, a ‘clean’ read. Nothing earth shattering, just a decent mystery. I’ll be following the series. Enjoy!

 

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