Review of Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne

SFFaudio Review

Science Fiction Audiobook - Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules VerneJourney to the Center of the Earth
By Jules Verne; Read by Simon Prebble
7 CDs – 7.5 hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: 2008
ISBN: 9781433243806
Themes: / Science Fiction / Classic / Geology / Dinosaurs /

In listening to Jules Verne’s Journey to the Center of the Earth, I was struck by how much modern films like Raiders of the Lost Ark and National Treasure owe to this book. Although it was written way back in 1864, while the War Between the States was in full swing and the earth was a very different place, in many ways its thoroughly modern, at home alongside recent sci-fi novels like John Crichton’s Jurassic Park.

In summary, Journey to the Center of the Earth is a fast-paced and lively pseudo science/exploration story that manages to be mostly interesting and entertaining. Unfortunately, it also crosses over into unbelievable territory about three-quarters of the way through and ends with a classic deux-ex-machina, but I found I can live with it.

Journey to the Center of the Earth takes aim at the theory that the earth grows hotter the nearer that you travel to its center. Verne posits the idea that the earth’s core is inhabitable and houses massive cavities, caverns so huge that you cannot see their roof. At its center is a sea large enough that you can travel across its and lose sight of land all around. Science has of course since proven this idea impossible, but it makes for a fun story if you divorce it from reality.

Journey to the Center of Earth has a compelling opening that reminded me of The DaVinci Code–Professor Liedenbrock and his nephew Axel, the heroes of the story, find a coded note written in runes within the pages of an Icelandic saga. They puzzle through it and discover that it is a note written by Arne Saknussemm describing a passage he has found to the center of the earth. The opening is located in the interior of a dormant volcano in Iceland. Liedenbrock and Axel recruit an Icelandic guide and the three men embark on their journey.

I found Verne’s descriptions of overland and sea travel to Iceland interesting, and the first scenes of the descent fascinating. Verne vividly portrays the vast depths and terrifying downward drops of the volcano draft, and creates excitement and dread in two sequences in which Axel gets lost in the inky blackness and the three men nearly die of thirst.

Unfortunately I thought that the tale started to unravel once the men near the earth’s center, which contains ice age creatures, dinosaurs, and even early men. If the story didn’t literally jump a shark it certainly started to lose me once Liedenbrock and Axel’s small boat passes very nearly over an Ichthyosaurus. I was also puzzled with the abrupt ending–Liedenbrock and Axel gain great fame from their expedition, while others treat their claims with skepticism. But, inexplicably, no one ever bothers to re-trace their footsteps and verify their claims.

Still, you could do worse than pass the time by giving it the book a listen. It’s also skillfully read by English-accented, professorial-sounding narrator Simon Prebble.

Posted by Brian Murphy

LibriVox Short Science Fiction Stories Collection #006

SFFaudio Online Audio

Here comes Volume #6 in the Short SF Stories Collection series – all public domain, all 100% FREE, from the folks at LibriVox…

LibriViox Short Science Fiction Collection Volume #6Short Science Fiction Collection Vol. 006
By various; Read by various
Zipped MP3 Files, Podcast or individual MP3s – Approx. 4 Hours 20 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: July 25, 2008
Science fiction (abbreviated SF or sci-fi with varying punctuation and case) is a broad genre of fiction that often involves sociological and technical speculations based on current or future science and technology. This is a reader-selected collection of short stories, originally published between 1752 and 1962. Those published after 1922 entered the US public domain when their copyright was not renewed.

Here’s the podcast feed:

http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/short-science-fiction-collection-vol-006.xml

And here are the individual stories with my own notes on some…

LibriVox Science Fiction Short Story - Accidental Death by Peter BailyAccidental Death
By Peter Baily; Read by RK Wilcox
1 |MP3| – Approx. 23 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
From the pages of Astounding Science Fiction magazine’s February 1959 issue. A tale about, aliens and space travel, told in a curious recorded epistolary form (and its set atop Mount Everest). Strange, but kind of familiar, worth listening to, but not likely to be at all memorable.

