I picked Dead or Alive as my first audiobook because I figured it wouldn't take much attention to listen too. That expectation was based on my opinion that all Tom Clancy books are basically the same and I was mostly right. However, I either haven't read the earlier books that included torture or they weren't as horrifying in print. Either way, the last few chapters of this book were actually stressful to listen to they were so violent. The rest of the book was just another Tom Clancy story, with a lot of action, a few political statements, and no character development. Usually I could enjoy this as mindless fun, but the torture scenes made that impossible.

I also picked this book because the narrator is an actor from Law and Order whose voice I thought would be good for this book - and it was. His voice had just the right kind of drama for a political/military thriller. Sometimes all the Russians or Arabs started to sound the same, as though the narrator forgot which voice belonged to which character. Other than that, the voices were done well and were pretty easy to understand. Tracks were a little long for easy navigation at 7-8 minutes.

This review first published on Doing Dewey. ( )

A vast improvement over Teeth of the Tiger. The younger generation of character is finally getting more developed, and Clancy is handling three separate plotlines as only he can. Looking forward to more in the series; it's definitely gotten invigorated with this installment. ( )