Orson Scott Card’s latest aural essay is up on Audible.com. This month Card’s talks about Joe Haldeman’s The Forever War!
Go check it out, or just have a listen |MP3| to hear what Card thinks about JH’s masterwork!
Posted by Jesse Willis
Tag: audible.com
FREE Audible Audiobook: Black River by Dean Koontz
Free DEAN KOONTZ Audiobook! To help promote the fact that Microsoft’s Zune is now compatible with Audible.com the latter is giving away Dean Koontz’ Black River. You’ll need an Audible account, but not necessarily a Zune. Get it now HERE.
Black River
By Dean Koontz; Read by Scott Brick
Audible Download – 2 Hours 11 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audible.com
Published: 2007
Master of suspense Dean Koontz creates an undercurrent of terror in this story set deep in the dark and troubled town of Black River. Burned-out Hollywood screenwriter Bo Aikens is fed up with life in Los Angeles. He heads out of the hustle and bustle of the big city and arrives in picturesque Black River in Northern California, seeking relaxation and artistic inspiration. In small, idyllic Black River, nearly everyone is happy, contented, and welcoming of strangers. But despite the beautiful setting, Bo begins to feel unsettled after several disturbing incidents. He discovers that all of his money has been transferred to a bank account in Black River, and a house has been purchased for him by someone on “his” instructions. Troubled by various, peculiar twists of fate, Bo decides to leave Black River. As he becomes entangled in a nightmarish plot, preventing his return home, it suddenly seems clear to Bo that his perfect little hideaway captures more than just the imagination of its visitors.
Posted by Jesse Willis
New Releases – from Audible Frontiers
Steve Feldberg, the man behind the awesome AUDIBLE FRONTIERS line over on Audible.com has detailed the new AF releases for December. Sez Feldberg:
“I’m especially excited by our multi-voice production on HYPERION, which utilizes five different narrators. If you’re familiar with the book’s structure – akin to Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales – you’ll know that it lends itself to a number of distinct voices.”
I think that’s awesome too. Personally though I’m glad too that Book 4 in the Starship series is on this list!
Available now:
Shadowbridge
By Gregory Frost
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: December 2008
Includes an exclusive introduction by the author.
Lord Tophet (book 2 in the Shadow Bridge Series)
By Gregory Frost
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: December 2008
Includes an exclusive introduction by the author.
The Speed of Dark
By Elizabeth Moon
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: December 2008
A Nebula Award Winning Novel!
Fast Times at Fairmont High
By Vernor Vinge
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: December 2008
A Nebula Award Winning Novella!
Forty Signs of Rain (book 1 in the “Science in the Capital” trilogy
By Kim Stanley Robinson
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: December 2008
Includes an exclusive introduction by the author!
Fifty Degrees Below (book 2 in the “Science in the Capital” trilogy
By Kim Stanley Robinson
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: December 2008
Includes an exclusive introduction by the author!
Sixty Days And Counting (book 3 in the “Science in the Capital” trilogy
By Kim Stanley Robinson
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: December 2008
Includes an exclusive introduction by the author!
COMING SOON:
Starship: Rebel
By Mike Resnick
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: December 16th 2008
*A simultaneous release with the book; includes an exclusive introduction by the author!
Hyperion
By Dan Simmons
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: December 23rd 2008
A Hugo Award Winning Novel!
The Fall Of Hyperion
By Dan Simmons
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: December 23rd 2008
A Hugo and Nebula Nominated Novel!
Posted by Jesse Willis
Spider Robinson reads The Persistence Of Vision by John Varley
John Varley’s Hugo and Nebula award winning 1978 novella The Persistence Of Vision is the latest unabridged story to be recorded by Spider Robinson for his Spider On The Web podcast.
Wow! Could your life get any more thrilling than this?
The Persistence Of Vision is the perfect tale for these times. With those bread riots we’ve all got planned for next week and all. Now, all we’ll have to do is let a few of our nuclear power plants do The China Syndrome-thing, get the survivors together, form a few farm collectives, shave off all our body hair, and then paint ourselves a nice shade of purple.
The Persistence Of Vision
By John Varley; Read by Spider Robinson
1 |MP3| – Approx. 2 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Podcaster: Spider On The Web
Podcast: November 2008
Wandering the roads and rails of a future USA, our narrator learns the art of living in a dead economy. Only a mysterious wall on the New Mexico/California border and a collective of the blind-deaf keep his wandering feet from moving on.
