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    Dead Center
    Dead Center
    Dead Center
    Audiobook7 hours

    Dead Center

    Written by David Rosenfelt

    Narrated by Grover Gardner

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    In Dead Center, we find our beloved Andy carpenter reentering the dating scene – God Bless him. Surprisingly he’s a hot commodity, but that’s not necessarily a good thing. His friends are offering up their two cents on his dating life, but of course they know as little about the dating world as Andy. One thing that rings true, whether the ladies he meets are terrific or not, is that the spectra of his longtime love Laurie hangs over his head. Bitter over her departure, he’s finding it hard to forgive and forget. She’s still the love of his life. Andy’s had no contact with her at all, and he can only assume she is back in Findlay, Wisconsin serving in the number two job on the local police force. Then one day he returns to the office to find Laurie waiting for him. She’s arrested a young man for murder and though the evidence clearly called for his arrest, she believes he’s innocent. He’s the son of her oldest friend and she’s come to Andy to find him representation. Andy follows Laurie back to Wisconsin where he must explore a secretive religious community that seems to hold the truth about what really happened to the deceased.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherListen & Live Audio
    Release dateJan 1, 2006
    ISBN9781593163556
    Dead Center
    Author

    David Rosenfelt

    DAVID ROSENFELT is the Edgar-nominated and Shamus Award-winning author of more than twenty Andy Carpenter novels, including One Dog Night, Collared, and Deck the Hounds; its spinoff series, The K-Team; the Doug Brock thriller series, which starts with Fade to Black; and stand-alone thrillers including Heart of a Killer and On Borrowed Time. Rosenfelt and his wife live in Maine with an ever-changing pack of rescue dogs. Their epic cross-country move with 25 of these dogs, culminating in the creation of the Tara Foundation, is chronicled in Dogtripping.

