Get Most Popular Full Audiobooks in Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

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Title: Death of a Starship

Author: Jay Lake

Narrator: Marc Vietor

Format: Unabridged

Length: 5 hrs and 50 mins

Language: English

Release date: 07-16-13

Publisher: Audible Studios

Ratings: 3.5 of 5 out of 5 votes

Genres: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

In a distant future in which the empire of humanity has spread throughout the stars, the Xenic Bureau of the Grand Ekumenical Security Directorate investigates any hint of aliens, strange disappearances, or other anomalous events. When rumors spread of the mysterious reappearance of a long-lost battleship, a priest, an alien-killer, and a cashiered starship engineer find themselves caught up in a chase across the empire and into secrets better left forgotten.

Members Reviews:

Premium Space Opera

Jay Lake has surprised me again. His steam punk fantasy has been excellent, but this excursion into Thomas Harlan's speciality -- alien contact set in a well thought out universe is terrific. This book involves concepts from Dan Simmons' Hyperion series with the Aztec future of House of Reeds. The story concerns a search for a McGuffin -- a vanished dreadnaught from an ancient civil war. The fascination concerns the pursuers -- chruch, state, radicals, and a hero caught between. I for one will be hoping for the sequel.

Some good concepts, but the book did not come together

I wanted to like it, but it seemed rushed. There was not enough character development and the setting was not very reasonable. They wanted to find a lost battleship, because it would be the most powerful thing in space. They expected that it could determine the winner of a civil war. Give me a break. Is a 200 year old battleship from our past going to be of any use against modern ships ? Particularly since the rate of change of technology has always increased. A Roman son could probably get by with his dad's sword, but a modern son would be better off with a 19 shot Glock than his father's old .38 revolver. 200 years of change will make current weapons look like stone axes.

Interesting concept, but it falls short

I read the description of Jay Lake's "Death of a Starship" and it sounded really interesting. The problem is it really falls short - the story is too negative.

Disappointing

Almost everything about this book disappoints. The title is Death of a Starship, but the starship in question, the Enver Hoxha, a Dictator class behemoth named after a ruler already forgotten by the present age, does not die. The space opera is decent, if somewhat thin on world building and advanced science prognostication.

Spoiler alert

Here's why I gave it two stars. Just when the story seemed to be picking up pace and interest, Lake kills off all the major characters, a rude thing to do after taking that much time to make you care about at least one of them.

Great book

I recently read a great short story by Jay Lake named "To Raise a Mutiny Betwixt Yourselves" (found in The New Space Opera 2, edited by Gardner Dozois and Jonathan Strahan). I had so far not heard of Lake, but I was highly impressed by this story. The prose was polished, almost literary. The story was compelling, the characters and their psychology had real depth. So I naturally looked for more of his sci fi.

When I picked up Death of a Starship I actually thought it was going to be an extension of that short story I read. I was wrong and disappointed. The book is short too, about 180 pages. Hm. I kept reading. The prose didn't seem as polished. The characters didn't seem terribly interesting. Was this book going to be a dud?

The book kept my interest enough to keep reading. At about page 50 or so, the story really took off.

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Title: Magnificent Guns of Seneca 6

Subtitle: Guns of Seneca 6 Saga, Book 3

Author: Bernard Schaffer

Narrator: Cody D. Roberts

Format: Unabridged

Length: 6 hrs and 26 mins

Language: English

Release date: 05-31-13

Publisher: Bernard Schaffer

Genres: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

Combining the best of gritty westerns like Tombstone and The Wild Bunch with the sci-fi inventiveness of Firefly and Star Wars, Bernard Schaffer's Guns of Seneca 6 series is an Old West romp on a remote planet where gunslingers, outlaws and lawmen battle over the frontier.

In this jaw-dropping sequel, newly-appointed Sheriff Jem Clayton just can't get used to being an upstanding citizen. People only seem to want to complain to him about all sorts of trivial things and he just can't fake being interested anymore. When a wagon full of bank robbers show up, it's time for Jem to unload his frustrations in more ways than one.

Soon, Jem is embroiled in an adventure with a crazy old preacher to hunt down a bandit posing as Jem's former alter-ego "Gentleman Jim," except this one is selling kidnapped women to off-world slave traders. The three Beothuk boys from the first book return to take on a quest in search of a new Chief for their tribe. Their journey brings them into the company of a fanatical rebel Beothuk who is preparing to make war on the white settlers. It won't be long before Jem's Colt Defeaters are firing and the lead starts flying in this non-stop, action-packed sequel to Guns of Seneca 6.

