Recorded Books – Page 6

The SFFaudio Podcast #043

Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #043 – Jesse and Scott talk about all the Recent Arrivals and New Releases that have been piling up while Scott’s been away fiddling on a roof.

Talked about on today’s show:
Fiddler On The Roof, Salt Lake City, Pride And Prejudice, Pride And Prejudice And Zombies, zombies, SuperFreakonomics, Freakonomics as psychohistory, Foundation by Isaac Asimov, altruism, Luke Burrage’s SFBRP #072.5, Isaac Asimov’s writing style, Hari Seldon is not much of a character, The Caves Of Steel by Isaac Asimov, |READ OUR REVIEW|, Black Destroyer by A.E. van Vogt, the “fix-up” novel, The Voyage Of The Space Beagle, The Martian Chronicles, The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury, Nightfall by Isaac Asimov, Nightfall by Isaac Asimov and Robert Silverberg, Books On Tape, a movie version of Foundation, FlashForward, TV is cops and doctors so SF on TV is cops and doctors SF, I, Robot (the movie), New Releases, Audible Frontiers, Stanislaw Lem, Memoirs Found In A Bathtub by Stanislaw Lem, Foundation Ziggurat Productions, Solaris (2002), Solaris (1972), Solaris by Stanislaw Lem, Andrei Tarkovsky, His Masters Voice by Stanislaw Lem, Fiasco by Stanislaw Lem, Diving Into The Wreck by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Badge Of Infamy by Lester del Rey (audible.com version), Badge Of Infamy by Lester del Rey (podiobooks and LibriVox), Jimcin Recordings, Armor by John Steakley, Vampire$ by John Steakley, John Carpenter’s Vampires, The Blue Tower by Evelyn E. Smith (audible), The Blue Tower by Evelyn E. Smith (LibriVox), Recent Arrivals, Fall With Honor by E.E. Knight, Winter Duty by E.E. Knight, E.E. Knight, The Shadow Of Saganami by David Weber, the Honorverse, Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clarke, Rendevous With Rama by Arthur C. Clarke, Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Fallout 3, the onion spoofs Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, V (the remake), The Prisoner (the remake), Edgar Allan Poe audiobooks, PoeAudio / Acoustic Learning, the exploration of North America, daguerreotype, Poe as a non-fiction author, The Cask Of Amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe, A Manuscript Found In A Copper Cylinder by James De Mille, the 4th Annual SFFaudio Challenge, Swoon by Nina Malkin, ghosts, Earth Abides by George R. Stewart, The “Erec Rex” series by Nina Malkin, Simon Jones (actor narrator extraordinaire), Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld, the beautiful illustrations in Leviathan, steampunk, airships!, my Zeppelins post, The Hindenburg (1975), movie director Robert Wise, Jesse professes his love of airships, Airborn by Kenneth Oppel |READ OUR REVIEW|, Skybreaker by Kenneth Oppel, Science Fiction vs. alternate history vs. Fantasy, blue gas, the Alcatraz series by Brandon Sanderson, the Chronicles Of The Imaginarium Geographica series by James A. Owen, dragons, Charles Williams, J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, The Inklings by Humphrey Carpenter, Hush Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick, Simon & Schuster Audio, The House Of The Scorpion by Nancy Farmer, cloning, The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare, Stephanie Meyer, Dark Adventure Radio Theatre, At The Mountains Of Madness, The Complete Ripley Radio Mysteries based on the novels of Patricia Highsmith, BBC Audio, Catwings by Ursula K. Le Guin, Recorded Books, Under The Dome by Stephen King, The Simpsons Movie, Born Standing Up by Steve Martin (autobiography), Roxanne, Programmable Logic Control, Picasso at the Lapin Agile (a play), Cruel Shoes by Steve Martin, Shopgirl, The Pleasure Of My Company, Cult Holmes, The Further Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes RADIO DRAMA, John Joseph Adams, The Improbable Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes, Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show, Mary Robinette Kowal, watches are only for affectation now.

Posted by Jesse Willis

Recent Arrivals: The Complete Ripley Radio Mysteries and Catwings by Ursula K. Le Guin

SFFaudio Recent Arrivals

They are still “recent arrivals” when I borrow them from my local public library right?

