The Florentine Deception

A Novel

By: Carey Nachenberg

Narrated by: Nick Podehl

A seemingly mundane computer cleanup leads to an electrifying quest for an enigmatic - and deadly - treasure in this gripping techno-thriller.

After selling his dorm-room startup for millions and effectively retiring at the age of 25, Alex Fife is eager for a new challenge. When he agrees to clean up an old PC as a favor, he never expects to find the adventure of a lifetime waiting for him inside the machine. But as he rummages through old emails, Alex stumbles upon a startling discovery: The previous owner, a shady antiques smuggler, had been trying to unload a mysterious object known as the Florentine on the black market. And with the dealer's untimely passing, the Florentine is now unaccounted for and ripe for the taking. Alex dives headfirst into a hunt for the priceless object. What starts out as a seemingly innocuous pursuit quickly devolves into a nightmare when Alex discovers the true technological nature of the Florentine. Not just a lost treasure, it's something far more insidious: a weapon that could bring the developed world to its knees. Alex races through subterranean grottos, freezing morgues, and hidden cellars in the dark underbelly of Los Angeles, desperate to find the Florentine before it falls into the wrong hands. Because if nefarious forces find it first, there'll be nothing Alex - or anyone else - can do to prevent a catastrophic attack.

©2015 Carey Nachenberg; This edition published in 2015 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc. (P)2015 Audible, Inc.

An Exciting Adventure

Such an enjoyable audiobook!

An mystery lover can appreciate the excitement of finding a clue to a missing gem. Even more fun to run across it while simply checking out an old computer. Like a hidden compartment or buried treasure, it bring to life the imagination.

So did The Florentine Deception. Finding the clue in the computer would be exciting enough. Yet what Alex Fife discovers is potential treason, foreign assassins, and an imminent plot to destroy America. Will his skills be enough to prevent it? Will it be too late? All because of a gem?

Alex, fortunately has a wealth of knowledge. Having sold his successful computer security software, he is singularly in a position to delve into the old system tracing back to who and what it involves. What he finds could cost his life and those he holds dear.

It’s a thrill ride of an adventure, with lots of action and twists to keep you wondering how they can succeed. From deep within the computer to to deep within a cave that may hold the answers, he and his likable friends try to stay one step ahead of killers. Only it doesn’t always work.

I’m always pleased to find a book available in audio format. Narrated by popular Nick Podehl, the audiobook runs just over ten and a half hours. He does have a great voice that suits Alex Fife very well.

Thank you to iRead Book Tours for providing this audiobook in exchange for an honest review. Loved listening to such an exciting story. You can find my full review on Jaquo Lifestyle Magazine.

Enticing subject

Great story and narration. Unfortunately, the writer seems to have desperate need for a good editor. Many chapters drug on needlessly and we’re unnecessarily repetitive. The protagonist, a seemingly smart guy, perpetually made stupid choices for no apparent reason. It was frustrating to have a book ping pong the reader back and forth between loving and hating it.
All of that being said I look forward to the author refining their skills or upgrading the editor so I can enjoy many more excellent adventures to come.

Fun, fast-paced techno-adventure

Where does The Florentine Deception rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

I'd place The Florentine Deception just below Ready Player One and Daemon in terms of my favorite audio books. I found all three books to be really fast-paced and fun to listen to. Normally I only listen to audiobooks during my commute, but I found myself also listening to this book during my downtime at breakfast, lunch, while brushing my teeth, etc.

What did you like best about this story?

I enjoyed the adventure aspects of the story most of all - the book is really a classic-style adventure novel (like a treasure hunt), with a technology angle. As a techie, I also enjoyed the "techno" parts of the story. Unlike most techno-thrillers, the technological part of this book seemed totally plausible (and scary). The technology parts were also easy to understand - there was no techno-babble.

Which character – as performed by Nick Podehl – was your favorite?

I really liked the narrator's portrayal of the main character (Alex Fife) - he really brought out the character's emotions. His portrayal of the Russian characters was also awesome! I thought that the narrator could have done a better job with some of the women characters, however. They all sounded a lot alike. That said, all of the characters were easy to distinguish (when talking to each other), so this is a bit of a nit.

Any additional comments?

Overall, I really enjoyed the story! The chapters are short, so it went by really quickly. The book could have done with a bit better editing, but that didn't detract too much from the story. Otherwise it was a great listen!

Kinda scary when you think about it!

