Recent Arrival: The Gathering Storm by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson

Scott D.

SFFaudio Recent Arrivals

Fantasy Audiobook - The Gathering Storm by Robert Jordan and Brandon SandersonThe Gathering Storm – Book Twelve of The Wheel of Time
By Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson
Read by Kate Reading and Michael Kramer
26 CDs – 34.5 Hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Macmillan Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9781593977672

Here’s the first of the final three novels of the massive Wheel of Time series. Kate Reading and Michael Kramer continue narrating, which is great news.

Tarmon Gai’don, the Last Battle, looms. And mankind is not ready.

The final volume of the Wheel of Time, A Memory of Light, was partially written by Robert Jordan before his untimely passing in 2007. Brandon Sanderson, New York Times bestselling author of the Mistborn books, was chosen by Jordan’s editor—his wife, Harriet McDougal—to complete the final book. The scope and size of the volume was such that it could not be contained in a single book, and so Tor proudly presents The Gathering Storm as the first of three novels that will make up A Memory of Light. This short sequence will complete the struggle against the Shadow, bringing to a close a journey begun almost twenty years ago and marking the conclusion of the Wheel of Time, the preeminent fantasy epic of our era.

In this epic novel, Robert Jordan’s international bestselling series begins its dramatic conclusion. Rand al’Thor, the Dragon Reborn, struggles to unite a fractured network of kingdoms and alliances in preparation for the Last Battle. As he attempts to halt the Seanchan encroachment northward—wishing he could form at least a temporary truce with the invaders—his allies watch in terror the shadow that seems to be growing within the heart of the Dragon Reborn himself.

Egwene al’Vere, the Amyrlin Seat of the rebel Aes Sedai, is a captive of the White Tower and subject to the whims of their tyrannical leader. As days tick toward the Seanchan attack she knows is imminent, Egwene works to hold together the disparate factions of Aes Sedai while providing leadership in the face of increasing uncertainty and despair. Her fight will prove the mettle of the Aes Sedai, and her conflict will decide the future of the White Tower—and possibly the world itself.

The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass. What was, what will be, and what is, may yet fall under the Shadow.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson

Review of Genesis by Bernard Beckett

Scott D.

SFFaudio Review

Genesis by Bernard BeckettGenesis
By Bernard Beckett; Read by Becky Wright
4 CDs – 4 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Brilliance Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9781423381501
Themes: / Science Fiction / Philosophy / Artificial Intelligence / Freedom /

Anax is a student who wants to enter the prestigious Academy and who is undergoing her final exam. A grueling oral presentation of several hours long given before examiners who conduct question and answer sessions is the device used by Bernard Beckett to show us Anax’s world. Anax’s presentation is about an almost mythological figure of history, Adam Forde. Adam lived in a time when the outside world suffered from catastrophic plagues which were responded to by building a wall around their island republic and shooting anyone who tried to break through. When he breaks one of the republic’s most sacred laws, Adam is put on trial. It is Adam’s crime and trial that Anax analyzes.

As Anax takes us further into Adam’s story we gradually become engrossed in questions of personal freedom versus safety and quality of life that arise. Beckett pushes this question further toward the end where Adam becomes engaged in a life-and-death game of wits that turns on the differences between mechanical intelligence and human intelligence. As Adam struggles to find a defining difference we become involved as well in considering what it is that makes us human.

The examiners are philosophers which, as Plato imagined in The Republic, are the rulers of Anax’s society. The emphasis on philosophy in the question and answer session is anything but dry. Anax is forced to push her knowledge and logic past any limits she has previously imagined in order to perform adequately. Ultimately Anax is forced to the same sorts of examinations that we have been doing through the story, which culminate in an interesting twist.

Becky Wright’s narration perfectly points up the elegant prose and superb style of writing. She does an excellent job especially since there is not a lot of action in the novel and most of it is told through conversation or Anax’s presentation of her story.

This is a short audiobook at only four hours long. Yet it is a gripping four hours. Highly recommended.

Posted by Julie D.

Recent Arrival: Return to the Hundred Acre Wood

Scott D.

SFFaudio Recent Arrivals

Fantasy Audiobook - Return the to Hundred Acre Wood by David BenedictusReturn to the Hundred Acre Wood
By David Benedictus; Read by Jim Dale
3 CDs – 3 Hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Penguin Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9780143145073

It was eighty years ago, on the publication of The House at Pooh Corner, when Christopher Robin said good-bye to Winnie-the-Pooh and his friends in the Hundred Acre Wood. Now they are all back in new adventures, for the first time approved by the Trustees of the Pooh Properties. This is a companion volume that truly captures the style of A. A. Milne – a worthy sequel to The House at Pooh Corner and Winnie-the-Pooh.
 


 
Posted by Scott D. Danielson

Review of Star Trek by Alan Dean Foster

Scott D.