Seneca 6 is a world where legends like Doc Holliday and Jesse James would all feel comfortable in. Listeners will too. The Guns of Seneca 6 series blends the best of the Old West and science fiction for all-out adventure.

Members Reviews:

Magnificent Guns of Seneca 6 was not as good as the first book by a lot

Magnificent Guns of Seneca 6 was not as good as the first book by a lot. In this book, we don't even see Jem until almost a third of the way into the book. That first third was filled with pointless flashbacks mixed in with some present events that didn't contribute to the story at all. I didn't feel connected to any of the characters but Jem and he wasn't in the book all that much. Too many viewpoints from characters that I didn't care about, including the bad guys. The action was still very good and the world building was very vivid. I felt like I was actually on Seneca and could imagine all the descriptive places that I visited in the book.

The only other bad thing that is kind of a big deal was there were lots and lots of errors in this book. Lots of extra words, missing words and just poor editing. This book felt more rushed and slapped together, the first book was amazing and had no errors. This was a disappointing read after reading that first book. 3 stars out of 5.

A fine space western

Having read the first two books in the series and enjoyed the thoroughly, I decided to pick this one up. Mr. Schaffer has done it again and has the makings of a space western opera on his hands. Gritty and realistic (as realistic as this type of novel can be), it packs a lot of action into a fairly small package.

It reads like a fine cigar, not too short or long, and smooth the entire way through. I heartily recommend this book (and series!) to any one that likes westerns, sci-fi, or was a fan of the late lamented Firefly TV series. I eagerly await the final books in this series.

Magnificient is hardly the word

Once again WOW. I love the world of Seneca 6. The story reads like one of the timeless tales that came from the Western Frontier.

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Title: Ten' aktroida [The Actroid's Shadow] (Russian Edition)

Author: Olga Toprover

Narrator: Sergei Kilesso

Format: Unabridged

Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins

Language: English

Release date: 05-06-13

Publisher: Olga Toprover

Ratings: 5 of 5 out of 1 votes

Genres: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

In the future, when robots have already fully permeated our everyday life, a devastating automobile accident with an unmanned drone big rig kills Nick's friend. The suspicion of murder falls on Nick, a psychologist who specializes in robots, but the investigation reaches a dead end. At the same time, Nick meets Liza, and begins work on an android that will be indistinguishable from a human.

But Nick doesn't realize that he is now part of a brilliant experiment. This audiobook has mystery, love, disillusionment, loss, and victory.

The author discusses creation of friendly artificial intelligence: robots who will never be enemies of man. Yet this risk exists...

Please Note: This audiobook is in Russian.

Members Reviews:

Smart suspense!

Where does Ten' aktroida [The Actroid's Shadow] (Russian Edition) rank among all the audiobooks youve listened to so far?

Dark and intense robotic sci-fi with a good deal of humor, very much in the style of Azimov's classics. The narration is great too.

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Title: Zombies: Escape

Subtitle: The New World, Book 2

Author: John Taylor

Narrator: Sean Wybrant

Format: Unabridged

Length: 1 hr and 4 mins

Language: English

Release date: 04-26-13

Publisher: IMT, LLC

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 4 votes

Genres: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

In Book 2, Zombies: Escape The New World, John, Kelly, Samantha and Mike continue their travels to the farm in Rolla, Missouri. Along the way, they pick up some new friends that were about to be eaten by zombies. Their new friends are now destitute and have nowhere to go. John and his family take them in and provide them with food and shelter.

John meets a beautiful young woman who turns out to have the qualities he's been looking for in a woman. John and his family find the real reason for the zombie outbreak. It was a diabolical hidden agenda of the government. John and his family learn that there is a cure and know their only hope is to set out and attempt to reproduce it.

Members Reviews:

Book 2

This book's story line, again, was good but too many grammar and punctuation errors. I am to assume that the books are not being proof-read before being published.

Escape? Maybe? Naaaaah!

The characters Taylor has created for his 4-book series are personable and capable, but they are not super-heroes, and I'm glad they aren't. I cannot relate to the dangers they face, but I can relate to their feelings about what is happening to them, and can almost feel their panic as they face an unknown future. This book in the series creates a new awakening love in the midst of the horrors of friends dying all around them. Have they found a safe haven at last? Or is the scourge just over the hill? Is there hope for a cure? Perhaps there is...in book 4 of the series, titled The Cure.

