The Operators cover art

The Operators

On the Streets with Britain's Most Secret Service

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The Operators

By: James Rennie
Narrated by: Alex Hyde-White
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About this listen

Few outside the security services have heard of 14 Company. As deadly as the SAS yet more secret, the operators of 14 Company are Britain's most effective weapon against international terrorism. For every bomb that goes off, 14 Company prevent 12. The selection process is the most physically, intellectually, and emotionally demanding anywhere in the world. This is the true story of one operator and of some of the most hair-raising military operations ever conducted on the streets of Britain.

©2016 James Rennie (P)2020 Pen and Sword Military
Espionage Freedom & Security Great Britain Military & War Special & Elite Forces Military England British Crime
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What listeners say about The Operators

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Beware of robots 🤖

Cannot fault the author or story, the content is excellent, detailed and a gives a great insight of the British army’s undercover activities in Ulster, however l only listened in small sections, as l couldn’t get on with the automated computerised voiceover used, which ruins the experience, it’s like being on the phone to a call centre , one chapter has an attempted Yorkshire accent which was laughable.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

one of the best secret service books!

I'd hear about the det before in the various sas books I'd read and how the sas would get training with the det. this book gave me a complete and detailed insight of the covert operations the detachment sqdn 14 would run in the fight against the UKs long war with terrorists on both sides of the boarder. it's well read and occasionally hard to listen to the code words etc but you soon get used to it. I'm now going to see if the author has written any more books, I thoroughly enjoyed this !!

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Ingesting book, awful narration

A really good insight into the training and work of the operators in 14 Company. Unfortunately the narration really let it down. For some bizarre reason the narrator kept attempting regional accents that he was totally ill equipped to perform.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Great story, poor narration

The overall story is excellent. However the narration really lets it down. He has very unusual pronunciation & at times by the time I’d worked out what he was saying a sentence or two had passed by.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Dreadful narration of an interesting history

Narration was terrible - accents bizarre and frequently emphasis on the wrong part of words. There was a lot on the selection aspects - would have liked to have heard more of operations. Could have used an editor

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Decent enough insight but please re-record it!

The story is a good enough insight into secret service (mostly the training side of things) touching on a bit of NI conflict but the narrator leaves a LOT to be desired. I listen to a fair amount of audiobooks in my car, mostly military and military history but this narrator is the worst I have encountered. His Welsh, Irish and often English accent is laughable, sounding somewhere between jalalabad and Western Australia, just awful. If you can over look that narration the story is worth a punt but they could do with a re-reading of it!

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Great story but hilariously poor narration

Narrator’s agent : “I’ve got you a gig. You need to do provincial British accents - Yorkshire, Welsh, Ulster amongst others. Oh and how are you on French car makes? And this is an amazing insight into Special Forces ops - the listener should be feel the tension in the story. “

Narrator : “Watch this!”

Narrator’s Agent : <Face palm> “You’ll never work in this town again!”

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Great but change the narrator

Really enjoyed this book apart from the photography section which was too technical. Fascinating insight with great detail and very human touches.

However, I’m afraid that the narration almost spoilt it especially in the first half. Accents changed mid sentence, pronunciation was regularly distracting - I’m sure a more suitable narrator could have been found. I was close to giving up because of it.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

not bad

like mentioned i don't think the American guy should have narrated this, his knowledge of military acronyms was lacking, the book story was good but I can see it could be confusing for anyone who hasn't used brevity code

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2 people found this helpful

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

Good book, well written.

Good book, well written. Even though I am ex army, I'd never even heard of this unit.

I wasn't overly keen on the narrator and how he would mispronounce words

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1 person found this helpful