Noble Man

Jake Noble Series

By: William Miller

Narrated by: Adam Verner

Length: 8 hrs and 31 mins

Publisher's summary

Fans of Vince Flynn rejoice!

Jake Noble, Special Forces veteran and ex-CIA operative, is living on his boat, trying to scrape together enough money for his mother's cancer treatments. When the Company offers him 150k dollars to track down a missing girl, Noble has no choice but to delve back into the seedy underbelly of Manila's sex trade.

With the clock ticking on the girl's life, Noble will need all of his old skills to survive. Every move he makes unravels another deadly conspiracy and what he finds goes deeper than a random kidnapping....

©2015 William Miller (P)2018 William Miller

Good character, good start, needs work

The story isn't as believable as the stories of the best writers, but this is a good beginning. It has a good main character, and the author has talent. I'll come back to Alex Noble when the next volumes are available.

The story is timely and socially moving: sex trafficking as a huge international business. Alex has some good skills and is a noble character. The author needs to put a little more credibility and depth into the locales and the relationships. The book could have used a bit more research into life in the Philippines. For example, the under-financed shelter for abused women needs a new water heater so the women can bathe and wash clothes. It seems the author doesn't know that a lot of cold-water bathing and laundering go on there. The solution is not to take the clothes to the coin-op laundromat. This was perhaps the first detail that had me wrinkling my brow in question.

The women's shelter is run by two women; one woman is kidnapped and the other is concerned. Alex is sent to find her. Not enough is done to enable us to "see" these women--when we finally find out that Samantha Gunn is half Chinese, it had no precedence in the narrative and comes as a surprise. Then Alex falls in love with Sam after a few hours. Not likely. And then the supposedly strong-willed Sam gives up her religious principles about sex before marriage and decides to let Alex decide for her. This is not the description of a strong woman.

I know of 2 other series where the spec ops guy is religious, and it doesn't seem to blend well for me. I happen to be a believing person and, in these women's situations I would be praying mightily, but the faith and praying of the women in this story will clash with many people's sensibilities and expectations in this type of story.

The narrator did a fair job, but needs a little more work on beefing up the accents and distinguishing among the characters. And he needs to learn to pronounce "Tagalog."

The series has a good future given a good researcher and a good editor. I'll be back to see if I can give 4 stars next time!

Somebody has watched too many movies..

That quote is prevalent through the whole book. A book that has almost every single ex-alphabet soup agency trope in it. Don’t get me wrong, I will listen to the next one in the series but I don’t expect it to be a story that I haven’t already heard from countless other authors.

Nice debut...but religious overtones a bit much

if Jake Noble becomes more like Sam Gunn, the series is doomed to fail ; I am hoping he doesn't.

Good 👍

It is worth the time and the primary character is one you will like. Another in the series is on the ho.

Story is alright, performance is not good.

The performer reading a book can draw you in or significantly affect your experience. Unfortunately, the performer in this book is just not good.

Jake Noble is not Jack Noble

The Jake Noble series has promise, unrealized promise. NOBLE MAN has lots of action but too little plot. I suspect the next novel in the series will be better. Adam Verner narration is flat. I have two dozen novels in my Audible library narrated by Verner and this is the first time he has failed to earn 5 stars.

L. T. Ryan writes the outstanding Jack Noble series. This novel is not part of that series.

Really excellent story..

Other than an Australian accent that sounded like someone from Sth Carolina, this was an excellent listen. The story was gripping.

Highly recommended

edge of your seat story!

William Miller is a fantastic writer! Great book, entertaining! I can't wait to read more.

I have thoroughly enjoyed them all - Jake Noble one of my faves!

I’m writing this review after listening to all 6 books. I read 1-5 on my Kindle and was super stoked to see book 6 roll out. William Miller did NOT disappoint!!! So I’ve written a review that really applies to all 6 books. So you’ll read this on the other books. Like any good book (IMO) there are characters you like and characters you’d like to slap up side the head with a large fish, preferably a Lionfish, at minimum a large catfish. I like Jake Noble, he’s not like some hero typecast characters who invariably beats the evil and rarely gets a scratch. Jake often has to work hard for his victories and rarely is much given to him. You know the books, the weaponless hero gets to the cache site and finds a HMMWV with a MK19, M4’s with EOTechs and 20 gazillion rounds. Jake’s gets to his caches and finds 40 yr old K-Rats and eats them. Like I said he has to fight for his wins. He’s got a good cast around him, usually ready to support him or leave him to his own devices with thoughts of firing him always overshadowing him. My favorite character in all 6 books is The Wizard. I’m my time with n I have ran across old intel codgers just like him. Guys that have been around the block so many times they should have named 4 streets after them. Now for the Golden Globe award for “Most Irritatingly Irritating Characters”. And that award and Lionfish slaps gots to Ezra. Smart as a whip and with less horse sense than a rock. Not to mention he’s the whiniest human I’ve ever listened to. Now I know why I started and enjoyed this series on my Kindle before in Audio. At least I could give Zee a more manly voice as he whined, complained and basically peed his pants at the sight of the most benign beings, God forbid a threat with a weapon! All that aside I thoroughly enjoy William Millers writing style and I have been patiently waiting for Will to pick up this series again! A couple of years ago I exchanged some emails with William and he is as good a human as they come, and that makes listening or reading his books all the more enjoyable. Now for the constructive criticism:
- the narrator shouldn’t make every female character sound so dang whiney. Even the non-whiney/weak characters had that whiney trait that went counter to the persons character.

- it wasn’t this book, but there was book 4 that there were Russian characters than had zero Russian accent (I hope I’m not thinking of a different series but I don’t think I am.) the narrator should apply appropriate access to the various nationalities regardless. It lends more realism.
- I would give - free of charge - a military/tactics review/edit of the Noble series gladly. Trust me when I say that nowhere in this universe would an 18 series MOS (US Army Special Forces) ask someone firing an MP5 if they can accurately or effectively engage a threat at over 700 meters. That question would never come out of their mouth. Also there was a portion of book 5 wheee if I’m not mistaken Jake and another character (DF) were engaging threats with short barrel AK’s at distances those weapons cannot reach, much less effectively. I could have misheard that, so take that with a grain of salt I guess. My point is that authors who include current or former SOF soldiers or even SOG operators who are almost always former SOF, should have someone who understands that world to provide editing - reviewing to ensure that storyline doesn’t go into the realm of impossibility when it’s not necessary. That’s just my 2 cents.
I m sure there are haters who might complain about Jake’s mom or Sam for their Christian faith and quoting bible scriptures but I thought it added an element that many authors are afraid to add, and it wasn’t overboard or over saturated, so if you do read a negative review mentioning that, just know that whoever left that review is really going overboard and likely just a God-hater. It was seasoned without being over salty. I’d you know what I mean then you know what I mean.
I truly hope there is a Jake Noble 7, 8, 9, 10…. I want to know what happens to Sam! And yes Jake is getting on up there at 36, he still has some gas in the tank!!!

Eh….. Slow moving,

Story moves slow, too much fluff. Could be a good character, but the writing lacks imagination coordinated with story and action. It’s just …. Eh. Couldn’t finish it