The Battered Badge

A Nero Wolfe Mystery

De: Robert Goldsborough

Narrado por: L. J. Ganser

A shake-up in the New York Polic Department's homicide squad following a high-profile murder is bad for business for private investigator Nero Wolfe.

When wealthy and popular crusader and reformer Lester Pierce is gunned down in front of his Park Avenue residence, the public outcry forces the NYPD to restructure its homicide department. As the deceased was highly critical of Inspector Lionel Cramer, the longtime head of homicide is temporarily relieved of his badge. But it seems Cramer was not just a scapegoat. He was seen dining in Little Italy with mob kingpin Ralph Mars.

All of this amounts to little more than conversational fodder for private eye Nero Wolfe and his assistant Archie Goodwin. But if Cramer's provisional replacement, Captain George Rowcliff, becomes permanent, Wolfe's future dealings with the force will be much compromised. Loath to depart from his routine, Wolfe makes the unusual decision to take on a case without an actual client.

His investigation quickly points toward Pierce's organization, Good Government Group, where high-minded idealism is often trampled under the competing ambitions of the staff - several of whom would clearly have benefited from Pierce's demise. Despite the burgeoning list of suspects, Wolfe hasn't ruled out the involvement of the underworld and its connection to Cramer. But in order to untangle an abundance of motives and end the inspector's forced furlough, Wolfe may have to venture out of his comfort zone - and the premises of his brownstone.

Continuing his beloved series, Nero Award-winning author Robert Goldsborough "demonstrates an impressive ability to emulate Rex Stout's narrative voice" (Publishers Weekly).

The Battered Badge is the 60th book in the Nero Wolfe mystery series, but all titles can be enjoyed in any order.

©2019 Robert Goldsborough (P)2019 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

First time with Nero

Totally enjoyed the writing and especially the performance by Ganser. He made the book -
I doubt anyone could come close in delivering the characters and tone of the author.

one of the better Goldsborough stories

While this is one of the better Goldsborough Wolfe stories, it suffers from anachronistic language. Ganser does a reasonable job reading the story but I missed the interpretations on the A&E video by Hutton, Chakin, and Dunn or even that by reader Pritchard.

They tried hard, but 3 stars is quite generous

I wanted badly to enjoy this book and this performance. I have read, and listened to, almost the entirety of Rex Stout's books, and I had high hopes that a continuation of Nero Wolfe could be satisfying. I knew it wouldn't be the same and I was prepared to grade on a curve. However, this is so far from the original feel and direction that I just couldn't do it.

The writer clearly tried and the narrator seems to have put in maximum effort. Unfortunately, both miss the mark by quite a distance. The writing isn't bad, but it just has zero Nero Wolfe feeling. The dialogue and the descriptions just bear no relation to anything from the original stories. I expected the author to put his own spin on things, but the character's names and occupations are the only real resemblance to the original stories. This seems like a problem, considering the only reason to continue a series, and bring back another author's characters, is to remain faithful to the originals. Especially as far as character traits and habits. The storyline was reasonably interesting, but poorly executed and presented in a very different frame than I would have hoped. Everybody "barks" or "rasps" everything and an occasional word like "libation" or slang like "mug" are jammed awkwardly in with the distractingly long dialogue sequences. At one point, Archie and Lon have a conversation that may be longer than all of the dialogue passing between the two in the entirety of the Stout books. Longer than any conversation between any two Stout characters, I imagine. It just felt forced and unfun to me.

The performance was an issue for me. I think he is talented and I imagine that for some books he may be great. For these characters, this style of story, and this amount of dialogue... He just felt wrong for the job. I feel bad because I am sure he was doing his best, but he was not set up for success in this endeavor.

After finally giving up on finishing, about 3/4 of the way through the book, I did some research. I was curious that the Stout estate had apparently sanctioned or approved these stories. I felt like they must have been asleep at the switch, but I also respected that Stout or his wife made a choice. Turns out they didn't. Stout didn't want someone to continue with his characters and his wife also respected that. Stout died first and it wasn't until after his wife died that the estate approved someone picking up the characters and continuing. I suspect that they were more interested in trying to generate income than in finding a natural successor to the stories. I don't expect perfection, but I bet there is someone out there writing fan-fiction who is hitting closer to the mark than these stories do.

Not one of his best

I am a big fan of Robert Goldsborough. He has done a great job of recapturing the Stout
style of story lines and characters.

Unfortunately, this was not one of them. The story is weak at best. Some of the characters
are almost comical when they should not be. The discussions be between Archie and Lon,
his newspaper buddy, are just terrible - nowhere near the fun banter you expect from other
stories.

This was great premise - Wolfe and Crammer working together. But their grudging respect
was lost in a badly told story.

However, it is after all a Wolfe story so it is worth reading.

Ok but not Rex stout

Sorry but there’s just so much lead up in this story and little plot. The voice actor really needs to listen to the old books and get a sense of the time and way of talking that the characters have. His portrayal of one of the main characters was so out of sync with the way he was written for decades that it was distressing to listen to. I think he can do the job but didn’t realize that anyone cared about how he portrayed the characters.

I miss Rex Stout

Gainsborough does ok, but he’s turned Nero Wolf mysteries into cosy stories. So much repetition from story to story gets to be an irritation too. I’ll listen or read them for free but I’m not paying for anymore of them. Still enjoyable for all that.

onto the next

All these novels are addictive. Very well structured and much fun. I dont think Rex would be disappointed.

Okay

I am a longtime fan of Nero and Archie. I’ve enjoyed Robert Goldsborough’s continuation of Rex Stout’s detectives in the past but this one was pretty predictable, almost formulated and L. J. Ganser’s narration felt phoned in. It was okay but a tad disappointing.

Very enjoyable

This audio book was a delight for me, as are all of Mr. Goldsborough’s writings. I think the narrator does a great job as well.

One of the best NEW Nero Wolfe mysteries

This is an especially good audiobook due to the superb narration by L. J. Ganser.