• Die Trying

  • By: Nicholas Ryan
  • Narrated by: R.C. Bray
  • Length: 6 hrs and 21 mins
  • 4.4 out of 5 stars (2,214 ratings)

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Die Trying  By  cover art

Die Trying

By: Nicholas Ryan
Narrated by: R.C. Bray
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Publisher's summary

Trapped amidst the horror of the zombie apocalypse, three men hear the sound of a helicopter overhead and know it represents their last desperate hope to survive the terror and reach safety. But survival comes at a cost - and the undead hordes that ravage the world are not the only lurking evil the men must face. But for Mitch Logan; his brother, Jed; and their friend, Clinton Harrigan; there is no choice.They must fight to survive - or Die Trying.

©2014 Nicholas Ryan (P)2014 Podium Publishing

Critic reviews

”A heart-stopping zombie thriller!" (D.A. Wearmouth, best-selling author of First Activation)

What listeners say about Die Trying

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Bray does a great job on a ok story

I am running out of zombie titles to review and I am getting desperate! The end result is this: R.C. Bray is the one of the best narrators for this genre. He narrates multiple books in my top 10. He has the ability to make a average title better. I am really starting to get very worried, what will be my next genre... romance novels here I come... See how the pressure is getting to me... bah romance novels!

While there is nothing wrong with this title, it is not the best in the genre. It just doesn’t add enough and it lacks two things I really enjoy in a zombie story. Firstly, I like the comic book albeit adult comic style violence. You know the action that makes you feel young at heart!

Secondly, and most importantly this one is devoid of humour. Looking at my top 10, all of them serve up large portions of sarcasm, often the character’s sense of humour highlights the humanity of the main characters (sane or not).

This will certainly kill some time if you have a boring commute to work but if you listen to a lot of zombie stories, you will probably soon forget about this one after finishing. So my buying advice is simple, ‘pay your money, have some fun, and move on’.

On more simple matters: The publishers summary is accurate of the story. If you choose titles on a cost per minute basis, then please take note that the narration can be easily sped up to 1.25x speed thus decreasing listening time.

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30 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

I have never been so tense

I have never been as tense while listening to a zombie apocalypse audiobook as I was while listening to Die Trying: A Zombie Apocalypse. The first part of this story that hooked me immediately taking place during a violent thunder storm in the pitch black of night, where our military guys were trying to track down a mysterious sound in the air, I really thought that was all the story was going to be for awhile and I would have been totally alright with that. Under constant fear the zombies would hear or find them and ruin their day. Nicholas Ryan bring forth a new type of zombie to my ears, the kind that will eat each other, one was wounded and suddenly the horde stops advancing, moaning turning to growling, and then they converged upon the wounded and tore it to shreds in an all out ravenous feeding frenzy. If that wasn't enough for you Ryan was able to create characters that really spoke to me with their complex histories and a certain mystery surrounding a few of them. My only criticism is that this audiobook was way too short, so many other avenues could have been explored. I highly recommend Die Trying: A Zombie Apocalypse, but only if you are looking for a quick listen that is really fast paced, full of action, tons of suspense and different than your usual zombies. As I said earlier I have already purchased Ground Zero: A Zombie Apocalypse an earlier release because Ryan was able to rouse something in me that few other authors have.

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17 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Pacing is all over the place

One thing I learned in writing classes: you never waste the reader's time.
I'm not done with the book, but one reoccurring thing bothers me so much I wrote my review early.
Pacing.
When the action starts and you want it to hit you like a ton of bricks, the narrative slows to a snail's pace. One passage goes on for what feels like 10 pages about a zombie being hit in the head with a crowbar, with a description of every little movement that happens while it's hit.
Also, I feel like I have been listening to a helicopter crash for an hour and a half. It gets so overdrawn in some passages that it ends up taking me out of the story and wondering when I can move on.
Otherwise, it seems like an ok book so far, if a little run-of-the-mill. RC Bray is excellent as always. He reads "The Mountain Man" series as well, one of my favorites.

