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    Still Life with Crows: A Novel
    Unavailable
    Still Life with Crows: A Novel
    Unavailable
    Still Life with Crows: A Novel
    Audiobook15 hours

    Still Life with Crows: A Novel

    Written by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

    Narrated by Scott Brick

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    A small Kansas town has turned into a killing ground.
    Is it a serial killer, a man with the need to destroy?
    Or is it a darker force, a curse upon the land?
    Amid golden cornfields, FBI Special Agent Pendergast discovers evil in the blood of America's heartland.
    No one is safe.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHachette Audio
    Release dateJul 5, 2011
    ISBN9781611138757
    Unavailable
    Still Life with Crows: A Novel
    Author

    Douglas Preston

    DOUGLAS PRESTON has published forty books of both nonfiction and fiction, of which over thirty have been New York Times bestsellers, a half-dozen reaching the #1 position. He is the co-author, with Lincoln Child, of the Pendergast series of thrillers. He also writes nonfiction pieces for the New Yorker Magazine. He worked as an editor at the American Museum of Natural History in New York and taught nonfiction writing at Princeton University. He is president emeritus of the Authors Guild and serves on the Advisory Board of the School for Advanced Research in Santa Fe.

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    Reviews for Still Life with Crows

    4/5

    843 ratings39 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Another great read in the Pendergast series. While some of these books aren't always a 5-star read, they're still incredibly enjoyable and I always find myself looking to grab the next one of the series at Barnes & Noble when it gets released each year. Hats off to Pendergast and all of his investigations.
    • 4/5


      Love Agent Pendergast. Superb research behind the entertaining plot. Epilogue capped it off nicely. Would recommend to anyone in search of a classic investigator amid real life circumstances with a sick twist.
    • 5/5
      Another good novel with Agent Pendergast...one of their early ones which certainly get alot better as you move through the series.
    • 4/5
      Had me on my seat! A wonderful Pendergast book that gets him out of The City but is still filled with all the great Pendergast-isms.
    • 4/5
      The first Douglas Preston/Lincoln Child book I ever read. Love the character of Pendergast. His antics are mind boggling. I've read everything they have ever written, both separately and together, since then. Highly recommend any of their books.
    • 4/5
      When the farm community of Medicine Creek, Kansas, is terrorized by a series of disturbing murders, FBI agent Pendergast discovers a link between a moonshine operation and an unsolved killing from more than 150 years earlier.
    • 4/5
      A great mystery crime novel given to me to read by my father- a book that not only lead me to read the entire "Penderghast" series, but to delve into the mystery-crime genre for a time. The intriguing protagonist is only the start to a great novel, were a complex mystery is unfolding in a small town, ending in ritualistic murders. What would seem to be a boring, cliche book ended up being something that has stuck with me throughout my literary experience. It is a refined, tense, and well written book that keeps you going until the very end- which for me would be the only flaw. Yes, the series does touch on the supernatural, but the antagonist was a bit ridiculous in this novel- and he is only revealed at the very, very end if i recall correctly. All and all, this is a great novel and definitely worth a read for someone interested in a crime novel with a twist.
    • 5/5
      My favorite of all of them.
    • 4/5
      An Agent Pendergrast book you must never miss.
    • 5/5
      A very dark and spine-tingling read! My favorite Pendergast book yet.
    • 5/5
      This is the fourth installment of Pendergast that I have read, and I think he just gets better and better.

      This tale takes place in a small (read desolate) town in Kansas. Has mysterious killings, Indian curses and all that make small towns both incredible and intolerable.