And, here are the details for the new Audible Frontiers version (which is done by a different narrator and is minus the sounds of pages turning)…
The Persistence Of Vision
By John Varley; Read by Peter Ganim
Audible Download – 2 Hours 29 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Audible Frontiers
Published: September 2008
Listen to a sample |MP3|
On the surface, this Hugo and Nebula Award-winning classic is about a drifter who comes to stay in a New Mexico commune founded by a group of deaf-blind people. But beneath the story, author John Varley examines deep, universal issues. What is the nature of communication? What does an individual gain – or lose – by subsuming himself to the whole? Can an outsider ever truly “belong”? Varley says that he has had more response to this story than anything he has ever written, that some readers have even told him it changed their lives. Listening to The Persistence of Vision, it is easy to understand why.
Posted by Jesse Willis
Spider Robinson is Audible’s latest Sci-fi Guest Editor
Spider Robinson is guest editor over on Audible.com right now. That means he’s written an essay (titled “The Missing Audiobooks“) and made a list of Audible audiobooks he recommends.
Here’s a snippet from the essay:
“Where are all the audio short story collections and anthologies?
Audiobook editors solemnly assure me that surveys prove audiobook readers hate short stories, whether in single-author collections or anthos. But if I ask where I can find those surveys they change the subject. So I can’t prove the pollsters bungled the job; I just strongly believe it. But in the case of science fiction, I’m certain: they’re dead wrong. There’s a vast audience for short SF; always has been.”
And here are Spider’s picks:
Several stories from… 2000x [from The Hollywood Theater of the Ear] |READ OUR REVIEW|
A Sheckley Trilogy by Robert Sheckley [from Wonder Audio] <--- from SFFaudio's own staff!!! The Retrieval Artist by Kristine Kathryn Rusch [from Deuce Audio] <--- from SFFaudio's own staff!!! Seven Views of Olduvai Gorge by Mike Resnick [from Audible Frontiers]
The Winds of Marble Arch by Connie Willis [from Audible Frontiers]
The Golden Man by Philip K. Dick [from Blackstone Audio]
Antibodies by Charles Stross [from Infinivox] |READ OUR REVIEW|
10 to the 16th to 1 by James Patrick Kelly [James Patrick Kelly’s StoryPod]
Posted by Jesse Willis
Review of The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
The Graveyard Book
By Neil Gaiman; Read by Neil Gaiman
Audible Download – Approx. 8 Hours[UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Harper Audio
Published: 2008
Themes: / Fantasy / Ghosts / Childhood / Revenge / Parenting / Afterlife / Humor / YA /
In a few words: Not as disturbing as Coraline (which is… a bit) and every ounce as entertaining as I hoped.
Now, details: The Graveyard Book is Neil Gaiman’s latest YA novel. The story is about Nobody Owens, a young boy who starts the novel as a toddler that ends up in a graveyard late at night, all by himself. I’ll let Gaiman tell you how that happens, because the journey is all the fun here. Nobody Owens grows up, and Gaiman’s ghosts do all the parenting.
Again, Gaiman manages to be both sinister and funny at the same time, like he’s telling you the worst thing you’ve ever heard, but with a smile and a wink. Here’s the first lines of Chapter 1:
There was a hand in the darkness, and it held a knife. The knife had a handle of polished black gold, and a blade finer and sharper than any razor. If it sliced you, you may not even know you had been cut. Not immediately.
You’d think what follows would be a bit grisly, and I suppose it is, but it’s all so fantastic that I smiled through most of that chapter, with the sort of glow I get around Halloween. A pair of ghosts (the Owens’s) raising a live boy, that boy growing up and learning his letters off gravestones and his life’s philosophy from the perspective of dead but well-meaning people; well, it’s just a great idea, and it’s perfectly presented by Gaiman. My kids love it too. This is the kind of book that will be revisited in my house often. In addition, I’d say that if you have a Harry Potter fan on your Christmas list, this book might be just the right fit, and it has the added bonus of introducing him or her to the likes of Neil Gaiman, which in turn could open that fan up to the rest of the world of books as well.
Gaiman also narrates, and like I’ve said elsewhere, he’s one of the few authors I’ve heard that could make a comfortable living as an audiobook narrator. I can’t imagine this audiobook being read by someone else, and I’m very happy that it isn’t.
Edited to add the SFFaudio Essential, which was forgotten by the reviewer. He has been sacked.
Posted by Scott D. Danielson