Day: August 28, 2013

Listen to the first five chapters of Brandon Sanderson’s Steelheart

Seth Wilson

SFFaudio Online Audio

Cover Art for Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson

Steelheart
By Brandon Sanderson; Read by Macleod Andrews
[EXCERPT] – 1 hour 31 minutes
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: 2013
Themes: dystopia / superheroes / revenge

Audible has made available the first five chapters of Brandon Sanderson’s forthcoming YA dystopian novel Steelheart for free. The novel will be released September 24.

A red star-like object called Calamity appears in our night’s sky. A year later, certain individuals begin developing supernatural powers and come to be known as Epics. A decade or so later, chaos reigns as the Epics turn our world into their personal playground–and battleground. The novel’s prologue flashes back ten years from the main events to a time when the world was still relatively whole. In an unsettling scene, the titular villain is introduced and grounds for a vendetta are established. The remainder of the excerpt follows the main character, whose name we don’t learn, along his first steps on the path of revenge as he courts the resistance movement known as the Reckoners.

Like many readers, I first heard the name Brandon Sanderson in connection with the Wheel of Time series. Having abandoned that bloated series long ago, I never read his contribution, but I did read and enjoy Elantris, the Mistborn trilogy, and Warbreaker. A few chapters into his gargantuan The Way of Kings, however, I realized I was experiencing Sanderson fatigue. Each of his books or series is best known for its wildly inventive magical system, but I felt like I was reading the same two or three character types with the same motivations battling the same circumstances over and over again.

Judging from the opening chapters, Steelheart shows all the signature strengths of the young writer while shedding the overwrought plotting and characters that plague some of his other work. The novel’s categorization as a YA novel, I think, accounts for a lot of the tight focus on action. The near future dystopian setting also shatters Sanderson’s fantasy mold–The Alloy of Law only cracked it. Of course, the world still bears Sanderson’s unmistakable imaginative stamp. Macleod Andrews’s lively narration also fits the fast pace of the novel quite well, though he’s also capable of rendering the few human, emotional moments expertly as well.

I’m tempted to comment further on the excerpt, but I don’t want to spoil the experience. At an hour and a half, it really is worth a listen, even if you’re normally not a fan of dystopias or YA fiction.

Posted by Seth Wilson

Review of A Wild Sheep Chase by Haruki Murakami

Jenny
SFFaudio Review

A Wild Sheep Chase coverA Wild Sheep Chase: A Novel
By Haruki Murakami; Read by Rupert Degas
Publisher: Random House Audio
Published: August 2013
ISBN: 9780804166539
[UNABRIDGED] – 9 hours, 38 minutes
Excerpt: |MP3|

Themes: / fantasy / sheep / surreal thriller /

Publisher summary:

It begins simply enough: A twenty-something advertising executive receives a postcard from a friend, and casually appropriates the image for an insurance company’s advertisement. What he doesn’t realize is that included in the pastoral scene is a mutant sheep with a star on its back, and in using this photo he has unwittingly captured the attention of a man in black who offers a menacing ultimatum: find the sheep or face dire consequences. Thus begins a surreal and elaborate quest that takes our hero from the urban haunts of Tokyo to the remote and snowy mountains of northern Japan, where he confronts not only the mythological sheep, but the confines of tradition and the demons deep within himself.

In Haruki Murakami’s seductive novel A Wild Sheep Chase, Murakami spins a yarn (see what I did there) around such issues as personal identity and the meaning of life.  Sound complicated?  No not really… well maybe a little, but it all depends on how deep you want to dive and how long you wish to hold your breath.  Do you need to be a trained philosopher and English/lit major to decipher the subtle beauty of this novel?  No, but it doesn’t hurt either.

Murakami’s ability to word-paint vivid autumn colors through brushed scenery of green grass and sunburnt leaves only pales to his talent of sketching his wintered black and white landscapes of rain soaked city nights and the lonely dark of death.  For the most part, I was rolling along really enjoying the ride.  When I reached the end, everything shifted and the true weight of what this story is about settled deep around me like an endless snow.  Lulling, dulling, and soothing the reader until who we are is reflected in a grimy mirror.  The I becomes you, the you becomes we, the we becomes… a sheep?

Here’s all you need to know.  Don’t get hung up on the whole “A sheep inside of me” thing or the uncountable mentions of a “dead whale’s penis,” just go with the flow and ride the tide.  Permit the current to carry you along and let loose your anchor and just drift.

Rupert Degas acting as narrator is brilliant.  Let me say this again.  Rupert Degas as narrator is brilliant.  I haven’t heard a reader narrate something so clean and true since I listened to Frank Muller narrate All Quiet on the Western Front or I Heard the Owl Call My Name.  Rupert Degas delivers a reading that sooths the ear while making Murakami’s narrative dance like maple leaves in a September breeze.

If you can’t tell, I found this to be a damn fine book.  I enjoyed the subtle layering of philosophy and critical theory.  I found the narrative captivating once I “let go.”  Hmmm, might this be a reflection of life?  Is life better consumed if one can let go from time to time with the understanding that time itself is an unanswered question of experienced interpretation?  Maybe…  Maybe so maybe no but still, this was a pleasure to read.

Posted by Casey Hampton.