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Title: The Wrong Tom Jacks

Subtitle: The Genehunter, Book 1

Author: Simon Kewin

Narrator: Tom Scott

Format: Unabridged

Length: 1 hr and 6 mins

Language: English

Release date: 04-09-13

Publisher: One Acre Audio Books

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 2 votes

Genres: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

Simms is a genehunter, paid by megarich collectors to track down the DNA of the famous for their private zoos. He's employed to locate the genetic code of Tom Jacks. But not the rock star Tom Jacks, just an unknown namesake.The job bugs Simms. Something about it is wrong. Someone is playing him. Problem is he doesn't know who or why. None of the illegal plug-in technology filling his brain is much damn use. The one person who can help him is an ex-lover, but she's also the one person on the planet who never wants to speak to him again.The last thing he needs is Agent Ballard of the Genetic Monitoring Agency pulling him out of the jump network to interrogate him about someone he's never even heard of.

Someone called Boneyard....

A Sci Fi cyberpunk novella set on an Earth slowly going to hell. The Wrong Tom Jacks is the first of five science fiction stories following the adventures of Simms, genetic detective and all-round nice guy.

Members Reviews:

Up my alley

Whetted my appetite for more in this series. Don't like to spend this amount of money for an hour's read though.

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Titel: Geisterbrigaden (Krieg der Klone 2)

Autor:: John Scalzi

Erzähler: Matthias Lühn

Format: Unabridged

Spieldauer: 10 hrs and 52 mins

Sprache: Deutsch

Veröffentlichungsdatum: 03-28-13

Herausgeber: Ronin - Hörverlag

Kategorien: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

Zusammenfassung des Herausgebers:

Wenn die Klone versagen, werden die Geisterbrigaden eingesetzt! In ferner Zukunft wird der interstellare Krieg mit scheinbar bizarren Mitteln geführt: Für die Verteidigung der Kolonien im All werden nur alte, betagte Menschen rekrutiert. Sie werden geklont und ihre Bewusstseine in jüngere Ausgaben ihrer Selbst transferiert, was sie zu billigem Kanonenfutter macht. Doch als die Aliens sich verbünden und damit den Krieg zu gewinnen drohen, müssen die Geisterbrigaden ran, deren Körper aus genetischem Fremdmaterial hergestellt wurden. Einer von ihnen ist Jared Dirac. Doch sein neuer Körper tut nicht immer das, was er von ihm will, und langsam wird die Zeit knapp.

©2007 Heyne (P)2013 Ronin

Kritik Bewertungen:

John Scalzi ist eine atemberaubende neue Stimme in der Science Fiction. Mit "Krieg der Klone" zeigt er uns, wie man die alten Themen des Genres auf faszinierend neue Weise erzählen kann.

-- Robert Charles Wilson, Autor von "Spin"; Gewinner des "John W. Campbell Award"

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Title: Noise

Author: Hal Clement

Narrator: Kaleo Griffith

Format: Unabridged

Length: 7 hrs and 1 min

Language: English

Release date: 03-02-13

Publisher: Audible Studios

Ratings: 3 of 5 out of 2 votes

Genres: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

Hal Clement, the dean of hard science fiction, has written a new planetary adventure in the tradition of his classic Mission of Gravity. It is the kind of story that made his reputation as a meticulous designer of otherworldly settings that are utterly convincing because they are constructed from the ground up using established principles of orbital mechanics, geology, chemistry, biology, and other sciences.

Kainui is one of a pair of double planets circling a pair of binary stars. Mike Hoani has come there to study the language of the colonists, to analyze its evolution in the years since settlement. But Kainui is an ocean planet. Although settled by Polynesians, it is anything but a tropical paradise. The ocean is 1,700 miles deep, with no solid ground anywhere. The population is scattered in cities on floating artificial islands with no fixed locations. The atmosphere isn't breathable, and lightning, waterspouts, and tsunamis are constant. Out on the great planetary ocean, self-sufficiency is crucial, and far from any floating city, on a small working-family ship, anything can happen. There are, for instance, pirates. Mike's academic research turns into an exotic nautical adventure unlike anything he could have imagined.

At the publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied.

