The Dark Tunnel (1944) – Ross Macdonald Free Audiobook

Written by Ross Macdonald
Read by Grover Gardner
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 64 Kbps
Unabridged

Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
Release date: June 24, 2005
Duration: 07:02:00
Series: Chet Gordon, book 1

On the home front, two wartime lovers reunite under a cloud of paranoia in this thriller from Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Ross Macdonald. This was his first novel and written under his real name. Kenneth Millar

In 1937 Munich, an American Doctor Robert Branch was a university professor, not a secret agent. But his best friend was dead, and Branch knew that it couldn’t have been suicide. He was also certain that a Nazi espionage group operating on campus had arranged the murder.. The only trouble was, no one would believe him.

Only the timely intervention of Ruth Esch, a flame-haired actress, saves him. So begins a month-long romance between East and West – a torrid affair that ends when the lovers make the mistake of defending a Jew, earning Branch a beating and Esch a trip to a concentration camp

Branch knew that the Nazis would have him eliminated as soon as it was convenient.

He’d even narrowed his choice of executioner down to three: a psychotic homosexual, a respected educator, and the woman he loved.

Six years later, Esch escapes to Vichy and makes her way to Detroit. To her surprise, Branch is waiting for her. He is a professor, working for the war effort, and his paranoia about a spy inside the Motor City war board sours their reunion. Once again, a dangerous net is encircling these lovers – a reminder that, in this war, love always comes second to death.

Ross Macdonald was a pseudonym for Kenneth Millar (1915-1983), an author of detective fiction best known for creating the character of Lew Archer, a California PI. Born in California, Millar lived in Ontario, Canada, until his father abandoned his mother, uprooting the family and forcing them to move again and again over the next few years-a formative experiences that would often be echoed in Millar’s work. While attending the University of Michigan, Millar began writing pulp fiction, publishing this his first novel, The Dark Tunnel, in 1944. Millar introduced Lew Archer in 1949.

Remember this is a first novel so some characters are stereotype and writing is a bit clumsy.