The Thief Who Couldn't Sleep
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The Thief Who Couldn't Sleep
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Narrated by:
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Theo Holland
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By:
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Lawrence Block
About this listen
Introducing Evan Tanner - the first series character created by Lawrence Block, best-selling author of A Walk Among the Tombstones...
Ever since a shred of shrapnel did a number on his brain's sleep center, Even Tanner has been awake 24/7. This gives him more time than your average underachiever. Time to learn the world's languages (he's fluent in Basque, but has trouble with Chinese). Time to embrace the world's lost causes and irredentist movements (The Flat Earth Society, the League for the Restoration of Cilician Armenia, the Society of the Left Hand). Time to write term papers theses for students with more money than knowledge. And, most important, time to do his dreaming while he's wide awake.
The Thief Who Couldn't Sleep is Tanner's first adventure. It finds our insomniacal hero on a mission to recover a hoard of gold coins, stashed 50 years ago in a house in Balekesir by the city's Armenian community. Promptly jailed by the Turks, Tanner escapes and plays hopscotch across the map of Europe, pulling strings, slipping across borders, and, almost incidentally, fomenting a revolution in Macedonia.
Well, these things happen...
©1966 Lawrence Block (P)2017 Lawrence BlockListeners also enjoyed...
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What listeners say about The Thief Who Couldn't Sleep
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Robin Beattie
- 19-03-22
Good thriller on the run in many countries
Secret service raffles type operative On the run from crooks. Intelligence of various countries History lesson thrown in
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Helen
- 25-04-20
Fabulous book
I Enjoyed this audio book very much from start to finish great story line too
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Norma Miles
- 13-05-20
Never thought of insomnia as a survival mechanism.
Narrator Theo Holland gives an excellent performance as the lagubrious Evan Tanner, Lawrence Block's Thief Who Couldn't Sleep, as he reads the first person tale of travel round a large part of Europe pursued by the authorities. Tanner is what? Loner, spy, thief, self satisfied and self taught scholar, a book lover, an honest man, a liar, an insurrectionist, a joined-inner - whatever he is, he's interesting. And he cannot sleep following an incident with shrapnel in Korea.
When Tanner hears an old woman's memories of a fortune being stashed in the porch of her parent's home, he starts to wonder if, just perhaps, it might still be there. And he decides to go take a look.
Lawrence Block writes in a straightforward staccato style of writing, easy to read, simple to follow, but the characters encountered are far from straightforwad: they are all real characters in the fullest sense of the word. And the reader is introduced to a kaleidoscope of them, from Turkey, to Ireland and Spain, Italy, Armenia, and more, all as fascinating as the countries which Tanner travels and the situations he finds himself in. Visual, amusing, this is such an enjoyable book, enhanced by the marvellous narration.
I had read other books by the author but this was my first encounter with Evan Turner. It won't be my last. My thanks to the rights holder of The Thief Who Couldn't Sleep: I downloaded a complimentary copy, without any obligations, from the Freeaudiobookcodes website, which, like the book itself, is highly recommended.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- Martin Gilje Jaatun
- 03-12-19
A wind-up shouldn't be so long-winded
As a fan of the "Burglar" series, this book didn't quite live up to my expectations. Most of the storyline seems to be about setting up the protagonist for future adventures, but the first part simply seems to long-winded, and although things do come together more towards the end, the reader (listener) does not really get an explanation of much of the initial (in)action.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Rhona
- 01-02-20
Great story
This book was published in 1966. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The story had no boring bits. I am definitely going to look for other books in this series!
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- col2910
- 22-03-20
Great fun
Lawrence Block again and this time in the company of his adventurer and spy Evan Tanner. Tanner here is on the hunt for some lost Armenian gold.
Istanbul jails, Shannon airport, Irish attics, a shooting in Dublin and some secret papers, an eccentric Madrid hairdresser, drugs and make-up, Spanish hay carts, Andorra, France, Italy, a Bulgarian priest, Yugoslavia, Macedonian uprisings, bed hopping, illicit border crossings, treasure hunting, untrustworthy partners, 800 mile road trips, Syria, Beirut, a Washington cell, government agencies and finally freedom and a new freelance gig.
A light hearted fun read as Tanner falls in and out of scrapes and the odd bed, while criss-crossing Europe on the strength of a tale recounted by an old Armenian woman back in New York. I really liked the tale with the cast of odd-ball characters Tanner met along his journey. As a character I like the quirk of his never being able to sleep. It does give him the opportunity to get the jump on some his less trustworthy associates. I also like his ability to speak multiple languages, another asset when encountering strangers in strange lands.
I think what also struck me was the Block's observations regarding Yugoslavia and the different nationalist identities of portions of the population, along with the rivalries, tensions and mistrust of each other. It's almost as if he had a crystal ball which predicted the break-up of the artificial state of Yugoslavia. The horrors of the Balkan wars of the early 90s and the subsequent details which emerged of ethnic cleansing, genocidal massacres and war crimes aren't easily forgotten. Tanner's Europe is the one I grew up in and is very different from the world today.
Overall I really enjoyed it. There's humour, action, scrapes - some believable, some far-fetched, and the great company of an easy going, likable main protagonist. I'm going to enjoy more of Evan Tanner's adventures in the next month or two.
4 from 5
Read - (listened to) February, 2020
Published - 1966
Page count - 224 (5 hr 33 min)
Source - Audible download code from one of the author's assistants
Format - Audible
https://col2910.blogspot.com/2020/03/lawrence-block-thief-who-couldnt-sleep.html
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