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10 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

enjoyed the writing

Any additional comments?


as the story opens, 3 weeks have passed since the dead have come back to life and started eating people. mitch, jed, and clinton are holed up in a house, afraid of drawing any attention to them. their food and water are almost gone, and between them, they only have one handgun. a storm is approaching. clinton hushes the guys as he thinks he hears something mechanical approaching. above the wind and pouring rain, they hear a helicopter. as the helicopter approaches their house, clinton notices the helicopter's engine is making a funny noise. clinton tells mitch and jed that he believes the helicopter is going to go down. as they peak out the window to try to find where the helicopter is, the helicopter turns on a spotlight and starts to look for a safe place to land. although they all agree that the helicopter's noise will draw zombies from all over the place, they come to the conclusion that rescuing the survivors may be the only way they can survive. with the storm raging, they head out to follow the failing helicopter.

mitch and jed are brothers, but there's a lot of bad blood between them. mitch was picking up jed the day the zombie apocylapse started. jed had just finished a 7 year stretch in prison. throughout the story, the tensions between jed and mitch build. you'd think that 2 brothers could put the past behind them, especially during a zombie apocylapse, but jed just cannot forgive his brother. the reason behind jed's hatred of his brother is kind of unrealistic, but the author does do a good job of ratcheting up the tension between them.

the author also does a pretty good job building mystery about the helicopter's survivors. you know there's something off about them, but you don't know exactly what it is until it's finally revealed. i've listened to a bunch of zombie novels, but i've never listened to one where the characters were so terrified of zombies. well, maybe if i only had 1 handgun and a crowbar, i'd be just as terrified. but the terror of what they went through causes them to even fear the appearance of a single zombie, and 2 of them are really burly men!

as for the zombies, they're the slow, shambling type. throughout most of the story, the characters try to avoid them as much as possible. most of the interaction happen at the bookends- the beginning and the ending.

after the big reveal, the plot becomes kind of predictable. the whole story takes place over a couple of days. the pacing of the story is kind of slow as the first 2 hours revolve around rescuing the people in the helicopter. this is more of a run and hide zombie story than a zombie battle story.

there's not a lot of character development, but the author is able to develop a palpable atmosphere of tension between the characters.

i think what i liked most about the story was the writing. it's one of the more descriptive zombie stories i've listened to. but that might be too much for some listeners. as a wannabe writer, i valued how the author described actions, situations, and characters.

as a zombie story, it's just ok. there are more entertaining and faster-paced stories out there. but if you're a fan of well-written sentences, scenes, and dialog, then definitely give it a listen. it has given me ideas of what to do and what not to do.

there's definitely an opportunity for the story to continue. i think that if a second book is written, then it would be more interesting b/c of the reveal. i like the author's writing style, and my biggest disappointment is that i think the author left a lot on the table.

overall, nothing in the story really stood out to me, but i did like the writing. the narration is pretty good. rc bray does a good job portraying the male characters. i found him easy to listen to.

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9 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

Stop Giving 5Stars

The writing is bad. Was there no editor? Seriosuly bad! I'm pissed. How do books like this find there way to RC Bray? Worst of all, fellow listeners give it a five star review. Stop it! When the writing is this bad you cannot rate something five stars. You are ruining the system for everyone.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

Yeah...No

I struggled to finish this book. I didn't enjoy it. I kept waiting for it to get good and it just never did. The story line seemed incomplete and the characters had no depth. I didn't find myself caring if they lived or died. I actually was kinda hoping they would all just die so it would b over and I could move on to the next book.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars

Hmmmm, well...

Story was of course short to say and not extremely entertaining sadly.
R.C. Bray's read is pretty good on the books I've heard him read.
Guess I wanted more to the story with the time we had.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars
  • OB
  • 08-02-21

Pretty good

Worth a listen. Some suspense and tragedy. Well written, I believe. Genre is played but this stands on it’s own. RC Bray makes it so.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

GREAT STORY

I really enjoyed this story and as always RC. Bray was awesome his voice is perfect for this kind of story. I also liked that the story was only close to 7 hours unlike other books like this that drag it over several books. I think that anyone who gets this audiobook will be greatly satisfied.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Like starting a story in the middle

This was like opening a book, starting in the middle, and not finishing the story.. I love this narrator but did not enjoy the book at all

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1 person found this helpful