A Death in Summer

A Novel

By: John Banville, Benjamin Black

Narrated by: John Keating

One of The Chicago Tribune's Best Reads of 2011

One of Dublin's most powerful men meets a violent end—and an acknowledged master of crime fiction delivers his most gripping novel yet

On a sweltering summer afternoon, newspaper tycoon Richard Jewell—known to his many enemies as Diamond Dick—is discovered with his head blown off by a shotgun blast. But is it suicide or murder? For help with the investigation, Detective Inspector Hackett calls in his old friend Quirke, who has unusual access to Dublin's elite.

Jewell's coolly elegant French wife, Françoise, seems less than shocked by her husband's death. But Dannie, Jewell's high-strung sister, is devastated, and Quirke is surprised to learn that in her grief she has turned to an unexpected friend: David Sinclair, Quirke's ambitious assistant in the pathology lab at the Hospital of the Holy Family. Further, Sinclair has been seeing Quirke's fractious daughter Phoebe, and an unlikely romance is blossoming between the two. As a record heat wave envelops the city and the secret deals underpinning Diamond Dick's empire begin to be revealed, Quirke and Hackett find themselves caught up in a dark web of intrigue and violence that threatens to end in disaster.

Tightly plotted and gorgeously written, A Death in Summer proves to the brilliant but sometimes reckless Quirke that in a city where old money and the right bloodlines rule, he is by no means safe from mortal danger.

©2011 Benjamin Black (P)2011 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

“Narrator John Keating keeps a firm hold on a variety of characters and accents – from the not-so-grieving widow's French purr to the too-involved Detective Quirke's hard-edged brogue. Supporting characters are distinctly developed, and Keating's masterful style keeps the action moving forward.” —AudioFile Magazine

“Black's drab Dublin streets are full of perplexing figures, archetypes, as if the characters were stalking through some Jungian map of the unconscious: weakened, dying fathers, good mothers, bad mothers, twins, ‘dark doubles,' ghosts surging up from the past… His narratives are loaded with poetic devices.” —The New Yorker

“[A Death in Summer] is an elegant novel, well-paced with dramatic twists, disturbing surprises and richly drawn characters whose actions and motives have a tangible psychological depth. Mr. Black/Banville is well in form here... It can be either plunged into without any need to reference the previous three or else taken as a welcome new installment of a sequential quartet by one of Ireland's leading contemporary novelists.” —New York Journal of Books

Fantastic Story, Beautiful Language but . . .

Any additional comments?

John Banville/Benjamin Black is a brilliant writer. Passages are often more like prose poems. This book is very good and the writing sublime. But the narrator was so bad I had to turn it off sometimes and so bad that it spoilt the book for me.

Elegantly construction

Would you listen to A Death in Summer again? Why?

I'm going to listen to it again immediately to study Black's construction of scenes, his graceful transition from one point of view to the next, his prose and his dialogue.

Did the plot keep you on the edge of your seat? How?

It was the blossoming revelations of the characters and their interactions that was most compelling.

What does John Keating bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

John Keating is one of the best male narrators at performing female voices. He also has an ability to differentiate clearly different Irish accents without making them cartoonish which helps to differentiate the characters.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

There was one laugh-out-loud moment but I don't recall where it was.

Any additional comments?

The student of writing mysteries could do well to study this book.

Reading is unbearable

I tried for an hour to listen to John Keating reading. Black/Banville’s prose is monotone and totally lost in it. I couldn’t take it anymore so I switched to Spanish. It’s really annoying to have spent the money!
Timothy Dalton read the first three Quirke books. Though he did not bother with character voice differentiation, he totally understood how to bring the poetry of the prose to life.

Fantastic writing

The author's ability to create characters whom you can clearly see and hear, reflects his skill, as he is actually John Banville, the Booker Prize winner.
That he chooses to write mysteries is a gift to readers/listeners b/c his voice is so clear
and he paints remarkable pictures with his words.

Compelling but boring at the same time.

I listened to it all so it must have been compelling but it wasn't satisfying--too artificial or maybe boring? Also monotonous and hard to keep my attention. Yet compelling, so go figure.

That French woman always looking for the right word got on my nerves. Too many cover ups.

Narrator Sounds a Bit Jaunty

I am just now listening to this audiobook, and after reading the opinions of the other listeners of this audiobook and I have to agree with them that after listening to listening to Timothy Dalton read the first 2 Quirke books, I wish they would have let Mr. Dalton do the narration rather than John Keating do it.

I'm sure that Mr. Keating is a good narrator for different type of Irish books, but to me he sounds a bit to jaunty for Quirke. It needs the moodiness of Mr. Dalton's voice to make Quirke sound more believable and moody as it was portrayed in the first two books.

Hopefully Mr. Dalton will be asked to narrate the next "Quirke" book.

Tobacco rituals

Which once noticed became predictable and quite annoying were empty of narrative utility stretched short chapters into long ones and disrupted flow. Interior dialog kept it interesting enough.

A Very Lacking Performance

This is my fourth Dr. Quirk book. The first three were compelling and a great audiobook. The performance in number four drove me to reading it on my Kindle. The readers performance was annoying. He has a tinny voice and he is a terrible actor. It is too bad,a good story ruined.

This narrator stinks

If you could sum up A Death in Summer in three words, what would they be?

So the darkness of Timothy Dalton is gone and instead the narrator sounds about eleven years old. I don't know about the story because I couldnt listen past the first chapter.

What did you like best about this story?

I couldn't listen to it, but I love Benjamin Black so I gave his part of this 5 stars.

What didn’t you like about John Keating’s performance?

He puts the emphasis on the wrong places in the sentences. He does not convey any meaning to what he says. He has an annoying voice. He isn't a good actor and it's an incredible disappointment after Timothy Dalton. What happened to him?

Any additional comments?

That's about it. Isn't that enough?

I miss Timothy Dalton

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

If the friend really liked the Quirke series, I would recommend it.

How would you have changed the story to make it more enjoyable?

Is everyone in Ireland this grim? Was every institution in the mid-20th century in Ireland this corrupt? It's getting old - maybe Quirke needs to go to the Bahamas on vacation.

Did John Keating do a good job differentiating all the characters? How?

The characters are interesting, and Phoebe is becoming more of a real person.

Do you think A Death in Summer needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

Maybe if we spend more time with Phoebe.

Any additional comments?

I really miss Timothy Dalton as the narrator. He gave a real sense of danger and menace that was missing with the narration by John Keating. Keating did a decent job, but either this particular book is a lackluster followup or Dalton was giving some extra spice to the previous books that is now missing. Maybe I'm getting tired of the grim corruption that pervades these stories.