Intriguing Legal Story

This is a first rate legal story, good enough to make a great movie. As you aware from the publisher summary, a passenger train is derailed and everything seems to point to an engineer 's error. Within hours after the crash, powerful litigation firms, all the local and national media zero in on the engineer. To complicate matters, one of the victims is the son of a Philadelphia mafia don.

My issue is in the lack character development. I found all of the characters intriguing, but I felt disappointed and wantedvto know more about the families and especially the law firms.

The narrator was far to bland for my taste. I felt he could have been far more creative with key characters.

This is indeed a great story. Despite my criticisms, I plan on trying more novels from this author.

14 people found this helpful

Interesting legal thriller!

An AMTRAK passenger train crashes in Philadelphia with 36 deaths and over 200 injuries. The train's engineer does nothing to try to slow down/stop the train. The engineer, who was gravely injured in the crash, recovers but remembers nothing. He is charged with 36 cases of manslaughter and 200 other lesser crimes.

This is author Myers' second novel. The protagonist is the engineer's defense attorney who is also his cousin and best friend. The plot twists come so fast they are difficult to keep up with. An Engineered Injustice is an easy 5 star suspense mystery. Narration is superb.

14 people found this helpful

cartoonish narrator

the plot was interesting. but the narrator was over dramatic and his voice would be better suited for Saturday cartoons.

6 people found this helpful

For Scott Brick Fans... Otherwise, BLAH!

Adam Verner acts just like Scott Brick. No, I don't mean he copies that reader, just that he just acts similarly, which is to say you are aware of his acting ubber alles. I was aware of Adam Verner from his first words... aware of his intrusion into the story with his, um, sensitive sensitivity dripping over every sensitive syllable. Great Audible actors present the author's voice, Brick is infamous for putting a sock into an author's mouth... a sock filled with Brick's foot. Adam Verner shows that same sock/foot mastery here. Worse yet, as a Philly native, it's obvious that Adam Verner has never heard a Philadelphian speak. Not one of his characters have authentic tongues. Where the hell did Adam Verner pick up the dialects he dropped into the voice boxes of these people? Hell, he didn't even pronounce the place names correctly.

Torre-es-dale? Where's that? It's pronounced Tars-dale fella. And that's a principle site in this book, so I won't even try to sweep up all of the other mispronunciations.

As for William Myers' story... Well it is more predicable than the rattle of the Frankfurt El. Bad.... bad... bad... guys are so evil that you giggle at them. What's happened to editors? Was there no one to help this guy with character development? Is nuance dead? Is Myers a graduate of the Snidely Whiplash wiring school of mustache twirling?

Maybe there's some saving scrap in this mess that others have clung to... Frankly I think it was squashed with a Brick.

8 people found this helpful

Comic book

I found the beginning of this story very hard to follow. I was several chapters in before I was able to determine who the main character even was. The main concept of the story was new however it read like a comic book. I kept feeling like I was in the middle of the Dick Tracy movie. the characters a bit unbelievable, especially the mob boss.

2 people found this helpful

Preposterous!

A waste of time. Ridiculous story line and unbelievable characters. Crime, law related writers must think they have to invent the most absurd plot to be read. As a consequence you are subjected to novel that utterly fails to advance human understanding of real human beings.

2 people found this helpful

Good story falls off - Narrator just stays bad.

This is maybe the most mixed bag story I have ever listened to. It is the hardest to "rate" that I can think of.
The easiest for me to rate however, which makes it the place to start, is the narrator. To say cartoonish is not quite the adjective, but close. Some of his voices sound like Bela Lugosi (1930ish actor for Dracula) doing Scooby Doo voice overs. Every line is read in the overacted "loud whisper" voice that make all Narrator lines not belonging to a character sound like it is being read as the overly dramatic guy hat does Movie Trailers. It is distracting and annoying to me and I was never quite able to get passed it. It wasn't the worst ever for sure. I have heard worse. The pronunciation, sound quality and edits were fine. It was just badly "acted".
Now for the less clear. It is actually a good story and for anyone in the Philadelphia region, the story will be very familiar. In the beginning the characters are all well developed and the story setup has no big gaffes or continuity errors that make you say "this could never happen." Unlikely and difficult, but the set up "could" in theory work. The story was good enough that you don't feel a need to role your eyes and "debug" it every 10 minutes while listening. In fact, it is the opposite and you do get caught up in it (despite the narration). Basically, a likable enough, good in his heart guy is the engineer of an Amtrak train that is involved in a catastrophic high speed collision with maintenance equipment improperly left on the tracks. As a result there are dozens of fatalities and scores of injuries. The engineer is set up to take the fall and personal injury attorneys of the unscrupulous variety line up for victim's in the multi-millions of dollars in damages that arise in the case.
There are many side stories and events, all OK, some adding nothing none seeming to take away from the core of the story.
It is toward the end, where the court battle (PRELIMINARY HEARING) begins that the story slowly fades into the just plain dumb. There is no clear line where it goes south, but by the end, you (or maybe its just me) role the eyes and shake the head. In solving the story the Judge (who is purportedly "fair" according to the hero lawyer) is making comments that would get a real Judge censured. The prosecutor, in clichéd style, is a win at all cost - to mean and pit-bull stupid to see the obvious. A lawyer bent on getting a conviction instead of the truth. The "law" is so distorted that evidence is disallowed when it would be admissible if entered by a 3rd year law student; while at the same time, things inadmissible in any court outside a Gulag are admitted. It just makes you want to call all of the lawyers MORONS and call it a day.
Finally, there is the end, sort of a pro-log intended to be a summary of good guys riding into the sunset and bad guys, well getting their just deserts. You cant be more specific without spoiler alerts. But, to my tastes, it was unnecessary to explaining anything or putting a period on the end of the story. It only served to make it my final piece of evidence that the story fell apart. In a word, that last bit of unneeded writing was just plain juvenile.
In all, I do not feel like I wasted my time or money. I liked the story, but by the end was disappointed but not robbed.

4 people found this helpful

Epic Cheeeze!

Wow. I just finished listening. I’m laughing and marveling. How did this get made... which was cheesier, the story, the dialogue or (my vote) the all in cheesiest performance from a narrator I’ve ever listened to? Good gracious, it’s all so wonderfully bad. My daily dose of Advil can stop now that I won’t be rolling my eyes every four minutes. And yet, I did just finish. There was enough interest in how the plot would play out to keep slogging through. (Predictable, oh yes, but I held out hopes for a grand twist... nope) I would say, if you want an eye rolling romp, go for it, but... fair warning, keep some good crackers on hand for the flood of CHEEZE!! 😂

1 person found this helpful

I started well

Interesting premise but then it became implausible.
Cardboard characters showed no depth of feeling. The author told us about their emotions but did not reveal them through their actions or meaningful conversations.

1 person found this helpful

Can't wait to return this book!

What disappointed you about An Engineered Injustice?

The opening. The first three chapters go on in gory detail about a train wreck just in case you lack the imagination to envision the grim details. I felt manipulated and not in a good way.

Has An Engineered Injustice turned you off from other books in this genre?

No.

Have you listened to any of Adam Verner’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

NA

You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?

Couldn't put up with it long enough to find out.

1 person found this helpful