      Excellent read!
    • 4/5
      Six-word review: Gruesome monster chase in Kansas cornfields. Extended review:The Agent Pendergast series is turning into a guilty pleasure for me. I know what I'm getting (I'll have fries with that), and I couldn't handle it as a steady diet (need balance, need nutrition, need fresh green vegetables), but sometimes it's fun to take a little vacation (catsup, plenty of napkins, no dishes to clean up afterwards).The mealtime analogy ends there, though, because you definitely don't want to be reading this one at the dinnertable.In fact, there are some meals that may never again look quite so appealing.Each of the Pendergast books so far, I've noticed, weaves some sort of social theme into the plot. Maybe this is for relevance and depth, maybe it's because the authors really want to get a message out and are using entertainment as a platform, or maybe it's just because exposed social ills get our revulsion reflexes warmed up for the gut-twisting details of the main story.(Honestly, I don't know why I'm enjoying these things. Usually too much grue puts me right off and I abandon the book. I can't say that it's because it's done here with such taste and refinement. Perhaps it's more that I just can't take these yarns too seriously--subterranean homeless populations and urban drug addiction and poultry processing plants notwithstanding.)At any rate, here we have Agent Pendergast sleuthing amid the alien corn in sun-baked Kansas while something awful is carrying off small-town citizens and leaving their horribly mutilated bodies in dramatically ritualized arrangements. His preternatural mental powers come into play once again as he divines the connection between present events and the blood-drenched site of a nineteenth-century massacre.Typically, most of the secondary characters are paper cutouts; to call them cardboard would be to overrate their substance. But there are always a few of an interesting complexity, notably the conflicted young woman who becomes his temporary aide and one member of the local constabulary.I've done some fairly heavy reading lately, and one or two of my slow-moving current titles involve focused brainwork. I raced through this paperback page-turner like the fast-food alternative it is, licking my lips and for a little while forgetting about my diet.
    • 3/5
      As with all my guilty pleasures, my enjoyment of the fun things outweighs the irritation caused by the guilty bits. In the cases of Pendergast novels, the guilty bits are the wild implausibilities in both setting and some of the characters.

      The delicious yummy things in this novel included:

      The corn. I have no idea why, but I loved the setting the middle of all that corn. There was one particularly good quote about it too: "It wasn't natural, to be surrounded by so much goddamned corn. It made people strange."

      I liked Corrie. I thought she was nicely characterized. She falls into the outcast-orphan trope, but it isn't overdone and I like the personal changes she undergoes through the story. They are believable and positive.

      I wanted to like Hazen. He started out strong as a no-nonsense sheriff who had plenty of common sense and drive, but he deteriorated into too much of a stereotypical roadblock that was only there to foil Pendergast.

      I always like Pendergast. He might be a little to perfect, but I just can't help myself.

      And the caves were cool, insofar as the mysteries they contained, what they represented, and ... well, I just think caves are cool. But... but but but... The last 30% of the novel was 80% too long. I confess to skimming most of the chapters in which the characters were wandering around down in the caves, being killed one after another. It's as if the authors really wanted to describe lots of awful, gruesome deaths in a cave, and had to make sure we got full details on every one. I would have been just fine with "They went down into the caves. Three hours later, only two of them returned, all bloody."

      My other grouse about the caves is that it was SO easy to run around in. They're chasing each other thither and yon, running along paths and down tunnels and across beautiful, flat floors. Um, excuse me? Have any of you ever been in an actual cave? Caves, as a rule, are not easy to get around in. They floors are covered with boulders, broken rocks, and rubble IF there even are floors. Much more often, all you have is sloping walls joining together, steep slabs of broken sedimentary rocks, and a mess. You don't go down into a cave with tennis shoes and a flashlight, you go with full climbing gear and headlamps. Maybe Job made all those cave parts passable, but....

