Robert B. Parker’s Blackjack

Chosen by Robert B. Parker’s estate to carry on the author’s work featuring Appaloosa’s police team of Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch, Knott creates new plots for Parker’s people and places in his own series. Those who love Wild West outlaw/lawmen books can run right through the pages of Blackjack to the surprise ending. For listeners, however, it’s a slower, more irksome story. Reader Linn voices all the characters in the same low voice with a slight Southwestern twang. But it doesn’t matter—the listener always knows who’s speaking because every line of dialogue is followed by “I said,” “Aly said,” “he said,” “Virgil said,” etc. As these folks generally converse in very short sentences, the repetition in this dialogue-heavy plot might drive listeners insane. A Putnam hardcover. (Feb.)