Yeah, I thought so.

The Complete Ripley Radio Mysteries
Based on the novels by Patricia Highsmith; Performed by a full cast
4 CDs – Approx. 5 Hours [RADIO DRAMA]
Publisher: BBC Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9781408409473
Ian Hart stars in these BBC Radio 4 dramatisations of Patricia Highsmith’s five Ripley novels. Tom Ripley detests murder unless it is absolutely necessary. He prefers someone else to do the dirty work. But if he’s called on to act there is no one more cool, calculating and clever. In these dramatisations, BBC Radio 4 brings all Patricia Highsmith’s Ripley novels together in one thrilling series. In The Talented Mr Ripley, Tom makes a bid for another man’s inheritance and succeeds, but has he really got away with it? Ripley Under Ground is set a few years later, when Tom is living in luxury in a French chateau with his beautiful wife Heloise – but the clever art forgery which funds Tom’s expensive tastes is about to be uncovered. In Ripley’s Game,Tom sets up a man he dislikes to carry out two perfect murders, while in The Boy Who Followed Ripley, a rich young stalker arrives at Belle Ombre and he and Tom end up fighting for their lives. Finally, in Ripley Under Water, strange new neighbours show an overdeveloped interest in Ripley’s past. Will Tom’s shady dealings be exposed? Tense, thrilling and atmospheric, these dramatisations are perfect evocations of Highsmith’s unique, complex and brilliantly twisted crime novels.

Catwings
By Ursula K. Le Guin; Read by Ursula K. Le Guin
1 CD – Approx. 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books
Published: September 2008
ISBN: 9781428174375
Le Guin wrote this highly acclaimed novel about a very special litter of kittens. Mrs. Jane Tabby has always longed to get away from the cramped alleys of the city. She knows it is too late for her, but she thinks her longing may be the reason her litter of kittens was born with wings. When they are old enough to fly, she sends the four kittens, who become known as catwings, out into the world to find their home. But they find that danger does not lurk only in city alleyways.

Posted by Jesse Willis

Hard Case Crime’s December 2009 release

Aural Noir: News

Hard Case Crime Ribbon Hard Case Crime has a near stranglehold on my paperback budgeted dollars. One reason is that they’ve got so many great titles that never get audiobooked. Another is their choice of cover art. A Hard Case Crime cover never fails to please. This is probably why I’m doubly excited to see they’re doing one book that is already an audiobook! Their choice for a December 2009 release, a classic reprint, surprised me and made me laugh.

Check out this accurate (but very misleading) description from HCC editor Charles Ardai’s email:

“It’s the very hard-boiled story of a man murdered by a blast from a sawed-off shotgun to the face at point-blank range; of a criminal on the run from Chicago who comes to a dirty Pennsylvania coal-mining town and winds up locking horns with the corrupt Masonic lodge that runs the town; of a Pinkerton detective who sets out to clean up the town; and of the doom that pursues a man across an ocean and leaves him at the mercy of the world’s most ruthless criminal mastermind. It’s a story narrated by a veteran of the war in Afghanistan, whose partner in investigating the twisted plot is a drug addicted private investigator with a brain like a steel trap.

And wait till you see the cover — Glen Orbik has really outdone himself here, with his portrait of a gorgeous, bosomy dame in a transparent negligee watching with horror as a man with a brand on his arm appears in her doorway.

And the author — it’s one of the best-selling authors in the world. His books have been made into movies, computer games, comic books; they’ve sold tens of millions of copies. He’s not someone you’d think of as a Hard Case Crime author in a million years!

Now, I can hear you out there, saying, ‘Come on, Ardai — if you’re gonna spill, spill already. What’s the name of the damn book?'”

Did you guess it?

Awesome!

The Valley Of Fear
By A.C. Doyle (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Publisher: Hard Case Crime
Published: December 2009
ISBN: 084396295X

-The legendary classic re-presented, Hard Case Crime style
-Edgar Award winner Leslie Klinger on The Valley Of Fear: “The first real hardboiled detective story.”
-By the best-selling author of The Lost World
-Inspired by a true story!

