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Ratking cover art

Ratking

By: Michael Dibdin
Narrated by: Michael Kitchen
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Summary

A powerful industrialist, Ruggiero Miletti, is kidnapped. Inspector Zen is transferred to Perugia to take over the case - but finds that there are many obstacles in his way. The local authorities see him as an interloper, and the victim’s family, one of the most powerful in Italy, seem content to let Miletti languish in the hands of his abductors. Zen has crossed swords with the establishment before - and lost. Can he succeed this time?

©1988 Michael Dibdin (P)2014 Audible, Inc.

What listeners say about Ratking

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Perfect portrayal

The Zen series of books by the late departed Michael Dibden, I have often gone back to and the earlier books by are far the best. The later books drift off and seem written as if Dibden was by then bored, which he probably was. This, the first of the series portrays the character of Zen perfectly and the choice of Michael Kitchen as the narrator is truly inspired. His sardonic and world-weary delivery makes him a perfect Zen. His strange intonation and emphasis in some ways almost seem as if he is reading it as if from his police notebook. Lovely performance and I can't wait to hear the rest of the series

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars
  • S
  • 12-03-14

Idiosyncratic Narration

Glad I persevered with this one! Within minutes of starting this audiobook I was convinced that I was going to have to return it. The idiosyncratic narration got between me and the story; the reader affects a 'reading a list' type diction combined with a world weariness that actually made it hard to follow at times.

That said, I did persevere and once I got into the book I saw that it actually fitted the persona of Zen rather well. The story of a kidnapped industrialist and the dirty family secrets which are brought to light in the process plays well against Zen's personal life (sidelined professionally, unlucky in love) and I grew to appreciate the sly humour and cynicism. I will be working my way through the series.

Overall very entertaining if you can persevere with the narrator.

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars
  • k
  • 16-10-13

A good story but the performance was distracting

A very good story with enough twists and turns to entertain. I however find Michael Kitchen's narrative style distracting. He seems to slowly stress odd W-O-R-D-S in sentences which I find irritating. This may work on TV or stage for dramatic effect when accompanied by facial expressions or gestures, but which I personally find adds nothing to a book reading.

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Really enjoyed this, delightful work

I was introduced to Zen through the three episodes shown on the BBC a few years ago. I enjoyed those, and was curious to read the books which inspired them.

I fully understand that any TV or film adaptation has to simplify the story quite a lot, and feel that the TV scriptwriters did a great job.

Although the basic stories were similar,, the book has so much more delightful depth, detail and complexity than the TV show with the same name. Zen seemed more life-like, with plausible "real-life" problems away from the office, and his situation, balancing his police work with the politics of the Italian judicial system, was intriguing.

I thought Michael Kitchen was an excellent narrator, with good clear diction and leaving nicely-judged pauses for emphasis and pacing.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Good story hampered by terrible reading.

I like Michael Kitchen as an actor but on this audiobook he fails to make the grade. His rendition of the narrative and badly paced and pays little attention to the punctuation, instead reading section of text with no connection to the rest of the sentence. Only the dialogue is well performed.
That notwithstanding, the story is excellent. When I was able to get past the delivery the book is a nicely written investigation which should appeal to those who like their detective fiction to be a little political and intelligent.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Stick with the strange narration- it's worth it

This is my first experience of Zen and I'm pleased I finally got to him!

Like a lot of people I found the narration annoying. I then read reviews here and they all said stick with it - it represents Zen's personality. Being my first experience of Zen I didn't know his character so I stuck with it and then I started to get it. I now think the narration adds to the story.

The story's itself was OK, I guessed who it was quite early on, but there was still enough there to keep me engaged and I think I'll download another.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Not the best Zen story

Zen's first outing is a slow burner, but picks up and moves very quickly towards the end. enjoyable but as mentioned in the title there are better stories. Having said this still worth a listen as it will have you guessing till the end.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Well written and enjoyable listen

Michael Dibden is such a good writer that this managed to transcend what to my mind was an odd choice of narrator. Michael Kitchen is an actor whose work I generally enjoy, but I’m not sure he is the right voice for Zen. Seems he has narrated the whole series, however, so I guess I’ll just have to get used to him.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Interesting story let down by narration

I had high hopes for this book as I think Michael Kitchen a great actor, but I was very disappointed. He hardly changed the nuances in his voice to reflect what was happening in the story, let alone attempt any variation in voice to help the listener know which character was speaking. Often I had to rewind to work out who was saying what as it was nigh on impossible to tell.
I had bought others in the series ready, but I will be returning these unopened as it was not a pleasurable listening experience and I'm not going to waste anymore time on them.
Such a shame.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

I tried but the narrator did my head in too

I lasted about two and a half hours before giving up. The narrator had a very idiosyncratic manner which may have worked if it was just for the narrated passages/ Zen's dialogue but every character sounded the same and it just became irritating. I didn't mind the laconic tone so much but the weird pauses in odd places and UNneCESSary and unnatURal emPHASis was too much for me.

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