      So that's all I'll grouse about. I liked the resolution of the mystery. A fun romp. I'll keep reading them. :)
    • 3/5
      If the F.B.I. employed Mary Poppins she would be Aloysius Pendergast. He is "practically perfect in every way". He has any tool he needs readily at his disposal. He is the composite gentleman and deals with every situation in a calm and rational manner. He seems a little bit larger than life. But in the Agent Pendergast novels it seems to work. This one takes place in a small rural town where unusual "tableau" murders have taken place. As usual, Agent Pendergast is working "off the books" so does not solve the crime, but in his own unique way, points others to doing so. I am always entertained by good old Aloysius.
    • 4/5
      I love this character.
    • 4/5
      In Medicine Creek Kansas, the victim of a grotesque murder is found in a corn field. FBI agent Pendergast finds out about it and goes there to offer his assistance. As the investigation progresses, it becomes evident to him that there is an evil element residing among the residents. After a second body is found, will he be able to find the murderer before more lives are lost? Still Life With Crows is a top notch thriller.
    • 3/5
      This book was an even mixture of good points and not-so-good points. I loved the fact that Pendergast was away from New York City and the Natural History Museum. It was nice to see him in a new setting. I also liked his sidekick for this story. She was an interesting character filled with teenage angst. I enjoyed her perspective. Now for the not-so-good. The ending was very predictable. I would have rathered a different twist (but it wasn't bad at all), however the epilogue was dragged out. Part 3 of the epilogue was all that was really necessary.
    • 3/5
      Different setting, different people and different type of a killer. The setting, a very small town in Kansas, is what you would expect from a place with three hundred or so people. They argue a lot, gossip and want to know everything. As in the first three books, you get the rich who want something, but the inconvenient murder is getting in their way. I like the choice of the setting. It is isolated and small.

      Pendergast's interest is peaked when someone killed a man in Medicine Creek in a gruesome and what seemed to be ritualistic manner. While it is more than creepy to read about something in the corn fields and each death is completely different than the next, I never felt the dread like in the first book.
      Pendergast himself was less present than I would have liked, but a few hints about his brother and family here and there are enough to keep that aura of mystery the man has. I love the character. He is like a weirder version of Sherlock Holmes.

      The same formula, but not in equal measure is used for supporting cast. He enlists a town misfit to drive him around as his assistant. Corrie is one of the characters I loved. I hope she will appear in other books. Next, it seems that Pendergast has to have a journalist in his corner, but this one doesn't have as prominent role as Smithback had. And there is an unavoidable jerk cop.