Here’s my own review of this book (from a now unavailable podcast version):

The Valley Of Fear is one of the least adapted of the original Sherlock Holmes novels, it has only appeared on screen three times, as opposed to the eighteen adaptations of The Hound Of The Baskervilles. Likely much of the reason for the disparity lies in the structure of The Valley Of Fear, which breaks the traditional narrative mystery to go into a massive backstory that preceded the crime in question, this backstory includes neither Watson nor Holmes and so when adapted it would have the primary characters off-screen for more than half the film!

Looked at as a novel and a mystery on its own The Valley Of Fear works very well. There are in fact two mysteries in it. The first mystery I was able to ratiocinationalize quite satisfactorily but the second which took me by surprise, it was by means of a clever misdirection. The story itself is set in 1888 London and in the USA a few years prior to the extended flashback sequence. In the first half of the novel Holmes and Watson employ their typical inductive detection strategy, then after solving the primary crime we are treated to a lengthy explanation as to how the murder they have solved came to happen in the first place. The second half, was inspired by true events and is quite enjoyable once you get into the change of pace.

Here are just a few of the audio versions currently available:

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #032

Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #032 – Jesse and Scott are ramifying and missling things as they talk about recently arrived and newly released audiobooks. We’ve got fists the size of baked hams in this episode so we say crazy things like:

“Soccer is cool!” – “The great thing about Laserdiscs…”

“Tele-Vision. It’s a Science Fiction-sounding word” – “…stupid Morlocks!”

We’re also asking the deep questions like: “Is there anybody more exciting than Robert Silverberg?” Indeed, it’s our most Reganesque show.

Talked about on today’s show:
Blackstone Audio, Flashforward by Robert J. Sawyer, The Quitaglio Ascension, End Of An Era, Golden Fleece, CERN, Flash Forward (TV series), The 4400, WWW: Wake, Nightmare At 20,000 Feet by Richard Matheson, Infinivox, The Year’s Top Ten Tales of Science Fiction edited by Alan Kaster, The Twilight Zone, William Shatner, John Lithgow, Where There’s A Will by Richard Matheson and Richard Christian Matheson, The Invisible Man by H.G. Wells, The Magicians by Lev Grossman, The Man In The High Castle by Philip K. Dick, The Grasshopper Lies Heavy, Codex, B>Wahammer: Slayer Of The Storm God by , Warhammer: 40,000: Heart Of Rage by James Swallow, Danielson Kid (age 14), Major League Soccer, soccer, Audible Frontiers, The Mote In God’s Eye by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, Lucifer’s Hammer, Footfall, The Stand by Stephen King, post-apocalypse, Timothy Lahaye and Jerry B. Jenkins, Wild Seed by Octavia E. Butler, Fledgling, BBC Audiobooks America, 2000X: Bloodchild, Brilliance Audio, Moonrise by Ben Bova, the Grand Tour novels, Omni magazine, Analog, The Precipice, The Rock Rats, The Silent War The Aftermath, the Asteroid Wars sub-series, releasing digitally on Audible before hardcopy, the MP3-CD format is the best, VHS, Laserdisc, DVD, BluRay, digital copies, Gun With Occasional Music by Jonathan Lethem, Raymond Chandler and Philip K. Dick, The Automatic Detective by A. Lee Martinez, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, the Retrieval Artist series, what is noir?, detective fiction, Young Adult fiction, The Cambridge Companion Science Fiction, Brian Stableford, Gary K. Wolfe, Kathryn Cramer, Andy Duncan, Ken MacLeod, The Oxford Dictionary Of Science Fiction, neural (adj), visi-screen (noun), visi-plate (noun), ansible (noun), Kerguelen (proper noun), mind-meld (verb), mind-meld (noun), Recorded Books, Bimbo’s Of The Death Sun by Sharyn McCrumb |READ OUR REVIEW|!

Posted by Jesse Willis

New Releases

Smoky Mountain Horrors by Weston Ochse Smoky Mountain Horrors
By Weston Ochse; Read by Weston Ochse
Audible Download – 4 Hours 47 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Kanigit Media / Audible.com
Published: May 11, 2009
Set mostly in Appalachian country, backwood characters will leave you laughing in pain and gasping in horror. You will learn something new about Weston’s horrific mountain tales every time you listen. They are not for the feint of heart. A collection of short horror stories. Two of the stories available for free HERE.