A bit slow in the beginning then, as you get more and more engrossed in the story and characters, you begin trying to figure out "whodunit" so that, by the end, when the real world implications become clear, it's more than a little nerve-wrecking! Nice listen!

if you enjoy action or cyber-crime stories

The Florentine Deception was an enjoyable adventure-type story with an interesting plot, lots of action and some nice humor. Although it is a techno-thriller centering around a cyber-security expert you do not need a profound knowledge of computer science to follow the story. The author does a great job providing just enough details for easy understanding and without it getting too technical or dull. The main theme was really a treasure hunt to find the location of the Florentine. This involved among other things a funny trip to the morgue with the hero's grandfather, a climbing adventure and a few altercations with a couple of adversaries who were also after the Florentine. The author created a likable group of characters who were supporting the somewhat unlikely hero of this story: Alex is a twenty-five-year-old computer geek who made tons of money with his start-up and is now spending his days drifting, mainly climbing with friends and doing computer-related favors for his relatives. While there wasn't a lot of character development or truly breathtaking twists, it was an easy and fun story to listen to.

Nick Podehl's narration was as ever excellent, and one of the reasons I decided to listen to this book in the first place. He was a great fit for the character of Alex, but also managed to bring all the other characters to life with different voices and believable accents. It always feels as if he really gets into the stories he narrates and he is enjoying himself, which in turn makes it easy for the listener to engage with the audio book. There were no problems with the production.

I think it's worthwhile mentioning that the author is donating the proceeds of this debut publication to charities supporting underprivileged students and veterans. So if you enjoy action or cyber-crime stories and/or have an interest in climbing and/or computer security, you should definitely enjoy this audio book whilst simultaneously supporting a very good cause.

Audiobook provided for review by the author.

Please find this complete review and many others at my review blog

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Inconsistencies drag down an otherwise fun ride

Mr. Nachenburg's first outing as a novelist is ultimately successful, but for me, what could've been a thoroughly enjoyable ride, was dragged down by a number of inconsistencies, particularly in the character's behavior. I'll get the bad out of the way first. Much of this could've been solved by a good professional editor, I believe, someone who could have caught a lot of these and smoothed. There are characters who seem to have a tech/IT background, but then later in the story act as if all they do with computers is browse the web. There are characters who refuse to eat pizza and later scarf down Tommy burgers. Perhaps I'm being nit picky, but there enough of these little slights that it got to be distracting. As well, there are times that the story telling fall into cliché. The main villain in particular. Not only are their motivations, while timely, cliché, but we find him monologueing at points during the story.

Nick Podehls narration is overall good, not at all flat, keeps the story moving along and interesting. Nick's voicing for the male characters was generally spot on, though he may have tended to give some of the male characters too much of a Southern California surfer-boy vibe. As for female characters, I'm going assume the best, and guess that he simply struggles to give depth to female characters, rather than him ascribing to him particular attitudes towards women. To this end, most of the female characters end up sounding...dumb, which is to the detriment of the story.

Overall The Florentine Deception is a fun engaging listen. Generally I listen to audiobooks during my commutes and a couple good gauges of whether I like a book or not is 1) I'm motivated to listen to it in the morning when I'm not so chipper, or 2) I choose the audiobook over streaming a hockey game on game nights. I found both of these to be true. The tech stuff is not impenetrable and Carey doesn't have to break the flow of the story too much to do the necessary explanations. Honestly, as someone with a tech background I sometimes wished it was more complicated than it it turn out being. The Florentine Deception has a fun puzzle, a fun mystery to be solved, without being a mystery novel, and for this I commend it.

A cool mix of caving, mystery, & computer stuff.

Alex Fife is rather bored. He had the luck and the skills to start a successful company young and then sell it for a very pretty profit. Now at 25, he needs a new challenge. Cleaning up an old PC for a charity is not quite the challenge he was looking for, but he stumbles upon references to the Florentine, an item an antiques dealer was trying to sell on the black market. Alex’s hunt for the Florentine turns out to be a bigger challenge than he had in mind.

Alex and Steven, who have been best friends for some years, initially dug into the Florentine mystery out of boredom and curiosity. Richard Lister, the now deceased antiques dealer, was involved in some shady things. Alex and Steven hatch a plan to check out his house, which is for sale. Hillary, Steven’s wife, thinks they’re a bit nuts but swiftly gets caught up in the excitement. One discovery leads to another as the action spirals up. However, the stakes also continue to rise as it becomes apparent they aren’t the only one looking for the Florentine.

