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    The Last Good Man
    The Last Good Man
    The Last Good Man
    Audiobook13 hours

    The Last Good Man

    Written by A.J. Kazinski

    Narrated by Simon Vance

    3.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    #160;According to Jewish legend, there are 36 righteous people on Earth at any given time. Without them, humanity would perish. But the 36 do not know they are the chosen ones, and many are dying. A monk in Beijing, an economist in Mumbai, a glassmaker in Venice and more have all perished under bizarre circumstances, with strange marks on their backs. #160;#160;Veteran Danish detective Niels Bentzon is called to investigate. He#8217;s ready to dismiss the assignment-but then he meets Hannah, a brilliant astrophysicist mourning the death of her son. Together, they piece together the puzzle of these far-flung deaths, and a pattern emerges. Thirty-four have died, and only Bentzon and Hannah can predict the time and place of the final two.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHighbridge Company
    Release dateMar 6, 2012
    ISBN9781611747584
    The Last Good Man

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    Reviews for The Last Good Man

    3.5/5

    8 ratings8 reviews

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    • 4/5
      I won this book from Goodreads first readers giveaways in exchange for an honest review.The Last Good Man is a thriller about 36 good people who are being eliminated around the world and the two policemen in different countries who are the only ones who believe what's going on: the main protagonist Niels in Copenhagen and Tommaso in Venice.There are a lot of great things about this book. It's fast paced, well written, and the first half of the book makes mostly the right moves. There are secrets that are revealed that I am highly impressed by. Niels is a likeable protagonist and Hannah, the physicist, is also a compelling character that adds a high level of intelligence to the book. There are some issues, which prevent me from giving this book five stars. The big reveal in the last third of the book was anticlimactic; previous surprises were much more impressive-- this surprise was easily figured out. I also wanted to hear more about Tommaso, who was the first person to believe there was a pattern to all of these deaths. How did he come up with this pattern? We only see glimpses, and then the rest is Niels trying to figure out what Tommaso has already figured out. Also, it seems kind of ridiculous that neither of them answer their cell phones for the first half of the book. And then, from there on, I was expecting... more. The ending just seems a letdown when the opening is so grand, so big. I was really anticipating a big conspiracy to reveal itself. That said, I blazed through the book in a day. It was a fast, fun read, especially the first half of the book, and had some great characters.
    • 4/5
      The Last Good ManBy A.J. Kazinsk]Narrated by [[Simon Vance]]Ⓟ 2012, HighBridge Audio13.9 hoursThe "Tzadikim Nistarim" are the 36 hidden righteous people of the earth according to Jewish mystic tradition. None of the 36 people self-identify as being good or righteous, but their actions have the effect of being socially just or averting a greater humanitarian disaster. If all the Tzadikim Nistarim are eliminated, humanity is doomed. In 2009, a number of seemingly unrelated deaths span the globe, and one man - an Italian police detective named Tomasso di Barber in Venice, makes the connection: Someone is killing the righteous people of the world. And so begins this international thriller that races against the clock to identify and secure the eponymous man of the book.The Last Good Man has all the makings of a great thriller: a touch of the occult, international settings, deadlines with dire consequences if not met, spiritual musings, flawed protagonists, and an elusive villain... and yet, it all falls a bit flat. The novel's arc is robbed of tension with its schizophrenic quality: Is this going to be a police procedural set in Italy? Or is it going to be a Scandinavian crime thriller ? Is the whole of the novel supposed to be a sort of modern, metaphorical, Talmudic commentary? A.J. Kazinski seems to have mashed three novels into one, supplying the listener with an overabundance of detail and sub-plots (e.g. eighty cents, Skype sex, an Arab terrorist, an architect...) that do nothing to advance the story and worse, weaken the overall narrative until it collapses into a series of anti-climactic events.Simon Vance is the British-American narrator who brings his BBC4 polish and credentials as a reader of international thrillers (e.g. The Millennium Trilogy - by Steig Larsson) to The Last Good Man. His reading is clear, the pace steady, pronunciations are consistent, all characters are delineated well and credibly... all the things that listeners have come to expect as de rigueur from a seasoned professional such as he. OTHER: I dnloaded a digital copy of The Last Good Man (by A.J. Kazinski; narrated by Simon Vance) from downpour.com. I receive no monies, goods or services in exchange for reviewing the product and/or mentioning any of the persons or companies that are or may be implied in this post.
    • 4/5
