The Black Dahlia cover art

The Black Dahlia

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The Black Dahlia

By: James Ellroy
Narrated by: Jeff Harding
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About this listen

A neo-noir crime novel from the legendary crime novelist James Ellroy.

Los Angeles, 15th January 1947: a beautiful young woman walked into the night and met her horrific destiny. Five days later, her tortured body was found drained of blood and cut in half. The newspapers called her 'The Black Dahlia'. Two cops are caught up in the investigation and embark on a hellish journey that takes them to the core of the dead girl's twisted life....

©1987 James Ellroy (P)2016 Isis Publishing Ltd Crime Crime Fiction Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Modern Detectives Movie, TV & Video Game Tie-Ins Mystery Police Procedural Emotionally Gripping

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All stars
Most relevant  
I was absolutely grabbed by the brilliant beginning and the middle, very atmospheric and full of life-like personages, but the story should have ended a three chapters earlier to make this book almost as good as "LA Confidential".

Would have profited from some editing.

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fantastic story little bit of a choir at the beginning of the story but once it kicks in you won't be able to press pause

Great!!

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Terrible narration, read in such a robotic manner.
It's a shame because the actual story is interesting although very unrealistic.
Narration has put me off listening to the quartet , back to basics and buy the paperback versions.

Robotic Narration

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Enjoyed the story more than the performance, plenty of twists and turns but the performance lacked a little drama to truly entertain.

Enjoyable none the less.

Great story

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I know it’s a small thing and not really the fault of the audiobook producer but there is no such thing as a Scottish accent. Jeff here does an alright job of of an Aberdeen accent but needs some work z🤣

Scottish accent?

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Ellroy is a phenomenal story teller, keeping the reader hooked through many an unexpected twist and turn. The choice of Jeff Harding to narrate is absolutely exquisite: his style, his voices, his characters matching the crime noir to perfection

Excellent

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having only ever seen the movie I went into this not expecting too much. I was so wrong, brilliant story, brilliant narration and so much better than the movie in every way, a great book

absolutely brilliant

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I’ve read half of the LA quartet and most of the rest of his collection so I thought I’d try the Dahlia as I listen to the complete collection while commuting. The performance is great and Ellroy’s classic jaded detectives and femme fatales litter the late 40’s crime noir thriller. Knowing some of the characters and locations from later books it’s interesting to see Ellroy litter places and people we will come to know better over later books.
Overall I really enjoyed this book and would definitely recommend.

Not Ellroy’s finest but a great performance

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there is no-one like James Ellroy. so stylish, multilayered and dastardly, but yet funny.

narration is absolutely perfect, except he does an Irish accent instead of a Scottish one — but frankly who cares. wall to wall brilliant.

absolutely stunning. so brilliantly written

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The Black Dahila - good read but some parts quite disturbing & some readers light not like the choice language in book
Jeff's narration great as always

The Black Dahila - good read but some parts quite disturbing & some readers light not like the choice language in book

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