This was a pretty fun read. I enjoyed that Alex and crew thought they were looking for one thing and as things progressed, it became apparent they were looking for something completely different. Us readers know from the book’s description that this will happen, but it was fun to see how the author made his characters work it out. This story is mostly about the action, though there is some character development for Alex and Steven. There’s also a touch of romance, which was fine, though I didn’t feel that it particularly added to the book.

There’s plenty of computer geek speak in this book, which is what I was expecting, since Alex and most of his friends are computer scientists of one flavor or another. I enjoyed watching Alex use his expertise to collect info on the Florentine and also in laying traps for the bad guys. However, there were a few times when Alex was explaining some basic things (such as fire walls) to other computer savvy folks and that just came off as out of character. I think the author wanted these things laid out clearly for the reader, in case they aren’t computer nerds, but it came off as a bit clunky.

In contrast, the author did a great job in explaining some basics about caving. Alex has a few friends, including the most interesting Linda, who are caving folks and this techno-thriller requires some cave exploration. Hooray! Steven is not a caving person, so Alex has the perfect newbie to explain some basics to. However, there were times when Alex got a little dense on the subject. For instance, he thought it was pretty ingenious of his friend Potter to bring along glow sticks, which I would think would be a basic in most caving survival packs. Then there was that scene where Alex and crew gave up a little too easily for my taste. I felt the author was eager to move on to the next section of the book.

Now let’s talk about the morgue and Alex’s grandfather (Papa). This was by far my favorite scene of the book. Papa was so funny and yet took his role in the task so seriously! I really enjoyed this morgue caper as Alex and crew gathered further information. I’m glad the author didn’t make light of morgue security because it provided so much opportunity for Alex and Papa to have these tense, yet ridiculous, conversations.

Over all, this was a light, fun read. There were some clunky bits here and there. However, this is balanced out by the morgue scene and ratcheting-up tension and action of the story. Once the true nature of the Florentine is figured out by Alex, there’s a race on to either capture the Florentine or counteract it. The ending wraps up all the questions (except for those concerning Alex’s future love life) for this tale and leaves the door open for future installments. It would be interesting to see what Alex and crew go after next time.

I received a copy of this book at no cost from the author (via iRead Book Tours) in exchange for an honest review.

The Narration: Nick Podehl was a good fit for Alex. He had that successful mid-20s feel to the voice that made Alex come through clearly. The narrator had to do several accents – Puerto Rican, Russian, Philipino, vague Arab, Ukranian, and regional American accents – and he did them well. His female voices were realistic.

Over-simplified, yet too detailed at the same time

Any additional comments?

I initially chose this book because I like a good crime mystery. I read through a ton of glowing reviews, and I was ready to be riveted. The opening was ok, so I powered through.

What really got me, though, was that at many (many) times throughout the book, the author just over-explains an idea; almost as if talking to a child. I just kept thinking: "come on already, get to the point." Now, I'm no technology guru...just an average person who can work the basics on a computer. The protagonist, on the other hand, is introduced as a forward thinking revolutionary in the technology field. Yet, he is so slow on the uptake of certain events, that this is hard to believe. On the flip-side of this, there are times that the author just goes off for a time in great detail on some technological point. There's no middle ground.

I listened through to the end, just to see what happens, but I was really ready to be done about 2/3 of the way through. The narrator was solid/consistent through to the end. Looking back, I wish I'd picked something else.

Fun, engaging, and actually educational

If you could sum up The Florentine Deception in three words, what would they be?

It's a great read, and I think outside of the story telling it opens up eyes for the "average joe" by making concepts around computer security much more tangible.

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

Yes it did, though at times I felt that the main character was experiencing an unusual string of bad luck! What I really liked about these circumstances was the nice balance the main character used between clever solutions at times and just brute forcing (like in real life) at other times.

Which scene was your favorite?

It's a toss up between the panic room scene and the cave scene

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

Probably the UCLA morgue scene

Any additional comments?

I think this book has an educational value to it, specifically for the average Joe. I'm in the tech industry and so suspect I was definitely taking a lot of the material understanding for granted, but my wife is not and as we both listened to the book I was mindful of how she would be able to absorb the concepts and appreciate them. She definitely learned a thing or two about security awareness, and that's a win for me!

Great book

I really enjoyed this book! I would put this in one of my top 5 books overall. When does part 2 come out?