LibriVox Science Fiction Short Story - After A Few Words by Randall Garrett…After a Few Words…
By Randall Garrett; Read by Alex Becker
1 |MP3| – Approx. 18 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
First published in Analog magazine’s October 1962 issue – with the LibriVox team identifying the author, “Seaton McKettrig,” as actually Randall Garrett using one of his many pseudonyms. A few off-pronunciations aren’t enough to mar this solid reading. A historical tale – that really isn’t.

LibriVox Science Fiction Short Story - The Diamond Maker by H.G. WellsThe Diamond Maker
By H.G. Wells; Read by Jerome Lawsen
1 |MP3| – Approx. 17 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
A canvas sack full of several hundred pounds worth of diamonds, proffered on a London bridge for a paltry £100. It sounds like a con, at the very least a deal too good to be true. But the owner of the diamonds has a tale of woe to explain why he is selling them at such a cut-rate price. This one reminds me of Wells’ The Crystal Egg. Narrator, Jerome Lawsen, has a nice setup, the recording on this one is very clean.

LibriVox Science Fiction Short Story - Egocentric Orbit by John CoryEgocentric Orbit
By John Cory; Read by Perry Clayton
1 |MP3| – Approx. 7 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
It took a long time for human beings to accept that our little piece of meteoric rubble wasn’t the exact and absolute center of the Universe. It does appear that way, doesn’t it? It may not take so long for a spaceman to learn … First published in Astounding Science Fiction’s May 1960 issue. This is the second version of this story to be recorded by LibriVox.

LibriVox Science Fiction Short Story - Flight From Tomorrow by H. Beam PiperFlight From Tomorrow
By H. Beam Piper; Read by Jerome Lawsen
1 |MP3| – Approx. 47 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
First published in the unwieldy titled “‘Future’ combined with ‘Science Fiction Stories’” magazine’s September/October 1950 issue. This one’s a novelette, an out-in-out time travel tale, that though a bit predictable, and certainly very period, has a certain vintage charm. Jerome Lawsen, reads it well.

LibriVox Science Fiction Short Story - In the Year 2889 by Jules VerneIn The Year 2889
By Jules Verne; Read by James Christopher
1 |MP3| – Approx. 31 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
First published in 1889, and credited to Jules Verne, it was actually written by Michel Verne, Jules Verne’s son. But then just to confuse matters more it was published under Jules Verne’s name correctly a year later when the senior Verne re-wrote it (and changed the title to In The Year 2890). In any case, this tale is set a mere one thousand years in the future.

LibriVox Science Fiction Short Story - The Measure Of A Man by Randall GarrettThe Measure of a Man
By Randall Garrett; Read by D.E. Wittkower
1 |MP3| – Approx. 29 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
“What is desirable is not always necessary, while that which is necessary may be most undesirable. Perhaps the measure of a man is the ability to tell one from the other … and act on it.” From the April 1960 of John W. Campbell’s Astounding Science Fiction magazine.

LibriVox Proto-Science Fiction Short Story - Micromegas by VoltaireMicromegas
By Voltaire; Read by Annoying Twit
1 |MP3| – Approx. 45 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
An 18th century tale (first published in 1752), Micromegas is significant in the pre-history of SF. Earth is visited by a pair of alien visitors, one from a planet circling Sirius and the other from the planet Saturn! This reading is also significant as it was recorded using a £1800 microphone!

LibriVox Science Fiction Short Story - The Sky Trap by Frank Belknap LongThe Sky Trap
By Frank Belknap Long; Read by Dr Special
1 |MP3| – Approx. 35 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
From Comet magazine’s July 1941 issue (the same issue that has Leigh Brackett’s A World Is Born – which is also available HERE). This is Dr. Special’s first recording for LibriVox. He reads it very well, even though there are a lot of lines like… “Good God Dave, do you suppose something has happened to space?”

LibriVox Science Fiction Short Story - Test Rocket by Jack DouglasTest Rocket
By Jack Douglas; Read by Lance
1 |MP3| – Approx. 5 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
From the Amazing Science Fiction Stories magazine’s April 1959 issue (which had an amazing cover).