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    Reviews for Dead Center

    4/5

    286 ratings17 reviews

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    • 5/5
      David, I have never enjoyed any books more than yours, especially Andy..I have read many books since able to read and I am now 70.... Thank you!!! You have enhanced my retirement, I am in the car a lot and even listen whilst driving, whether it a few miles or hundreds. I think I have now read nearly all and pray you will keep rolling them out, all others seem to pale right now...
    • 5/5
      I love the Andy Carpenter books. It's an easy read and very entertaining.
    • 5/5
      The last thing Andy Carpenter expects is for his former girlfriend Laurie Collins to call him and ask him to defend a young man she has arrested for murder. But Andy, and Tara, are off to the wilds of Wisconsin to look into the case. Jeremy Davidson is accused of murdering his girlfriend Elizabeth and her friend Sheryl and burying their bodies in his parents' yard within steps of his apartment in the family guesthouse. Laurie doesn't believe it and Andy has questions.Teaming up with local attorney Calvin Marshall who is as snarky as Andy, the two try to find out about the two girls who were both residents of a very private and insular town near Findlay. No one in the town is willing to speak to either attorney. Even calling on the computer skills of Andy's friend Sam back home in New Jersey only gives them the barest hint of a way to proceed when he manages to give a possible name to Elizabeth's former boyfriend.When Jeremy's home is firebombed, Laurie insists that Andy call in Marcus to provide protection for him. But the protection isn't expansive enough and Calvin winds up dead with a broken neck in a supposed car accident. Then, after agreeing to talk to Andy, the former boyfriend is found hanging in his motel room's bathroom after leaving a signed confession. The confession is enough to get Jeremy's trial cancelled and get Jeremy released from jail, but Andy isn't satisfied. He still wants to find out who actually murdered Elizabeth and Sheryl and the boyfriend. His continued investigations manage to put both him and Laurie in peril. I'm curious to see where this series goes next. Andy and Laurie have agreed to try a long-distance relationship since, while they love each other, their choices of places to live are incompatible.
    • 3/5
      Lawyer Andy Carpenter heeds the call of his former girlfriend who has moved to Wisconsin to be the sheriff there. Laurie is calling because a local boy is accused of murder and needs a good lawyer. The premise is weak but the story is good. I like Andy and his cast of characters but I'm ready for a story line that isn't half about his on again/off again Laurie thing.
    • 4/5
      Enjoyed the book. It was fun seeing how Andy viewed Findlay. There was a framing element but it wasn't a big deal. The only thing that kind of bothered me was that Marcus just keep appearing, almost nut magic to stay the day. Necessary as it was, it also stretched credibility to the breaking point. Yes, it's fiction but there is a point where a mystery should not be a fantasy with magical saves.
    • 5/5
      laugh-out-loud, law-enforcement, snark-fest, snow, lawyers, culture-shock, cults The mystery tale is creative, and there's the issues between Andy and his ladylove, but that's not the best of it all for this Wisconsinite! It's all the frozen tundra snarks and the foodie fun! No way does Wisconsin or its people come off badly. Unless, of course you object to our winters, potluck suppers, or basic kindness. I loved it! Grover Gardner really shines as narrator.
    • 5/5
      At Laurie's request, Andy takes on as a client a young man accused of murdering two coeds, one of whom was his former girlfriend. The evidence against him is overwhelming, which is why Laurie as chief of police had to arrest him. But it didn't sit well with her; hence her plea to Andy to defend him. Andy is easily talked into the case. A religious cult figures in, and something smells to high heaven to Andy. Yet he gets to be in the same town as Laurie, so for Andy, things are looking up. Andy wants to prove his client innocent, but that would mean he would be free to return home. Andy's life seems to be one delemma after another. But he always has Tara, his dog, to come home to, so how bad could it be? Great writing and wonderful characters in a complex plot will keep you turning pages until the end.
    • 4/5
      Andy gets called to look at a case in small town Wisconsin where his ex-girlfriend is now chief of police.
      The young man is accused of brutally murdering two young girls, by Laurie isn't convinced and thinks Andy might be able to defend him.
      The murders centre around a small town cult where nobody wants to speak to the law or to lawyers and it gets increasingly dangerous for everyone involved.
      Enjoyable read.
    • 4/5
      Mr. Rosenfelt makes me laugh out loud. His Andy Carpenter books are funny and interesting with always a touch of intrigue. His capacity for musing dialogue is unsurpassed and his insight into his characters is endearing. Another good addition to the series.
    • 3/5
      Another fun one, although not quite as tight as the previous ones, either. Still entertaining, though. I'm going to listen to the next.
    • 4/5
      Another good Rosenfelt book with Andy Carpenter, Laurie Collins, and Tara. Andy goes to Findlay, Wisconsin at the request of ex girlfriend Laurie now acting police chief in her home town. She has arrested a teen named Jeremy for killing his ex girlfriend and another girl part of a secretive town call Centurion and the strange religion that revolves around a mysterious wheel and someone called the keeper. It was a very satisfying read and most of all I am happy Laure and Andy will continue to see each other. :)
    • 3/5
      A relatively entertaining audiobook, but with a host of plot-related flaws. Right off the bat, I felt that the main character, Andy Carpenter, suffered from a bad case of Mary Sue disease: wealthy, powerful, popular, and irresistible to women,he is also a media darling and (at least, so we are told) a fantastic defence lawyer. We are introduced to him when he is still reeling from the loss of his romantic interest and has been celibate for four whole months! Gasp! Tragedy! And clearly all the girl's fault! What in his misogynistic mind is a horrific and coldblooded betrayal was actually her finding her perfect job in her own community where she grew up, and him being unwilling to move to be with her. Because god forbid that a man, even one with $25M to spare, ever make any career or location sacrifice for a woman.