The Coming Of Conan The Cimmerian (Book One in the Conan of Cimmeria Series)
By Robert E. Howard; Read by Todd McLaren
14 CDs or 2 MP3-CDs – 16 Hours 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: June 11th, 2009
ISBN: 9781400112234 (cd) , 9781400162239 (mp3-cd)
Thirteen of Robert E. Howard’s legendary stories starring Conan the barbarian, a swordsman who cuts a swath across the lands of the Hyborian Age, facing powerful sorcerers, deadly creatures, and ruthless armies of thieves and reavers.

Haze
By L.E. Modesitt, Jr.; Read by William Dufris
10 CDs or 1 MP3-CD – 11 Hours 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: June 25th, 2009
ISBN: 9781400112913 (cd), 9781400162918 (mp3-cd)
A war is about to start between planets in this new science fiction novel by the bestselling author of the Recluce series.

Red Seas Under Red Skies (Book 2 of the Gentleman Bastard series)
By Scott Lynch; Read by Michael Page
20 CDs or 3 MP3-CDs – 25 Hours 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Audio
Published: June 4th, 2009
ISBN: 9781400110520 (cd), 9781400160525 (mp3-cd)
In The Lies of Locke Lamora, Scott Lynch took us on an adrenaline-fueled adventure with con artist extraordinaire Locke Lamora. Now Lynch brings back his outrageous hero for a caper so death-defying, nothing short of a miracle will pull it off.

From Recorded Books’ SCI-FI AUDIO imprint (First quarter 2009 new releases on CD)…

Rollback
By Robert J. Sawyer; Read by George K.Wilson
9 CDs – 10 Hours 45 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9781436186506
Dr. Sarah Halifax earned worldwide fame for deciphering the first alien message received on Earth. Now nearing the end of her days, she learns that, at long last, the reply has come.

Shaman’s Crossing (Book One of The Soldier Son Trilogy)
By Robin Hobb; Read by
16 CDs – 18.5 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 978-1-4361-7968-3
Nevare Burvelle was born to be a
soldier in the Gernian army. But as Nevare’s career takes off, his worldview alters considerably. Corruption and nepotism reign, and now Nevare questions his own ideals, wondering why he continues fighting for the empire.

Fifty Degrees Below
By Kim Stanley Robinson; Read by Richard Ferrone
15 CDs – 18 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 978-1-4361-8634-6
When the Gulf Stream stalls, dangerously low temperatures grip the Eastern Seaboard and Western Europe. While multinational corporations attempt to exploit the disaster, humankind’s only hope may be a desperate move to dump millions of tons of salt into the ocean.

Mean Streets
By various; Read by various
9 CDs – 9.5 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 978-1-4361-9217-0
Featuring New York Times best-selling authors Jim Butcher and Simon R. Green, and national best-selling authors Kat Richardson and Thomas E. Sniegoski, Mean Streets offers four novellas from the hottest names in contemporary paranormal suspense. Running the gamut from demons and werewolves to zombies and black magic, these whodunits crackle with otherworldly secrets, making for a noir collection with an extra set of fangs.

Fool’s Experiment
By Edward M. Lerner; Read by George K.Wilson
10 CDs – 11.5 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9781436164849
As a NASA engineer, critically acclaimed author Edward M. Lerner developed a background in science and technology perfectly suited to his fast-paced SF thrillers. In Fools’ Experiments, the military-industrial complex unwittingly unleashes a devastating threat to humanity after government programmers experiment with viruses and worms. But what escapes is no ordinary computer virus, and when the deadly artificial life-form reaches the Internet, humanity’s very existence is at stake.

From Recorded Books’ SCI-FI AUDIO imprint (Second quarter 2009 new releases on CD)…

Forest Mage (Book Two of the Soldier Son Trilogy)
By Robin Hobb; Read by John Keating
22 CDs – 19 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9781436179706
Nevare Burvelle has survived major combat and is making a quick recovery from a disease plaguing his fellows in the King’s army. He also believes he is free from the Speck magic that held him under its sway. Now traveling home to rendezvous with his fiancée, Nevare suffers haunting visions and soon realizes that malicious magic still resides within him—and is intent on destroying everything he holds dear.

