Look, I need to get something off my chest. Patterson books are the MREs of thrillers — you know exactly what you're getting, they'll keep you alive on a long drive, but nobody's winning a Michelin star. And that's fine. I've burned through dozens of them on I-35 between Austin and Dallas. But Steal tested my patience in a way most Patterson collabs don't, and it wasn't entirely the story's fault.
Let me cut to the chase: the narration nearly killed this one for me.
When Your Narrator Brings a Butter Knife to a Gunfight
Jay Ben Markson delivers every line of Steal in what I can only describe as the vocal equivalent of a flat tire on smooth asphalt — technically functional, gets you there, but you feel every rotation. Near monotone is being generous. Dylan Reinhart is supposed to be this sharp, witty abnormal psych professor who moonlights in dangerous situations. The character needs energy, sarcasm, edge. What we get is a guy reading the phone book with good diction.
I was cleaning out the garage Sunday afternoon — Linda's been on me about it for weeks — and I actually stopped what I was doing to check if my phone speaker was malfunctioning. Nope. That's just the performance. It's clean audio, crisp production, zero technical issues. But liveliness? Personality? Not in the budget, apparently.
If this series had a previous narrator who brought more heat (and from what I gather, it did), switching to Markson was a strategic miscalculation. Like replacing your lead scout with a finance guy because he can read a map.
The Patterson Assembly Line Still Produces
Here's where I'll give credit. The story structure does what Patterson and Roughan do best — short chapters that hit like three-round bursts. You're never more than a few minutes from the next hook. Carter von Oehson fakes (or doesn't fake?) a suicide, daddy's a hedge fund titan with secrets that could crater his empire, and Dylan Reinhart gets pulled into the middle of it. Standard Patterson chess pieces on the board.
The setup is genuinely clever. A college sophomore posts about killing himself on Instagram, his sailboat comes back empty, and the one person who believes he's alive — his billionaire father — can't go to the cops without detonating his own life. That's a solid premise. I've seen this scenario play out in real life with missing persons cases where the family knows more than they're sharing, and the dynamics ring true enough. Delicate Truth does something similar with family secrets and institutional cover-ups — and does it at a level that made me wish Patterson played it that tight.
The triple-cross stuff with art galleries, casinos, and hedge fund money is entertaining if you don't think too hard about it. Patterson's never been about the fine print — he's about velocity. And at 8 hours 17 minutes, this thing moves. Even at 1x you'd burn through it in a weekend. At my standard 1.25x, I had it done before Ranger's Tuesday morning walk.
But — and this is where it lost me — the middle section sags. There are stretches where Dylan and Elizabeth Needham are chasing threads that feel like busywork. You can almost hear the gears of the plot machinery grinding while Patterson and Roughan set up their dominoes. In a more dynamically narrated version, you might not notice. With Markson's flat delivery, those slow patches feel like convoy duty on an empty highway. You're awake, but barely.
Who Gets Value From This Intel
If you're a Patterson completist or already invested in the Dylan Reinhart series, you'll want this. The story delivers on its promise — there are twists, the father-son dynamic has some genuine tension, and the ending doesn't cheat. The short chapter structure makes it perfect for commuters or anyone who needs clean stop-and-start points.
But if you're new to the series, don't start here. And if you care about narrator performance — really care, like it makes or breaks the experience for you — this one's going to frustrate you. I'd honestly recommend reading the print version over this audio edition. That's not something I say often.
The author clearly did their homework on the hedge fund world and the psychological dynamics of a family built on secrets. That part works. The mystery mechanics work. The execution on the audio side? That's the weak link in the chain.
Boots Off, Gun Cleaned, Honest Assessment
Worth your time? Here's the debrief: Steal is a competent thriller handicapped by a narrator who doesn't match the material's energy. It's a 3.5-star story getting a 2.5-star delivery. Ranger fell asleep during this one, and I don't blame him — though in fairness, he does that during most things. Stream it if you're curious, but don't burn a credit. Save that for something that earns it.
