The Black Blade: A Huckster Novel
By: Jeff Chapman / Narrated By: David Bosco
Length: 5 hrs and 25 mins
Okay, so, like, I have a reeeeally high bar for Mr. Chapman… Grand, but man! was I missing the GORE!!!
Right ‘bout here I should note that one of my Fave Categories is Romance, wiiiiiith a definite fondness for Regencies. And the cleaner the better. M’ toes curl at the drop of a hat, doncha know. -OR- at the first mention of shapely legs, a broad chest. Further Note: You shan’t find too many Thrillers reviewed here at Audiobook Accomplice cuz they’re just too much for me, you know? All those adrenaline-rushes, and that means MORE Toes Curling, but this time in horrified anticipation.
One SHOULD be able to assume from this that I abhor mayhem and violence and, well, gore, right?
Uhm… if it’s Jeff Chapman doing the writing? Dude, I snap his audiobooks up and don my Splatter Apron cuz Stuff Hits the Fan, like, CONSTANTLY. And it’s ALWAYS delightfully chucklesome. Things like characters walking about, minding their own business, all whilst things like violently lopped off fingertips fall into boots, or heads (Violently) cleaved asunder are kept in place with a kerchief.
You know. Benign stuff like that.
So here we have, for my Month O’ Western(ish) audiobooks wherein I take on one western(ish) Listen each week, this week’s choice, which I was looking forward to mightily. Cuz J. Chapman is incapable of writing the straight and narrow. His stories are always jam-packed with Adventure heavy on the Action, with characters meeting Deplorable Villains and seemingly Insurmountable Obstacles, with Cringeworthy Grossness that somehow makes a person gracelessly snort laughter. AWEsome, no?
The Black Blade opens with our hero behaving just sliiiiightly less than honorably as he is in cahoots with buddy Orville who scams people by pretending to be a fortune teller. Hero Jimmy is off out of sight, raising and lowering items in lieu of actual spirits actually doing it. Whilst Orville is working over a young woman, Jimmy notes a rather ominous fellow in the vicinity. And after the young woman leaves with her decidedly unimpressed husband, Ominous Fellow comes over with a proposition.
He has a Knocker, whatever that is, that he’d like this pair o’ hucksters to get rid of. Nooooo, Jimmy thinks and says so. “But the money!” Orville declares, eyes glazing over in avaricious glee. And so Jimmy is dragged into a situation that turns dire pretty danged quickly. Ominous Fellow, Marzby, is waaay more than he appears to be, and that is NOT a good thing. Pretty soon we’re introduced to a kidnapping, a Pig-man, a quest to retrieve a Black Blade, and groovy Chapmanesque creatures such as a shapeshifting opossum, coyotes of enigmatic intent, a bandido who’ll just as likely shoot to kill as anything, and a young girl named Isobel who just wants to be the heck away from her Ma and off having adventures.
This is truly a grand mashup of genres, so I dearly liked it a lot as it was well done. The Old West with Dark Magic and Shapeshifters. The best part about it is the style of writing is true to the era, with metaphors that are totally how one might imagine a person in the Old West might see things (I’m taking a Deep Point Of View workshop, and I do believe Chapman nails it as far as the Listener being able to see through Jimmy’s eyes… esPECially keeping his gramma’s words of wisdom and advice near at hand). Not since any Olivia Atwater Offering have I enjoyed a genre mashup so much (No offense to Alexis Hall, but truly. Atwater’s were funner).
David Bosco? Entirely new to me, so I was a trifle worried for a bit. I needn’t have because he wound up capturing character voices so well, delivered action perfectly, and there was nary any vocal juggling (And Isobel sounded female and not all Guy Doing A Girl Voice). Certainly I think he COULD’ve additionally relayed gore in a manner that woulda had me squirming delightedly in squeamishness. Alas, ‘twasn’t there -BUT-
I DID check publication/release dates, and I see this was a 2017 offering. Dunno where Chapman was on his writing journey, but a look at one o’ my Faves, The Sniggard’s Revenge, shows it was published in 2021, indicating, p’raps, that Chapman has grown leaps and bounds into his craft.
Either that or his cats didn’t deposit any dead offerings at his doorstep as inspirations for, yesss! Blood, Guts, Innards!
Not Chapman’s best, but a delightfully engaging Listen nonetheless. This dratted Heat Dome affecting much of the country has me dozing off at inopportune times, but I can honestly say that this audiobook had me entertained enough that I didn’t doze even a single time.
Still waiting for a “Merliss Tale” but decidedly happy that? Well, I think I have enough “Krampus”-themed audiobooks in m’ Library to build a page for that particular occasion this year. And wouldn’t ya know it? Chapman has gone and written an addition for m’ Library…!
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