      I liked the previous books more. but I wouldn't go so far to say I didn't like this. Still Life With Crows is just different. I still liked it. I wouldn't recommend this as the first Pendergast book though. I would start with Relic.
    • 5/5
      Super creepy, excellent story. Had me from the first chapter, first paragraph!
    • 5/5
      Excellent, well written. I dread the day I finish reading all of their novels. I haven't been disappointed yet.
    • 4/5
      #53, 2006I enjoyed this book, although I won’t say I loved it. It’s set in Kansas, where a series of rather bizarre killings in a small farming town coincides with the arrival of some folks who want to plant genetically-engineered corn. Agent Pendergast (featured in other books by these authors) shows up to investigate. I’m giving it a high rating because it was a page-turner, and pulled me in right away and kept me reading. I found the ending a bit unsatisfying, though. That didn’t spoil that I enjoyed the rest of it though, it just means I’m not likely to want to read it again. I also found that, while it was a bit creepy at times, it wasn’t too scary for me (and I can be a wimp about horror books, which is why I rarely read them any more, after too many Stephen King-induced sleepless nights), and by the end, I’d stopped being scared at all. 8/10, and I’ve heard that other books in this series are even better, so I’ll probably hunt up a few of those, too.LJ Discussion
    • 4/5
      A mutilated, ritually-displayed, corpse found in a cornfield draws the series protagonist, Agent Pendergast to Medicine Creek, Kansas or how the locals like to call their town, Medicine Crick. Pendergast's intrusion into Sheriff Hazen's county is not welcomed; however, he believes that he can't prevent the FBI agent's investigation. Another thorn in his side is the fact Pendergast has hired an adolescent misfit to transport him around the town and to provide information about the history of the town and its residents. When additional murders occur, Pendergast begins to wonder if the murders could be related to an old curse associated with the ancient Indian burial mounds located near town.The audiobook I listened to was produced well. Scott Brick was skilled in narrating this book; he effectively juggled the many characters, male and female, of this book. His voice added to the suspense of this novel. I hope that he narrates the other novels.
    • 4/5
      Pendergast is a terrific character. Preston and Child are terrific writers. The entire concept is right in my wheelhouse when I'm looking for an X-Files fix and I'm not in the mood to rewatch some Mulder and Scully. This is another solid entry in the series and is as good or better than those that came before. As such, it made me bump up the next one to a spot closer to the top of the TBR pile.
    • 5/5
      Great book. Great reader. But don’t listen alone in the dark , alone . . .
    • 4/5
      In this 4th book of the series, FBI Special Agent Pendergast shows up (while on his vacation!) to a small corn-farming community in Kansas to help solve a recent murder. He hires a high school girl, who is often in trouble herself and who just wants to get out of town as soon as she’s done high school, to be his assistant and chauffeur. The local sheriff is surprised that Pendergast thinks the killer is local… in this small town of fewer than 400 people, where everyone knows everyone! Unfortunately, the killings don’t stop at one…I thought this was really good. I liked the change of location for this book. It was very creepy at times, in amidst all that corn!
    • 2/5
       Still Life With Crows is about a small town in Kansas called Medicine Creek. Now some freaky things have been going on. By freaky I mean murders. No one knows who it is. People just keep disappearing and keep being found in the same corn field. An FBI agent is sent in to work on the case with the Kansas police. Together, they find out the unknown secrets of the townWhile reading Still Life With Crows, I thought it was an okay book. Not Terrible...but not amazing. I remember that I loved the beginning and thought that the author was giving great detail. But then once I got to the middle of the book I got bored because I thought the book was too predictable. So I put the book down and never finished it, I hate when books are too predictable. Therefore, I would not recommend this book to people.
    • 4/5
      Genre: Horror/Thriller Rating: Best of the Series I’ve Read so Far Agent Pendergast, just as mysterious as ever, turns up in a tiny Kansas town after a bizarre murder is found with the scene set as a ritualistic tableau. But the next murder makes no sense, at least none that anyone can figure out, since it breaks all the rules regarding serial killers. Pendergast, unloved by the local cops, finds a young girl, an ousider like him, to assist and he and she set out to catch the killer. Very good descriptions of the country, the scenes, the local flora and fauna, complex mystery, and lots of crazy chases.
    • 4/5
      Lexi DubovickBook ReviewSWAGOctober 20, 2012Still Life With CrowsBy: Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child“Still Life With Crows” by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child is by far the most advanced adult book I have ever read. It is about the small town of Medicine Creek, Kansas shaken by a serial killer that comes out of the blue. But this is no ordinary serial killer. This one murders his victims based on whoever is around. He has odd and disturbing ways of displaying the bodies and the crime scenes.What I loved about this book was that it was not only the chase for a psycho, but actually about creating a plot deeper than just solving murders. I can’t say much more without giving away important details, but the authors give you a lot to think about in between the murders.I would give this book a rating of 4 stars. What I didn’t like about the book was that the authors added in too many random characters without any explanations, and seriously lacked character development except with a few of the main characters. It was extremely hard to follow when a brand new unexplained character was speaking about something from their point of view. I always got confused between which character was which. Again, it just made it confusing and hard to follow.Overall I truly loved this book! It had great descriptions (except when it came to the characters), great development with the plot and building things up, and very descriptive murder scenes. It is extremely gory so I advise anybody who may not be able to handle gross, disturbing, scary, and somewhat torturous books. In my case I didn’t take this as a bad thing, but it was quite different for me as a reader.This book is definitely for those of you looking for a scarier, “more detailed” version of something like law and order, with intricate planning and great detail. Enjoy!
    • 5/5
      Probably my favorite Agent Pendergast novel so far. Loved the small town Kansas setting surrounded by corn fields, in the midst of a long hot summer. Pendergast is away from New York this time and on vacation, although a vacation for him means murders and mayhem. Once again, we find ourselves undergound. Hey, at least it's cool down there.
    • 4/5
      An unusual installment in the chronicles of Special Agent Pendergast, as he investigates a gruesome murder in the small dusty town of Medicine Creek, Kansas. The victim has been mutilated and arranged in an intricate scene in a small clearing in a cornfield. Soon other murders are taking place, and the fish-out-of-water Pendergast must counter small-town suspicions and prejudices as he attempts to unveil the killer. He enlists the help of 18-year-old Corrie Swanson, a town oddball who reminds me of a younger Lisbeth Salander (from the "Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" trilogy). A stand-alone Pendergast chapter that is riveting for its characters and high suspense.