Brightness Reef
By David Brin; Read by George K.Wilson
20 CDs – 17 hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9781436179744
Persecuted refugees from six separate alien races have migrated to the idyllic planet Jijo. And despite their incredible diversity, the inhabitants live together in blissful harmony. However, settlement on Jijo is illegal—and it’s only a matter of time before the residents of this forbidden paradise are discovered by the galactic powers-that-be.

Iron Sunrise
By Charles Stross; Read by George Guidall
11 CDs – 13 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9781440710575
PlanetMoscow is vaporized by an unnatural star explosion, prompting those who escaped to counterattack the likely culprit—planet New Dresden of the neighboring system.
But New Dresden wasn’t to blame, and as worlds go to war, an unseen enemy labors to destroy the universe itself.

Counting Heads
By David Marusek; Read by Kevin R. Free
13 CDs – 14 Hours 45 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 978-1-4361-8640-7
The debut novel from highly regarded short-story author David Marusek, Counting Heads pushes the limits of the genre. Life in the year 2134 is nearly perfect, with nanotechnology and medical science granting people near immortality. But when Sam Harger is flagged as a terrorist, his powerful wife dies in a plane crash, and his daughter’s cryogenically frozen head becomes a sought-after prize, Sam must fight to save the human race from a secret cabal.

The Fabulous Riverboat (Riverworld Saga, Book 2)
By Philip José Farmer; Read by
10 CDs – 12 hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 978-1-4361-8636-0
The Fabulous Riverboat tells of a world where all of humanity has been mysteriously resurrected on the banks of one mighty river. Samuel Clemens (a.k.a.MarkTwain) is tasked with finding a fallen meteorite and using its ore to build a massive riverboat. But in order to succeed, he’ll have to outwit some of history’s most nefarious villains.

Into Looking Glass
By John Ringo; Read by L.J. Ganser
10 CDs – 12 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books / Sci-Fi Audio
Published: 2009
ISBN: 9781440710612
When a subatomic physics experiment causes a massive explosion, interdimensional gateways open in Florida—and aliens pour out. Some intend to bring Earth to its knees. Others seem willing to help, but will annihilate the planet if Navy SEAL Command Master Chief Robert Miller can’t stop the menace from spreading.

And from Recorded Books’ new “Mystery” imprint…

The Somnambulist
By Jonathan Barnes; Read by John Curless
9 CDs – 11 hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Recorded Books Mystery
Published: 2009
ISBN: 978143618066-5
Set amidst Victorian London’s seamy, fog-shrouded underworld. Meet Edward Moon, an illusionist and detective who operates solely with the aid of his hulking, mute sidekick.

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #025

Podcast

The SFFaudio Podcast #025 – Jesse and Scott are joined by Brian Murphy of The Silver Key and The Cimmerian blogs. We mostly talk about Fantasy, with a little war talk to make things manlier.

Talked about on today’s show:
Recent Arrivals, Penguin Audio, re-release of Stephen King audiobooks, Desperation, The Regulators, Thinner, Rose Madder, Joe Mantegna, Blair Brown, Kathy Bates, Kate Nelligan, the origins of the “Richard Bachman” pseudonym, Donald E. Westlake, Chapterhouse Dune, Frank Herbert, full cast narration, Macmillan Audio, Starship series, Mike Resnick, Jonathan Davis, Book Of The Road, dual narration, Elric Of Melbinone, Michael Moorcock, Audio Realms, The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman, the Canadian publishing industry, Raincoast Books, Od Magic, Patricia A. McKillip, Dreams Underfoot, Charles de Lint, cover art matters, Black Gate blog, Confessions Of A Speed Reading Instructor, “how long is a book ?”, Top 10 Fantasy Battles Of All Time, The Iliad, Homer, Recorded Books, George Guidall, the Robert Fitzgerald translation, reciting Homeric length epics (the documentary In Search Of The Trojan War), Bernard Cornwell, The Winter King, King Arthur (2004), Clive Owen, Excalibur (1981), Audio Renaissance (Macmillan Audio), Chivers Audio (BBC Audiobooks America), ISIS Audio, the Sharpe television series, George R.R. Martin, A Song Of Ice And Fire series.

King Arthur,

Posted by Jesse Willis