RAVENS

The Boatrights, a small-town Southern family, win $318 million, making real their dreams of the high life. Shaw and Romeo, two men who are passing through the quiet town, hear about the win and start scheming. Soon the winning ticket becomes shared earnings as a secret extortion threat hangs over the family. Robert Petkoff and Maggi-Meg Reed narrate admirably as they portray the story’s characters, among them a quiet psychopath, a teenage girl, a beaten-up deputy, and a tipsy mom. However, the same characters are voiced by both narrators. Reed’s voice is better suited to the women, and the deeper-voiced Petkoff should stick to the men. Nonetheless, both narrators deliver the rising tension of these intersecting lives. M.B. © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine [Published: AUGUST 2009]