Drowned Hopes
A Dortmunder Novel
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Narrated by:
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Arte Johnson
About this listen
Arriving home at dawn after another failed burglary, John Dortmunder—the anti-hero of Donald Westlake's popular comic crime series—is shocked to find his apartment occupied by a notorious cellmate everyone had supposed (and hoped) had been jailed for life. Tom Jimson needs Dortmunder's help.
Thirty years ago, before his last prison stretch, Tom had pulled a big job up near Albany—a very big job—that left a cool $700,000 in cash buried under a water reservoir in an upstate New York valley. Being the nasty sort of fellow he is, Tom's plan is to blow up the dam, flood the surrounding countryside, and grab the cash. With the fate of 900 small town nobodies hanging in the balance, Dortmunder races against Tom's itchy dynamite finger to formulate an alternative plan for retrieving the loot. Thus begins a convoluted caper, in the Westlake tradition, of misadventure and hilarity.
©1990 Donald E. Westlake (P)2009 PhoenixListeners also enjoyed...
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- Length: 11 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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If you've never read a Repairman Jack novel, this is the place to begin. It's 1990. A twenty-one-year-old named Jack has dropped out of college, leaving his old life behind to build a new one in New York City. Manhattan's rough edges are jagged enough to shred any unwary newcomer, but perhaps not one who is determined to stay off the grid, at any cost, in the busiest metropolis on earth. And to do so, he'll have to take jobs of a less than legal nature.
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Fun, as long you don't think too much
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By: F. Paul Wilson
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In the Bleak Midwinter
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- Unabridged
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Clare Fergusson, St. Alban's new priest, fits like a square peg in the conservative Episcopal parish at Miller's Kill, New York. She is not just a "lady"; she's a tough ex-Army chopper pilot, and nobody's fool. Then a newborn infant left at the church door brings her together with the town's police chief, Russ Van Alstyne, who's also ex-Army and a cynical good shepherd for the stray sheep of his hometown.
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Ice Cold Complex Small Town Police Procedural/Mystery
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Aurora
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- Unabridged
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In Aurora, Illinois, Aubrey Wheeler is just trying to get by after her semi-criminal ex-husband split, leaving behind his unruly teenage son. Then the lights go out—not just in Aurora but across the globe. A solar storm has knocked out power almost everywhere. Suddenly, all problems are local, very local, and Aubrey must assume the mantle of fierce protector of her suburban neighborhood.
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The Best of Us
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- Length: 6 hrs
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He's a self-described beach bum who won his houseboat in a card game. He's also a knight errant who's wary of credit cards, retirement benefits, political parties, mortgages, and television. He only works when his cash runs out, and his rule is simple: he'll help you find whatever was taken from you, as long as he can keep half.
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Before the A-Team, there was Travis McGee
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The Tomb
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- By: F. Paul Wilson
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- Length: 15 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Much to the chagrin of his girlfriend, Gia, Repairman Jack doesn't deal with electronic appliances. He fixes situations for people, often putting himself in deadly danger. His latest project is recovering a stolen necklace, which carries with it an ancient curse that may unleash a horde of Bengali demons. Jack is used to danger, but this time Gia's daughter Vicky is threatened. Can Jack overcome the curse of the yellow necklace and bring Vicky safely back home?
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Pretty good story
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Our Story Begins
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- Unabridged
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Wolff here returns with fresh revelations - about biding one's time, or experiencing first love, or burying one's mother - that come to a variety of characters in circumstances at once everyday and extraordinary. A retired Marine enrolls in college while her son trains for Iraq. A lawyer takes a difficult deposition. An American in Rome indulges the Gypsy who's picked his pocket.
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Great
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The Stand
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- Unabridged
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This is the way the world ends: with a nanosecond of computer error in a Defense Department laboratory and a million casual contacts that form the links in a chain letter of death. And here is the bleak new world of the day after: a world stripped of its institutions and emptied of 99 percent of its people. A world in which a handful of panicky survivors choose sides - or are chosen.
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My First Completed Stephen King Novel
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The Drowning Game
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- Length: 9 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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They said she was armed. They said she was dangerous. They were right. Petty Moshen spent 18 years of her life as a prisoner in her own home, training with military precision for everything, ready for anything. She can disarm, dismember, and kill - and now, for the first time ever, she is free.
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Gripping Thriller!
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By: LS Hawker
What listeners say about Drowned Hopes
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- G. E. Gordon
- 02-05-16
Dortmunder fan
I read this book a few years ago and loved it. Arte Johnson did an excellent job with the reading. He did a very well changing voices during the rapid fire conversations as well as adding occasional sound effects. Only complaint is that it was too short!
