Matthew B.J. Delaney

A budget version of the matrix. Instead of the whole world being a prison it's just Manhattan this time. The plot is made of holes and the plot twist can be seen coming from the moment they first reveal the prison setup. The ending is rushed for some reason, probably on editor's orders. Probably for the best. Nevertheless, if you suspend your disbelief, it's a fun, albeit derivative as hell, idea.

This novel had me riveted to my chair for hours. And at just under 550 pages, that says a lot for the author. While much more suspenseful than truly frightening, it had its share of horror moments. I would definitely recommend it to horror-genre readers. And I've read somewhere that this book was optioned for a film. That ought to be good!

plot summary in brief

The first part of Jinn begins during World War II during a Marine landing on one of the Solomon Islands. The Marines are there in the show more midst of heavy enemy presence, the greatest part of which they overcome shortly after landing. Then the sergeant receives word that they have one more job to fulfill. A special unit has gone missing and no communications have been received since the last radio message in which a voice stated "revenge will be mine." So this group of Marines goes off in search of the missing unit, but soon it becomes apparent that they are not alone in the jungle. Something, not the Japanese, is after the group, and they begin to be killed off, one by one. One of the last survivors of this nightmare, Eric Davis, is taken on board a merchant marine, where he is put into the infirmary, remembering very little. But the Galla is hit by the enemy and sunk.

Flash forward from 1943 until 2007, when an American research ship carrying a submersible that can dive to 20,000 ft plus, is out on an expedition. The submersible is launched, and as the crew is proceeding across the ocean floor, they come across their apparent target, the Galla. They send up a signal and the machinery is set into place to raise the Galla (or at least a part of it).

Now move ahead again to Boston, 2008. The son of a prominent and powerful businessman is killed on the roof of his father's building. The police are sent to investigate, but clues from this crime lead to more savage murders, done in much the same way as the first. Before all is said and done, the police will realize they are dealing with something not human.

A lot of reviewers did not like this book, but too bad. It kept that tightness in the stomach that I always get from suspenseful books the entire time I was reading it. Many times I wanted to peek at the end to make sure things came out okay, but luckily I held back. I liked this book, and thought it was terrific. And this is the author's first book! show less

My original The Memory Agent audiobook review and many others can be found at Audiobook Reviewer.

Being a fan of James Anderson Foster since I first listened to him in the Adrian’s Undead Diary series. And being, not really a fan, but one who thinks that dual narrations can be a treat to listen to. I am surprised that I have not listened to The Memory Agent sooner than now.

This is such an interesting yet not totally unique story. The concept of the mental prisons is absolutely fascinating show more to me. Especially since I have been recently bitten by the LitRPG bug. So I related to the technology in that way. Think of a giant MMORPG (Massively Multi-Player Role Playing Game) where convicts are sent to live out their sentence as someone else in a new reality. Mind you this happens with no knowledge of it happening because the convicted has the pleasure of having their memory’s erased before “plunging in”.

Matthew B.J. Delaney chose to present this story in a way that seemed haphazard and confusing at the time of listening. After processing the story for a couple days I was convinced that Delaney was trying to present his story similarly to the way some Hollywood blockbuster movies are organized. Making me do the work of connecting the dots and drawing conclusions until more is revealed.

Not sure who made the call of the dual narration for this book, whoever it was, they made the right choice. The narrators switched everytime the timeline jumped or you could think of it as a different voice for the different realities. Making it very clear as to what storyline was happening at the moment.

I think this was my first time listening to James Patrick Cronin. He has a pleasant voice that adequately conveys the emotions needed at any given time. Cronin’s voice was very soothing, calm and collected. I would listen to him again without thinking twice.

This was on of James Anderson Foster’s best performances that I have heard. There was a confidence coming from him that I do not remember hearing in the past. You could hear the effort he was putting into his performance to make this a pleasurable listening experience.

My beef is with the production quality of Foster’s performance. Brilliance Audio clearly, for some unknown reason, had Foster processed with some kind of noise gate, this is a technique that essentially turns the mic on and off depending on the volume of sound coming into it. This resulted in a clipping off a couple milliseconds of almost every new paragraph voiced by Foster. Making “Parker” sound more like “Harker”. If something like this happens once or twice I probably wouldn’t have said anything. But, it started to become a little distracting.

Audiobook was provided for review by the narrator. show less

Slow moving story line that made it difficult for me to get through.