      Mystery-wise, the evildoer is awfully obvious, the plot requires a large concatenation of circumstances, and I felt like we had a bad case of Did Not Do The Research. There is a nearby oh-so-scary religious cult which is clearly a biased blend of scientology and Mormonism, a rather pathetically unrealistic set of court scenes, and a far too naive defence attorney as the main character. That perhaps irritated me most; detection and initial determination of guilt before accepting a case...well, that isn't how the justice system works, or, indeed, is supposed to work. Fortunately, the narrator's cheery and self-deprecating cynicism, likeable side characters, and a dog elevated this from abysmal to relatively enjoyable. The narrator is not half as funny as he thinks he is, but I'm a sucker for that type of narrator affect. In addition, the much- maligned ex is on the scene, and the narrator is far less bitter and hateful to her in person than in his thoughts. Last, I listened to this on audio and I always get a kick out of anything that Grover Gardner reads.
    • 3/5
      Number 5 in the series. Set in Wisconsin a change from NJ but with all the usual characters.
      This series is best read over time not back to back.
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed reading this book. This is another one that through me a curve ball. While I wasn't completely mislead, one or two people turned out to be innocent when I would have bet strongly they were behind it all. Great book to listen too, it was humorous and fun. This is the 5th book in the series and only the 2nd one I've read.Andy Carpenter is a lawyer in New Jersey, he happens to be rich to most of his lawyering tends to be pretending to be busy and being an on-air expert to TV stations. When out of the blue his ex-girlfriend calls up from Wisconsin and tells him she arrested a boy for murder even though she doesn't believe he did it.Andy is put in a tight spot, he's still upset with her for dumping him and he really doesn't want to go to Wisconsin. On the other hand, he abhors miscarriage of justice. Throwing a wrench into the mix is a small but strongly held religion in the nearby town where the murdered girls were from. Andy has a hard time penetrating the protective barriers they all put up. Pretty soon things start to snowball and Andy might be lucky to live through the mess.
    • 3/5
      Dead Center by Rosenfelt is a story told by Andy, a lawyer from New Jersey. Andy is in love with Laurie who has left Andy to return to her home town area of Cheese County where she is now serving as the acting Chef of Police. This is a light mystery with a touch of cultism in “The Centurions” a town and religion that controls the inhabitants and excludes any outsiders. Following an unexplained death, the twists and turns of investigations bring Laurie and Andy back together to solve this local mystery. The story was short and light and mildly entertaining. I gave it the book a 3 star rating because 2.5 was not available and I felt it was better than a 2 out of 5.
    • 4/5
      This is book #5 of the stand-up comedy/mystery/dog-related legal procedural series featuring lawyer Andy Carpenter and his golden retriever Tara.In Dead Center, Andy’s girlfriend Laurie Collins has left Paterson, New Jersey to take her “dream job” on the police force of her old home town in Findlay, Wisconsin. Although she hasn’t seen Andy in four months, she calls and asks him as a favor to come out there and defend a friend of her family, Jeremy Davidson. Jeremy has been charged with the double murder of his girlfriend Liz and her girlfriend Sheryl. The bodies were found in a shallow grave on his property. Blood flecks were spattered in Jeremy’s car. Jeremy’s guilt seems so obvious that ordinarily Andy wouldn’t take the case, but he wants to see Laurie again, and so he and his golden retriever Tara make the drive to Wisconsin.Liz and Sheryl were members of a bizarre religious cult located in Center City, about ten miles from Findlay. The people of this faith have no desire for interference from, or information sharing with, the outside world. Thus, Andy needs help, and he brings some others from his team up to Findlay to help out. Soon they are all in danger. On the bright side however, Laurie seems more conflicted than ever about whether she really wants to live apart from Andy.Evaluation: One gets the impression that this plot was designed to showcase funny remarks about Wisconsin, and if you’ve ever lived there (as I have) you will get a big kick out of this book. Even aside from the jokes about winters and cheese, however, these humorous mysteries from Rosenfelt never fail to entertain me. I don’t see a Pulitzer in the author’s future, but I do see a lot of loyal readers like myself who love having a witty, diverting read.
    • 5/5
      David Ronsenfelt possesses the ability to combine great suspense with great humor and come up with a winner every time. What fun to read his books ... and to be challenged by his "song-talking".