City of Endless Night

By: Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child

Narrated by: Rene Auberjonois

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER"A consistently exciting and never predictable series."--Associated Press
When Grace Ozmian, the beautiful and reckless daughter of a wealthy tech billionaire, first goes missing, the NYPD assumes she has simply sped off on another wild adventure. Until the young woman's body is discovered in an abandoned warehouse in Queens, the head nowhere to be found.
Lieutenant CDS Vincent D'Agosta quickly takes the lead. He knows his investigation will attract fierce scrutiny, so D'Agosta is delighted when FBI Special Agent A.X.L. Pendergast shows up at the crime scene assigned to the case. "I feel rather like Brer Rabbit being thrown into the briar patch," Pendergast tells D'Agosta, "because I have found you here, in charge. Just like when we first met, back at the Museum of Natural History."
But neither Pendergast nor D'Agosta are prepared for what lies ahead. A diabolical presence is haunting the greater metropolitan area, and Grace Ozmian was only the first of many victims to be murdered . . . and decapitated. Worse still, there's something unique to the city itself that has attracted the evil eye of the killer.
As mass hysteria sets in, Pendergast and D'Agosta find themselves in the crosshairs of an opponent who has threatened the very lifeblood of the city. It'll take all of Pendergast's skill to unmask this most dangerous foe-let alone survive to tell the tale.

Critic reviews

"As always, the authors have crafted a story that is almost impossible to pull away from, and their prose is as elegant as fans have come to expect. Pendergast continues to be one of thrillerdom's most exciting and intriguing series leads, and the series remains among the most reliable in the genre."—Booklist

"VERDICT: Fans of the Pendergast series will be delighted with this latest romp and its careful plotting and suspense should appeal to mystery fans generally as well."—Library Journal

"This, yet another masterpiece by Preston & Child, will be the perfect way to start out your New Year. Just as it was when D'Agosta and Pendergast first met up in the thrilling book, Relic, they are together once again solving a crime of mammoth proportions. Preston, Child, and their well-known characters are always sheer perfection!"—Amy Lignor, Suspense Magazine

"One of the best in the series--tense and tightly wound, with death relentlessly circling, stalking, lurking behind every shadow."—Kirkus Reviews

"If you'd like to know how Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes tales would be reviewed today, look no further than "City of Endless Night"... A typically terrific mystery laced with the gothic overtones for which this series is known...This is mystery thriller writing of the highest order, a tale as relentlessly riveting as it is sumptuously scintillating."—Providence Sunday Journal

"Preston and Child continue to write tense and compelling tales while also invoking the feel of Sherlock Holmes or other gothic stories of the late 19th century....Marvelous."—Associated Press

Expect more

In past Pendergast novels there was a more extensively developed plot. This one was clear far too early.

Worth the credit

Good story. Kept me in suspense till final chapters. My only beef is that there were a handful of sound editing blips where the narrator clearly had re-recorded a line but the insertion was not seamless. I suspect that’s a reflection on the sound editor. Still, I enjoyed the book and it was otherwise well narrated.

Good story, horrible narrator

I have definitely liked other Preston Child books better than this. The two disappointments are first, and glaringly so, the narrator. OMG - if he didn't already have one foot in the grave! His voice was that of an 80 y.o. and it totally doesn't cut it with this fast paced thriller that has very few, if any, old folks in it.

Next, it seemed a bit off from their prior books. Like, there may have been a different writer for parts. In all fairness, I may have made this decision as a knee jerk to the switch in readers.

Please don't use Mr. Auberjonois - go back to Scott Brick! There is none better - he is D'Agosta and Pendergast.

Not What We're Used To

I've listened to and/or read all of Preston and Child's previous books. The vast majority were superbly intriguing with several layers of depth for the reader to dive through. This book did not live up to those standards. It was simplistic, shallow, and seemingly a quick write--an imitation of previous tales. Usually, I would have stopped listening to this story but, because it's Preston and Child's work, I continued in hopes that the next book in the series will be more thoughtful, detailed, and fresh. That hope compelled me to finish so that I'd have the necessary foundation for the next book. Auberjonois was good as usual, doing his best with the material provided.

Great as always.

Fascinating, with a deliciously evil twist. Psycho-thriller and adventure. Couldn't put it down. Can't wait for the next one