      The Last Good Man by A. J. Kazinski (really Anders Klarland and Jacob Weinreich - why use a pseudonym if you plan to put your real names on the book jacket anyway???) Four stars because although it was a bit difficult to get into to swing of reading (normal for me with translations), once I was in tune with the authors, I found this to be an exciting, well-written mystery with much action and plot points to figure out. I enjoyed it very much - the side plots made it more than another DaVinci Code knock off religious/conspiracy mystery and I found the characters to be truly engaging. Only four stars because I would have liked a little more information about how the math worked with the solution of places and dates they came up with and a little more clarity in the end. At times, the novel was exciting and intriguing but a little light in how the mystery was being solved.
    • 3/5
      A bit hard to follow initially but got better as it went along - possibly a result of being a translation.
    • 4/5
      The Last Good Man is a mystery/thriller about Neils and his new friend Hanna, who is a physicist, and Tommaso, an Italian policeman. Neils is an interesting character as he is afraid of flying and leaving his area of comfort and is somewhat burned out on police business and develops a relationship with Hanna when he cares about another very independent woman. The story line follows the Jewish belief that there are 36 good but not especially religious people who can save the world. As the book progresses, Neils investigates death after death while trying to stop the murders. He is trying to save the world by saving the 36 good people as they are the only ones standing in the way of evil taking control. It is a fast moving and enjoyable thriller. I give it a 3.5 star rating.
    • 3/5
      "The correct interpretation of numbers determines whether we live or die. it's life or death That's something that every scientist understands. That was why Tycho Brahe got his nose sliced off in a duel.""Because of numbers?""Because he claimed that so-called complex numbers existed. And his adversary claimed that they didn't.""Who was right?""Tycho Brahe. But he lost his nose."Venetian policeman Tommaso di Barbara has discovered a trend in killings around the world - every Friday at sunset, a good person is murdered. Humanitarian, lawyer, volunteer - they all die with a strange burn-like mark on their back. Niels Bentzon picks up the Interpol report - but can't bear the thought of travel and doesn't speak di Barbara's language. Only once he teams up with Hannah Lund, astrophysicist extraordinaire mourning the premature death of her son, is he able to impose a pattern and find out when the next murders will be. The question is, can he stop them?Parts of this were really well written - as a police procedural, with all of the distractions from the climate conference and the terrorist threat, it succeeded. I kept reading, engrossed, all the way to the end with no trouble.Niels and Hannah are both interesting characters - neither is perfect and each is dealing with their own romantic issues - but as a partnership they work very well. In particular, their weaknesses are key - Hannah's inability to deal with normal interpersonal situations, Niels' travel phobia; both are worked slyly into the story but are completely obvious as obstacles when we happen on to them.Kazinski writes Venice and Copenhagen well - the floods, the abandoned madhouse/hospital, the cold, the ridiculous media interactions with the police at the conference, the conflicts between cyclists and cars in Copenhagen and most of all, the pervasive, penetrating, personal cold that a north European winter brings (I'm writing this with the heating on, socks and slippers, and a blanket over my knees).However, this gets big negative marks for resorting to a fate-imposed, generational mysticism. I bought it until Niels tried to run away and whatever he did, events conspired to send him back to Copenhagen; similarly the suggested passing of the burden to a new soul at the climax dragged this novel down into Dan Brown land. Except worse because at least there, none of it is magical and spiritual and fate, it's all just bad guys.
    • 3/5
      I selected this book because I found a number of parallels in the structure to a work I'm currently writing. I was interested to see how the author (in this case, two authors working under a single name) handled the information readers need to know to understand the plot points as well as how that information was spread across multiple characters.
      The first 100 pages were strong enough. But the middle part bogged down in elements that were repetative and, frankly, the devices used by the authors were clunky. I kept reading because I wanted to see how they finished the work and how the devices changed throughout. I can't say I would have kept reading if not for what I might learn about how to handle my own project.
      I continued on because this was an "instant" bestseller in the authors' country and has received some press in the U.S. because of that. I was interested to see why this became a bestseller, and was surprised whenever I found another of those clunky devices, unnecessary repetition, and poorly executed scenes.
      Then, the end matter told me what was really up. It seems the authors are both filmmakers in their home country. So the book was a bestseller pretty much because of their fame rather than any quality attributed to the book.
      Was the plot interesting enough? Yes. But too many of the other elements associated with the book were poorly excuted to support its success.
    • 3/5
      A bit hard to follow initially but got better as it went along - possibly a result of being a translation.