Posted by Jesse Willis

Recent Arrivals – Blackstone Audio

SFFaudio Recent Arrivals

A pentaverate from Blackstone Audio! :)

Science Fiction Audiobook - Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules VerneJourney to the Center of the Earth
By Jules Verne; Read by Simon Prebble
7 CDs – 7.5 hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: 2008
ISBN: 9781433243806

Geologist Otto Lidenbrock is perusing an ancient Icelandic manuscript when he discovers a mysterious encrypted note. The message reveals the account of a sixteenth-century explorer who claims to have found a passageway to the center of the earth.

In his quest to penetrate the planet’s primordial secrets, the impetuous professor, together with his quaking nephew, Axel, and their devoted guide, Hans, sets off immediately for Iceland. Descending through the belly of a volcano into the bowels of the Earth, they discover an astonishing subterranean world of prehistoric proportions.

A classic of science fiction that helped give birth to the genre, this imaginative speculation on the earth’s nature is both a rousing adventure story and an apt portrait of the psychology of the questing scientist.
 
 
Science Fiction Audiobook - Wyrms by Orson Scott CardWyrms
By Orson Scott Card; Read by Emily Janice Card
9 CDs – 11.5 hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: 2008
ISBN: 9781433218542

The sphere is alien in origin but has been controlled by Man for millennia. A legend as old as the stars rules this constructed world: when the seventh seventh seventh human heptarch is crowned, he will be the Kristos and will bring either salvation or destruction.

Patience is the only daughter of the rightful heptarch, but she, like her father, serves the usurper who has destroyed her family, for she believes that duty to one’s race is more important than duty to one’s self. But the time for prudence has passed, and Patience must journey to the heart-soul of this planet to confront her own destiny and her world’s.
 
 
Science Fiction Audiobook - The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. DickThe Man in the High Castle
By Philip K Dick; Read by Tom Weiner
7 CDs – 8.5 hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: 2008
ISBN: 9781433214523

It’s America in 1962. Slavery is legal once again. The few Jews who still survive hide under assumed names. In San Francisco, the I Ching is as common as the Yellow Pages. All because some 20 years earlier the United States lost a war—and is now occupied jointly by Nazi Germany and Japan.

This harrowing, Hugo Award-winning novel is the work that first established Philip K. Dick as an innovator in science fiction, breaking the barrier between genre fiction and the serious novel of ideas. Dick offers a haunting vision of history as a nightmare from which it may just be possible to awake.
 
 
Science Fiction Audiobook - Already Dead by Charlie HustonAlready Dead
By Charlie Huston; Read by Scott Brick
8 CDs – 9 hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: 2008
ISBN: 9781433235795

From the Battery to the Bronx, Manhattan is crawling with Vampyres. Joe Pitt is one of them, and he’s not happy about it. Yeah, he gets to be tough as nails and hard to kill. But spending his nights trying to score a pint of blood to feed the Vyrus that’s eating at him isn’t his idea of a good time. Now some fool who got himself infected with a flesh-eating bacteria is lurching around, trying to munch on folks’ brains. Joe hates shamblers, but he’s still the one who has to deal with them. It ain’t easy going his own way, refusing to ally with the Clans that run the undead underside of Manhattan. But it’s worse once he gets mixed up with the Coalition and finds himself searching for a little rich girl who’s gone missing. Now anarchist Vampyres are pushing him around, a crazy cult is stalking him, and Joe’s got to find that girl and kill that shambler before the sun comes up.
 
 
Science Fiction Audiobook - Winterfair Gifts by Lis McMaster BujoldWinterfair Gifts
By Lois McMaster Bujold; Read by Grover Gardner
2 CDs – 2.5 hours – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: 2008
ISBN: 9781433250170

This Hugo-nominated novella adds a delightful extra chapter to Bujold’s Vorkosigan series, describing the wedding of Miles and Ekaterin and events leading up to it.

In the festive season of Winterfair on the planet Barrayar, Lord Miles Vorkosigan is making elaborate preparations for his wedding. The long-awaited event stirs up romance and intrigue among his eccentric family and friends, particularly for bioengineered space mercenary Sergeant Taura and shy, diffident Armsman Roic. But Miles also has an enemy who is plotting to turn the romantic ceremony into a festival of death.
 