Members Reviews:

Great read, a little plot weak

I recently found Clement's work. This is an awesome book, the world and culture of the setting is very interesting and well researched.

My only problem with Clement is that he gets so interested in the setting that the plots are a little weak. This book suffers the same problem. If you are expecting things to build to a big dramatic finale... they wont. But if you love the worldbuilding as much as I do, and you go in knowing that, its great.

good tale

Great setting. Novel world construction. Solid science, well told. Incomplete story line. There are issues left unresolved, so I was startled when the story just stopped.

For chemists and physics teachers only

Like Iceworld, too technical for somebody who has always been a dolt in science.

More science than suspense

Settled generations before by Polynesian islanders tired of the oil-processing, pseudo-life stations taking over the Pacific, the inhospitable planet Kainui has all the ocean anyone could want, being entirely covered in super salty, acidic water. It's colonists have grown artificial, enclosed cities which float, drifting with winds and currents.

And Kainui has plenty of wind and current too. Along with unbreathable air, dangerous thunder levels, underwater earthquakes, tsunamis, waterspouts, escaped and mutated pseudo-life, and pirates. Earth anthropologist Mike Hoani, there to study how the colonists' language has evolved, gets his sea legs in a hurry.

Hoani joins a metal harvesting (from floating islands of pseudo-life) boat. Battered routinely by storms and quake-generated waves, the boat is damaged and nearly sunk in an accident. Crippled and storm-driven, the boat drifts southward toward the frozen pole, and bumps up against a strange floating island, which yields an unidentifiable metal. Prize or poison?

Clement, 1998 Grand Master, delivers lots of science. His alien watery world in its binary star system is fully realized, right down to the physics and chemical reactions.

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Title: Darpocalypse

Subtitle: The Living Dead Trilogy, Book II

Author: Joseph Souza

Narrator: Dan Lawson

Format: Unabridged

Length: 14 hrs and 46 mins

Language: English

Release date: 02-26-13

Publisher: Audible Studios

Ratings: 3 of 5 out of 8 votes

Genres: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

The second wave of the plague has struck with a brutal vengeance and a full-on zombie apocalypse has spread throughout every corner of the world.

Abandoned by her father, Dar has managed to set up a camp in the Boston Common. Surrounded by hordes of ravenous zombies, one person living inside the camp holds the key to their survival.

A few lucky people on Earth have developed a mysterious immunity from the plague. Known as ghosts, they are prized for their ability to walk among the dead and gather food and supplies without fear. The Boston camp harbors one such person, and President Roberts orders the Armys finest soldier to bring their ghost to Washington, D.C. at any cost.

As the world descends into apocalyptic madness, the horde grows increasingly aggressive, threatening the wellbeing of every survivor in Dars camp. Boston Common becomes ground zero for a dramatic showdown, and Dar realizes that she must make a decision that threatens not only her life, but the survival of every person shes been entrusted to protect.

Editorial Reviews:

Troubled teenaged zombie slayer Dar has set up a camp in Boston where she rules with an iron fist. Her secret tool is Annabelle, who has an immunity to the plague and can walk among the undead without fear. People like Annabelle are called "ghosts", and they are valued for their ability to gather supplies. Narrator Dan Lawson provides a solid performance that doesn't lapse into excessive excitability as the story's action scenes unfold. He weaves in subplots involving the deposed President of the United States, a murderer, and a ruthless special forces colonel without overstating the intensity of the events as they build up to a shocking end.

Members Reviews:

"Mule-Kick" said three times in 20 minute period.

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

a different book and a different narrator

Would you ever listen to anything by Joseph Souza again?

probably not, this was high school level material. Needed editing, bad.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

He read his part word by word. Was very wooden, did not improvise with contractions, his pace did not change. Hard to tell who was saying what, as they all had the same voices.

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

What a waste of money and time. Just could not go on, I did not care about any of the one dimensional characters, I hope they all die.

Any additional comments?

How was this made into an audiobook? I would not have used this book for a doorstop.

Better than the Reawakwening, but still needs work

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

The writing needs to improve. Many times you are left pondering the grammar.

Would you ever listen to anything by Joseph Souza again?

In the future,sure. The growth from his first book to the second was huge. But still a ways to go.

Which character as performed by Dan Lawson was your favorite?

Brabas had a cool voice. And I like the guys from Boston; they were hilarious.

What character would you cut from Darpocalypse?

Not sure.