SFFaudio Review

Science Fiction Audiobook - Star Trek by Alan Dean FosterStar Trek
By Alan Dean Foster, Based on the movie, written by Roberto Orci and Alex Hurtzman
Read by Zachary Quinto
7 CDs – 8 Hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Simon and Schuster Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9780743598347
Themes: / Science Fiction / Time travel /

|HEAR AN EXCERPT – Kirk on Trial|

Star Trek is dead. Long live Star Trek! Like lots of others, I went to the film expecting to hate it, but came away liking it, even though it was not the Star Trek I knew. In fact, the film pretty much killed Star Trek as I knew it. A bad thing? I’d use the word “unfortunate” because I look at Star Trek and see a huge missed opportunity for intelligent television. I don’t see any thoughtful writing in the franchise’s future – we didn’t see much of it in Voyager and Enterprise either. It had nearly turned into every other show, and this movie just finished the job.

Yet, it wasn’t a bad movie. It was very much a product of the Hollywood Blockbuster machine. Danger, action, sex, witty dialogue, big special effects, some things that make zero sense… it’s all here. It was exciting, it looked great, I liked the actors, and I liked recognizing things that they threw in there from the Original Series. It was fun.

But I’m not here to review the movie. This is Alan Dean Foster’s novelization of the film, read by Zachary Quinto, who portrayed Spock. Back in the 1970’s, Alan Dean Foster wrote one of the best novelizations I’ve run across – Alien. I must’ve read it three or four times as a kid. And he’s no stranger to Star Trek – he wrote the Star Trek Logs which were novelizations of the episodes of the Animated Series. He did a great job with this book, too.

Zachary Quinto also did a great job narrating. The voices are new, even if the characters weren’t. Quinto was an inspired choice to play Mr. Spock, and of course plays that character in the reading as it was on the screen. The others weren’t exactly attempts at mimicry, but rather more subtle changes in cadence. With Chekov and Scotty, he did the accents, and is real good at both of them. An excellent performance, throughout.

In eight hours of unabridged narration there is nothing here that deviates in any significant way from the movie. It just takes longer, but that’s not a bad thing. You come away with what a novel gives you that movies can’t: the inner thoughts and feelings of the characters. Also, there are some scenes from Kirk and Spock’s childhoods that weren’t in the movie, and other things scattered through the book.

So that’s the new Trek. We’ll see what happens from here.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson

New Releases from Audible Frontiers

Scott D.

New Releases

Fantasy Audiobook - Stalking the Dragon by Mike ResnickStalking the Dragon: A Fable of Tonight
By Mike Resnick; Read by Peter Ganim
8 Hours 37 Minutes – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: 2009

It’s Valentine’s Day and private detective John Justin Mallory is planning on closing up the office early and taking his partner, Col. Winnifred Carruthers, out to dinner, since he’s sure no one else will do so. But before he can turn off the lights and lock the door, a panic-stricken Buffalo Bill Brody visits them.

It seems that the Eastminster pet show is being held the next day, and his dragon, Fluffy, the heavy favorite, has been kidnapped. Mallory’s nocturnal hunt for the miniature dragon takes him to some of the stranger sections of this Manhattan – Greenwitch Village (which is right around the corner from Greenwich Village and is populated by witches and covens); a wax museum where figures of Humphrey Bogart, Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre come alive; Gracie Mansion (which is haunted by the ghosts of former mayors); and the Bureau of Missing Creatures, a movie set where they’re filming a PBS documentary on zombies and various other denizens of the Manhattan night.

As Mallory follows the leads and hunts for clues, he comes up against one dead end after another. Along the way he meets a few old friends and enemies, and a host of strange new inhabitants of this otherworldly Manhattan. Aided by a strange goblin named Jeeves, Mallory has only one night to find a tiny dragon that’s hidden somewhere in a city of seven million.
 
 
Science Fiction Audiobook - Undaunted: Kris Longknife, Book 7Kris Longknife, Book 7: Undaunted
By Mike Shepherd; Read by Dina Pearlman
12 Hours 34 Minutes – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: 2009

Kris Longknife encounters some peaceful aliens who have come to warn humanity of an unidentifiable force that is roaming the galaxy, obliterating everything in its path – a path now leading directly toward the human worlds.
 
Posted by Scott D. Danielson

The Memory Palace: The Mad Gasser Of Matoon and Edgar Allan Poe’s death-day

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

The Memory Palace with Nate DiMeoOne of the cool things about podcasting is that it’s old enought now to have developed it’s own distinct ethos. I’ve mentioned my favorite history podcast on SFFaudio before, it’s called Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History. Carlin takes the dramatic events of real history and makes them into a story – an amazing history story, told by an enthusiast. Another program I’ve long enjoyed is much more frequent than Carlin’s slowly releasing podcast. It follows essentially the same formula, but delivers the history in tiny five minute (or so) doses. Here are the most recent two podcasts from the feed of Nate DiMeo’s The Memory Palace.

a gas gas gas
By Nate DiMeo
1 |MP3| Approx. 6 Minutes [HISTORY STORYTELLING]
Podcaster: The Memory Palace
Podcast: October 28, 2009
This show tells the story of “The Mad Gasser of Mattoon.”

this ungainly fowl
By Nate DiMeo
1 |MP3| Approx. 5 Minutes [HISTORY STORYTELLING]
Podcaster: The Memory Palace
Podcast: October 16, 2009
This show tells what happened to Edgar Allan Poe on his death-day.

Podcast feed:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/thememorypalace

iTunes 1-Click |SUBSCRIBE|

Posted by Jesse Willis