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Broken Monsters

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Broken Monsters

By: Lauren Beukes
Narrated by: Laurence Bouvard
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About this listen

In the city that’s become a symbol for the death of the American dream, a nightmare killer is unravelling reality. A terrifying new thriller from Lauren Beukes, award-winning author of The Shining Girls.

Detective Gabi Versado has hunted down many monsters during her eight years in Homicide. She’s seen stupidity, corruption and just plain badness. But she’s never seen anything like this.

Clayton Broom is a failed artist, and a broken man. Life destroyed his plans, so he’s found new dreams – of flesh and bone made disturbingly, beautifully real.

Detroit is the decaying corpse of the American Dream. Motor-city. Murder-city. And home to a killer opening doors into the dark heart of humanity.

A killer who wants to make you whole again…

Crime Crime Thrillers Detective Fiction Modern Detectives Mystery Suspense Thriller Thriller & Suspense Women Sleuths Women's Fiction Exciting Scary Dream

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Critic reviews

Praise for BROKEN MONSTERS:

‘Well-executed…exquisitely paced and impeccably controlled…’ New York Times

'Deftly layered, engrossing, striking' Sunday Times

‘Scary as hell and hypnotic. I couldn't put it down’ Stephen King

‘This is a tremendous novel, full of original characters and stunning dialogue’ The Times

‘I unhesitatingly urge you to buy it and read it now’ James Ellroy, author of LA CONFIDENTIAL

‘This wickedly unpleasant thriller has a rare and intriguing capacity to make the reader think’ Telegraph

‘Beukes is a compelling storyteller who has created strong characters in Gabi and Layla’ Metro

'Beukes has once again redefined the thriller genre' Stylist

‘Make a long flight fly by with this gripping thriller’ Grazia

‘Following up an international bestseller is never easy, but [Beukes] makes it look easy’ Shortlist

‘Never exploitative, never superficial, never uncomplicated: Beukes shows how horror can be the best way to explain our unbelievable reality’ Guardian

‘Set in Detroit, this is an enjoyably violent procedural high on hallucinogens’ Evening Standard

‘A compelling spine-chiller that keeps you hooked to the very end’ Heat

‘A terrifying crime novel that places the victims at its centre’ Marie Claire

‘Captivating … Broken Monsters defies the standard tropes of the serial killer genre’
Los Angeles Times

‘When Stephen King calls a book “scary as hell and hypnotic”, don’t read it late at night in a tent in the woods … I regretted not having a door with a deadbolt.’
The Wall Street Journal

‘This clever and creepy horror fulfils the promise of the grisly first pages’ Sunday Mirror

‘A strange and fascinating thriller’
Sunday Express

All stars
Most relevant
don't listen to this as an audio book. the narrator was dreadful she made all the women squeaky and all the men deep and throaty. poor acting took away from the actually excellent story that Laura Beukes wrote.

Great book bad narrator.

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Any additional comments?

Don't know which was grimmer, the story or the narration. I found the story horribly fascinating but the narrator made it sound like an episode of the Simpsons. I would recommend getting the version for the eyes, rather than the ears.

Grimpsons!

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I love the book however I had to really consentrate to ignore my annoyance of the narrator's horrible voices. Every man sounds like poor imitations of Keanu Reeves in Bill and Ted's or very idiotic. Teenage girls have these really high pitches "OMG-Whateva" annoying accents. Makes it difficult to take some characters seriously. Maybe Laurence Bouvard should rather narrate Sweet Valley High Books or stop with the terrible voices.

Beukes has great metaphors :-)

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For the most part we follow five different narrators with there own storys all coming together at the end. Two of them just really made me wish we were following anyone else but on the whole an enjoyable read.

The dream

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I have some ups and downs with this one.
The story is pretty good, though there is basically zero mystery, which is by design. Everything is pretty much laid out bare, who is who and why things are and you are just kind of along for the ride to see what happens.

The writing is fine, but man do I wish it cooled down with the “writing as if you are reading a Reddit Thread” or a Facebook comment feed. It pulled me right out of the experience.

Half the characters are interesting and pretty good, and half are caricatures of “teenage girl” and “rookie detective”.

The teenage girls specifically are probably my least favorite part, in that they constantly refer to each other as “bitch” and “slut” in an “endearing” way.

The narration is good for the most part, the general tone of voice and characterization of MOST of the characters is great, but for some it’s downright laughable. Like a child pretending to speak like an adult by bending their chin towards their chest and trying to deepen their voice.
And for the love of everything, look up pronunciation of words that you don’t know.

All in all, good experience, despite all of the above complaints. The overall story is quite enjoyable and the narration is fine.

A decent detective story with some interesting world building

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