 
Posted by Scott D. Danielson

Mr. Ron: A Jules Verne SPOOF & Twain’s Connecticut Yankee

SFFaudio Online Audio

Podcast - Mister Ron's BasementMr. Ron, of Mister Ron’s Basement podcast, has some exciting listening on offer. First up, and being serialized over the next four shows, is an extremely rare story. It’s a spoof of Jules Verne’s Science Fiction, written while Verne was still in his prime. Though it was credited to “Jules Verne, Jr.” it was actually written by Stanley Huntley. Huntley was an immensely popular 19th century newspaper humorist – though today he is now nearly forgotten. This tale, A Trip to the South Pole; Book One, was serialized for three weeks in 1880 in the legendary Brooklyn Eagle newspaper. Mr. Ron will offer it over the course of four episodes. Of it, he sez: “It is an insanely funny spoof of Verne, and the more familiar you are with Verne’s works, the funnier it is.” – and indeed it sounds like a dead -on parody of Verne!

A Trip to the South Pole; Book One
By Stanley Huntley; Read by Mister Ron
4 Parts – [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: Mister Ron’s Basement
Podcast: April 2008

Also, starting with Episode #1038, Mr. Ron will begin his serialization of Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. At the rate of one chapter a week, it will take nearly a year to complete it.

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court
By Mark Twain; Read by Mister Ron
? Parts – [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: Mister Ron’s Basement
Podcast: Begun April 2008 –

You can subscribe to this long running podcast , and get daily dispatches from the basement, via this feed:

http://slapcast.com/rss/revry/index.xml

Posted by Jesse Willis

Comics with sound: 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea by Jules Verne

SFFaudio Online Audio

One of the Yahoo! Groups I belong to had a recent discussion of the old “Classics Illustrated” comic books. Good times there. This brought up the following files…

Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea - Peter Pan Records20,000 Leagues Under The Sea
Based on the novel by Jules Verne; Performed by a full cast
1 MP3 (from a 45 RPM record) & 1 PDF (from a comic book) – Approx 13 Minutes & 24 Pages [AUDIO COMIC]
Publisher: Peter Pan Records
Published: 19??
Product #: PR42
UPC: 071083001987

Blog - Power Records PlazaFor similar goodness, be sure to check out a site I mentioned last Spring… Power Records Plaza is a blog devoted to those 1970s and 1980s record companies that put out comics with sound. Lots of new additions have been posted there since my last visit. Have a visit yourself, you’re sure to find hours of nostalgia and fun.

Posted by Jesse Willis

PUBLIC DOMAIN AUDIOBOOK: The Master Of The World by Jules Verne (via LibriVox)

SFFaudio Online Audio

LibriVox.orgMark F. Smith, the narrator behind The First Men in the Moon, Greylorn, Tarzan Of The Apes, The Mysterious Island, and plenty more public domain Science Fiction, has released another classic SF novel through LibriVox.org. Mark sez of his latest: “This book is a sequel to an earlier Verne novel, Robur the Conqueror, but enough detail is given to fully appreciate this story without having first read the other.”

Librivox Science Fiction Audiobook - The Master Of The World by Jules VerneThe Master Of The World
By Jules Verne; Read by Mark F. Smith
18 Zipped MP3 Files or Podcast – Approx. 5 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: January 2008
Chief Inspector Strock gets the tough cases. When a volcano suddenly appears to threaten mountain towns of North Carolina amid the non-volcanic Blue Ridge Mountains, Strock is posted to determine the danger. When an automobile race in Wisconsin is interrupted by the unexpected appearance of a vehicle traveling at multiples of the top speed of the entrants, Strock is consulted. When an odd-shaped boat is sighted moving at impossible speeds off the New England coast, Stock and his boss begin to wonder if the incidents are related. And when Strock gets a hand-lettered note warning him to abandon his investigation, on pain of death, he is intrigued rather than deterred. Set in a period when gasoline engines were in their infancy and automobiles were rare, and when even Chief Inspectors had to engage a carriage and horses to move about, the appearance of a vehicle that can move at astounding speeds on land, on water – and as later revealed, underwater and through the air – marks a technological advance far beyond the reach of nations. It is technology invented by and for the sole benefit of a man who styles himself (with some justification) “The Master of the World.”

Subscribe to the complete podcast audiobook via this feed:

http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/the-master-of-the-world-by-jules-verne.xml

Posted by Jesse Willis