Audiobook Review: Movieland by Lee Goldberg

Movieland
Author: Lee Goldberg
Narrator: Nicol Zanzarella
Series: Eve Ronin (Book 4)
Publication: Thomas & Mercer (June 21, 2022); Brilliance Audio (June 21, 2022)
Length: 351 p.; 9 hours and 4 minutes

Description: Malibu Creek State Park is a beautiful locale for campers, tourists, hikers, and Hollywood. For Detective Eve Ronin, it’s a backdrop for murder in a riveting thriller by #1 New York Times bestselling author Lee Goldberg.

For decades Malibu Creek State Park was the spectacular natural setting where Hollywood fantasies were made. But when a female camper is gunned down, it becomes a real-life killing ground. Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department homicide detectives Eve Ronin and Duncan Pavone are assigned the case…which Duncan fears is the latest in a series of sniper attacks that began long before Eve came to Lost Hills.

Seven victims over fourteen months…and top officials still refuse to see a connection. Eve and Duncan are stonewalled, threatened, and ordered to keep quiet. But Eve won’t back down. She’s no stranger to intimidation or corruption—she’s had a target on her back from day one at Lost Hills station.

Despite finding no evidentiary links between the shootings, Eve and Duncan follow their instincts into the shadows of Malibu Creek, where it’s not enough to expose the secrets and break the conspiracy of silence. They also have to make it out alive.

My Thoughts: The fourth Eve Ronin mystery has her partner Duncan Pavone just two weeks from retirement and Eve worrying that she hasn't yet learned enough from him. Her TV show is in the pilot stage with her estranged father set to direct it and her long-time movie extra mother set for a speaking role, but Eve is still reluctant to see her life on the screen. 

Unfortunately, a $10 million lawsuit against her for harassing a fellow deputy into suicide is hanging over her head and the department isn't offering her any support. Her quick rise to the murder-homicide division of the Sheriff's Department has made her lots more enemies than friends. 

This time the pair are called to a homicide in the National Park that is in their jurisdiction. Two women have been shot with bird pellets, killing one and leaving the other, a blogger with a grudge against the Sheriff's Department, injured but alive. 

The Park administration wants to cover this up so that park attendance isn't hurt, but Duncan is sure that this is just one more in a long list of crimes using a shotgun. It is the first fatality though. Both the Park and the Sheriff's Department have been covering up the incidents.

Eve and Duncan are determined to find the murderer despite the cover ups. Of course, Eve is also looking for the deputies who vandalized her car and tried to kill her too. 

The story was action-packed. I really liked Eve's determination to solve the crimes despite the great personal danger she faced from inside and outside the Sheriff's Department. I liked to see that her relationship with her mother wasn't as broken as it looked in earlier books. I also liked how political Eve was while still believing herself to be non-political. She seems pretty efficient at using pressure to get her way within the Sheriff's Department.

Nicol Zanzarella did a great job narrating the story. 

I bought this one. You can buy your copy here.