In Plain Sight

I’ll be honest: I went into *In Plain Sight* expecting a fun, if familiar, mashup of steampunk and detective tropes. What I got instead was a gut-punch of a story that lingers like a bad dream. Dan Willis doesn’t just *set* his tale in Depression-era New York—he marries the era’s despair to a supernatural threat so insidious it makes the Black Death look tame. The plague at the heart of the story isn’t just a MacGuffin; it’s a metaphor for systemic rot, and Willis forces you to sit with the discomfort of a city where the hungry are literally *consumed* by the forces that should protect them. Alex Lockerby is a fantastic protagonist—not because he’s likable (he’s often a self-loathing jerk), but because his flaws make his rare moments of decency hit like a hammer. Vic Mignogna’s performance is the audiobook’s secret weapon. His Lockerby sounds like a man who’s smoked too many cigarettes and seen too many corpses, but he avoids the monotone trap that sinks so many noir narrations. The real standout? His handling of the infected. There’s a scene in Chapter 7 where a plague victim begs for help in a voice that’s *half-human, half-machine*—Mignogna’s delivery is so unsettling I actually paused to check my locks. My only critique: the pacing stumbles slightly in the middle, when Willis indulges in a few too many alchemical exposition dumps. And while the steampunk elements are inventive (a tesla-coil-powered revolver!), the worldbuilding occasionally feels uneven—some gadgets get loving detail, while others are hand-waved. But these are quibbles. The finale is worth the ride: a climactic showdown in a collapsing theater that had me gripping my headphones. If you’re tired of sanitized fantasy, this audiobook is a shot of dirty, brilliant adrenaline.