Review: Echoes

This Podcast Novel is completed.

Podcast Novel or Audio Drama: Podcast novel

Title: Echoes

Written by: Nathan P. Butler

I found it at: Podiobooks.com feed through iTunes

Reading/Voice Acting Quality: 3/5 - Not sure if the author is reading this or not, (It's never mentioned, so I assume that the reader is the author. Usually if someone else reads it, they are given a credit at the beginning of an episode.) but whoever is reading this? SLOW DOWN. We get that it's an exciting story. But honestly, it was hard to get used to the reader's pace at first. The reader does a good job of making the character voices in dialog distinctive, but it still a bit too fast.

Overall Production Quality: 4/5 Could have used intro/outtro music. It's not required, but it does make for a more dynamic experience. The only positive to having JUST the story in this podcast novel, is that there are no ads. Each Episode is very short compared to other podcast novels. The longest coming in at 13 minutes and 27 seconds. Most podcast novels are about two to three times longer.

Comments: This one was one of the first non-fantasy-world podcast novels that I found. I think I found a group of three the same round of Podiobooks feed shopping in iTunes. This was the first one of the three that I listened to. (And reviews of the other two are coming.) It seems that this particular author does primarily Star Wars Fandom work and this is his first attempt at something original. It's a good story, and I enjoyed it very much. I think he might have done a few things differently as far as reading. (Like I said above: SLOW DOWN.) but these are just my opinion. It's possible that I've been listening to too many podcast novels that are hugely produced. The fact that the episodes are so short presented an interesting dilemma to me. Normally, I listen to these novels at work because I work with files and it helps the time go by. But the total of this novel clocks in at 3.1 hours and my shifts are 5 hours long. Normally I'm used to listening to 6 or 7 episodes of longer podcast novels and completing one (or catching up with one) in a week. I solved this by using the other 1.9 hours catching up on new episodes of podcasts that are not completed. So just to warn anyone considering this one, it's shorter than many others that I'll review here.

Other than these nitpicks, the story is a good one. It follows Atlanta Homicide Detective Darren Fox as he tries to solve a very strange murder that was committed in Atlanta, but has connections to congressmen in Washington D.C. The politics and relationships between the characters make this story dynamic and interesting. There's an interesting twist about...I think half-way through. I don't want to give it away though. I try to make these as spoiler free as possible.

Overall Score: 4.5/5 – If you enjoy mysteries and can pay attention to the fast reading, then give Echoes a try.

Author’s Website: http://www.starwarsfanworks.com/

Story Website: http://www.starwarsfanworks.com/echoes/index.html

Search “Echoes” on iTunes.