Any additional comments?

The only reason I listened to this book was because I bought it in tandem with the first and it was already on my smartphone. I ran out of material and decided to give it a try.

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Title: The Savage Gentleman

Author: Philip Wylie

Narrator: Jason Watt

Format: Unabridged

Length: 6 hrs and 7 mins

Language: English

Release date: 02-20-13

Publisher: Audible Studios

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 4 votes

Genres: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

Betrayed by his wife, Stephen Stone spirits his son, Henry, away to a remote tropical island and trains him to be an ideal physical specimen and a perfect gentleman. After years of isolation, Henry Stone is now a young man, standing a full six feet two inches tall and weighing 190 pounds. His hair is bronze, his eyes turquoise, his skin mahogany - a magnificent man. When Henry finally returns to civilization, he finds that his fathers business has grown into a news empire. Though he is the owner of this huge conglomerate, a great conversationalist and excellent company, well versed in etiquette, and extraordinarily nice, Henry has never seen a woman. Indeed his father has taught him never to trust a female and that love itself is a myth. When Henry collides with the contemporary world and the modern woman, the collision is necessarily fascinating and complicated for both Henry and the society he is discovering.

Members Reviews:

Sinclair Lewis Meets Doc Savage

This is a fairly easy read and a rather mild satire (mild for Wylie who will tend in later years to be more assertive with his anger). Our hero is raised on an island and taught both letters and survival arts by several elders who are trying to protect him from the modern world (read: women). The book's misogyny is quite mild (his dad had a bad relationship and so attempts to keep his soon away from women--good luck with that). And the boy becomes something of a physical superman, though neither the conceit of the "wild man" in civilization nor the conceit of the John Stuart Mill-type superman raised by a genius father are utilized to any satisfying extent. Only a year or so later will Lester Dent/Kennith Robeson start writing the Doc Savage story where the father raises the brainy child to fight crime and better civilization. In truth, Wylie really doesn't know how to write about women well and the trope of the evil woman in The Savage Gentleman isn't exploited at all. It's just a fun story to read with a great fight scene in the end and that ending will remind the reader really of the movie Citizen Kane had it had a happy ending. Kudos to Bison Books for another successful release.

Five Stars

great read

After reading Philipm Wylie's "The Savage Gentleman" and Lester Dent's "The Man of Bronze", you will know.

Just as Philip Wylie's Hugo Danner from "Gladiator" is recognized as the inspiration of today's Superman, Henry Stone is just as obviously Lester Dent's Doc Savage to readers of both Wylie's "The Savage Gentleman" and Dent's "The Man of Bronze". Many of the old timers like Philip José Farmer either spoke or wrote of the obvious connection between the publication dates of Wylie's two books and the immediate creation of the two derivative characters. Wylie's seminal highbrow presentations and the lowbrow Golden Age pulp versions are both fun reads. Highly recommended.

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Title: Between the Stars

Subtitle: Act of God, Book 3

Author: Eric Kotani, John Maddox Roberts

Narrator: Michael Goldstrom

Format: Unabridged

Length: 7 hrs and 58 mins

Language: English

Release date: 02-08-13

Publisher: Audible Studios

Genres: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Sci-Fi: Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

On the Saturnian moon Rhea, Derek Kuroda unearths two enigmatic objects of immense power. He joins forces with a genius inventor hoping to use the objects for space exploration, but others are intent on using the artifacts for more sinister purposes.

Members Reviews:

Four Stars

John Maddox Roberts writes superb science fiction, and "Between The Stars" is no exception. Thank you, John.

Niven & Pournelle Look Out!

While exploring on the Saturnian moon Rhea, Derek Kuroda discovers the first alien artifacts found in more than a century of space exploration. Tests on the enigmatic object suggest that they are either energy packs or weapons. One thing is certain: they are sources of immense power. And so Kuroda joins forces with Sieglinde Kornfeld-Taggart, whose scientific skills and inventive genius helped to form the Island Worlds group of orbiting colonies. Following what had at first seemed a successful Asteroid Belt Rebellion, Liberty has somehow become no more than a word in the Belt as well as on Earth-so the plan is to use the newfound power of the artifacts to launch dozens of asteroid worlds to freedom among the stars. But repressive elements throughout the Solar System are just as intent on stopping them...

Eric Kotani is the pseudonym of a noted physicist. John Roberts is a well-known science fiction writer.