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1 person found this helpful
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- Nancy
- 11-14-21
Abridged leaving most of the book out
Drowned Hopes is a great book and if you ever get a chsnce to read or listen to the unabridged book, it’s well worth it. I would not have bought this if I had realized that so much of it and so many good scenes had been cut out. I found it more difficult to follow as a result; less understanding of the characters and action piled on action. I wish Audible had an unabridged version.
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- William C. Hand
- 01-06-19
Lesser Dortmunder story with rushed narration
This is a typical misadventure with Dortmunder and co. that introduces a couple new (but not particularly interesting or believable) characters. The story is marred by some convenient coincidences and a sudden and unsatisfying ending. It also seems a shorter adventure than the others so far. A bigger issue is the sound. The volume jumps from a murmur to a shout and back, requiring adjustment by the listener. The biggest issue was the narrator, Arte Johnson, who rushes through the text. His breakneck pace robs the dialog of cadence and inflection, making the speakers hard to distinguish. Arte attempts some accents but they drift from scene to scene. Whether it is the pace or lack of inflection, Dortmunder's weary fatalism and Kelp's optimism weren't as apparent. I'd previously read this book and was more satisfied with the story so I have to believe the biggest issue with the Audible version is with the narrator.
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4 people found this helpful
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- Bettina Speyer
- 07-10-17
Great story, poor audio production
Classic Westlake, great plot, but sound alternates between inaudible whispers and blaring. Had to constantly adjust volume to follow.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Midwesterner
- 09-03-12
Arte Johnson makes this hilarious!
Where does Drowned Hopes rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?
In all my years of listening to books on recorded media, this will always be among my very favorites. I bought it on CASETTE tape and I have revisited it many times since.
The plot is great -
An old ( and elderly ) cell mate of Dortmunders has finally been released on parole and wants help recovering money which he buried behind a library in a small town 'upstate'. The trouble is that now, there is a manmade resevoir where the town used to be. "Now my money is buried under 6 ft of dirt, and 40 ft of water." All of the different wacky plans that the gang comes up with for salvaging the money and the fact that the old convict continues to be a homicidal maniac who constantly needs to be stopped from just blowing up the damn to let the water drain out, make this just a hilarious story that still makes me laugh everytime I listen to it. And it is Arte Johnson that makes it come to life.
Did the plot keep you on the edge of your seat? How?
Very entertaining storyline.
What about Arte Johnson’s performance did you like?
Arte Johnson is spot-on with the characters voices. Dortmunder, the downtrodden thief. Kelp, the optimistic sidekick and all manner of other colorful and quirky characters which he verbally illustrates beautifully.
Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
A wonderful piece of fun escapism. I still listen to it once every few years. In fact I drove my kids crazy for a bit because I was always quoting lines from it.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Katelin
- 04-16-21
Erratic volumes
Volume was erratic but otherwise well done!
Story is great as always. More humor in this than others.
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- Kathleen
- 10-02-18
Worst narration
Narration was terrible. Can’t get rid of the stars but worst narration ever.
Couldn’t understand
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3 people found this helpful
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- Kelly Howard
- 08-16-12
Good book. Bad, BAD, BAAAD performance
What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?
A different reader, along with a guarantee that Johnson would never record another book.
How did the narrator detract from the book?
He made it impossible to listen to: Arte Johnson is so far beyond awful I don't even know words to convey the depths of his hideousness. Grating voice, few (and random) changes of tone for character and scene, volume ranges from 2-10 without warning, pacing speeds & drags like an old tape machine with stretched tape & stripped gears...I could go on endlessly. I realize the production is probably old but still, it sounds as if it was recorded inside a 55 gallon steel drum.
You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?
Everything but the reader.
Any additional comments?
I've been a Westlake fan for decades & wouldn't have thought it possible that I'd be completely unable to listen to a Dortmunder book. What were they thinking when they produced this travesty?! I have visions of Johnson holding them at gunpoint, or with pictures of the producers in compromising situations with livestock.
To paraphrase Monty Python, this is not a book for listening. This is a book for avoiding.
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7 people found this helpful
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- Gary L.
- 07-19-23
A poor representation of a great series.
Abridged? Eviscerated is more like it. Even the narration is rushed. This story, like all the Dortmunder stories, is great in its intended form, but if this was the first one I came across, I’d have never bothered with another. I’d encourage everyone to read the full version in print. And if you haven’t discovered the rest of the series, you have a treat in store if you explore the rest of the series.
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- Karen
- 02-17-13
Terrible narration
Would you try another book from Donald E. Westlake and/or Arte Johnson?
I really liked the book but this reading was so bad that I can't even listen to it. It was too hard to understand the mumbling delivery.
What didn’t you like about Arte Johnson’s performance?
see above
Any additional comments?
I wouldn't buy another audio book read by Arte Johnson
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5 people found this helpful