Random House Audio – NO DRM & Cory Doctorow’s Little Brother

SFFaudio News

Random House AudioBoingBoing.net is reporting that Random House Audio is abandoning digital rights management schemes for their audiobooks. The article gives more details, including the fact that Cory Doctorow’s much-anticipated forthcoming novel Little Brother is to become a commercial audiobook. Doctorow sez:

“My agent had negotiated a one-off no-DRM deal with them [Random House Audio] for that edition, but now it seems like everyone’s going to have the same option: authors who don’t want DRM won’t be forced by Random House to include it.”

Cool news!

Posted by Jesse Willis

Commentary: What are we missing?

SFFaudio Commentary

SFFaudio MetaBy any measure of the times were living in, there is a new audio renaissance. More audiobooks are getting made now than ever before. And more SF, Fantasy and Horror audiobooks are being released than ever before. Here’s a list of the top 10 SFF novels from Sci-Fi lists:

1. Frank Herbert Dune
2. Orson Scott Card Ender’s Game
3. Isaac Asimov Foundation
4. Douglas Adams Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
5. George Orwell 1984
6. Robert A. Heinlein Stranger in a Strange Land
7. Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451
8. William Gibson Neuromancer
9. Isaac Asimov I, Robot
10. Arthur C. Clarke 2001: A Space Odyssey

All of these novels have had UNABRIDGED AUDIOBOOK releases at some point or another. Several have had more than one unabridged release! That’s wonderful. But I’m still not satisfied. What novels are we still missing? Or rather, what novels are you missing.

Personally I’m missing a few, here’s a list of just 10 titles I’ve picked from out of the air. I’d like to see any and all of these made into unabridged audiobooks:

1. Scott Lynch The Lies Of Loch Lamora
2. Dan Simmons Hyperion
3. Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle The Mote In God’s Eye
4. Clifford Simak Way Station
5. Alfred Bester The Stars My Destination
6. Steven Gould Jumper
7. Alastair Reynolds Revelation Space
8. Robert J. Sawyer Golden Fleece
9. John Brunner Stand On Zanzibar
10. Ken MacLeod The Star Fraction

What novels are missing from your audiobook shelf?

Posted by Jesse Willis

Recent Arrivals – Lovecraft, Dick and new Infinivox

Science Fiction Audiobook Recent Arrivals

Some great stuff in the SFFaudio mailbox to show ya. 

Horror Fantasy Audio Drama - Lovecraft's At the Mountains of MadnessDark Adventure Radio Theatre: At the Mountains of Madness By H.P. Lovecraft; Performed by FULL-CAST
1 CDs, 71 min – [AUDIO DRAMA]
Publisher: H.P. Lovecraft Society
Published: 2006

This title brings Lovecraft’s tale to life as it might have been adapted for radio during his lifetime. In the style of The War of the Worlds and The Shadow, Dark Adventure Radio Theatre dramatizes HPL’s story with a cast of professional actors, exciting sound effects and original music by Troy Sterling Nies, (conductor ofThe Call of Cthulhu). Relive the excitement of 1930s radio with one of HP Lovecraft’s most exciting and fascinating stories. 

This is absolutely beautifully packaged.  Comes in a jewel box but also contains vintage newspaper clipping about the M.U. expedition, a map of the expedition’s route, photographs of the Elder City.  And even a page from Danforth’s notebook.  All these facsimile are exactingly done.  The website states that “it’s beautifully produced and packaged with the same deranged attention to detail that you’ll find in other HPLHS products.” I’d have to agree.

Blade Runner by Philip K. DickBlade Runner (Do Android Dream of Electric Sheep?)
By Philip K. Dick; Read by Scott Brick
8 CDs – 9.5 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Random House Audio
Published: 2007
ISBN: 9780739342756

It was January 2021, and Rick Deckard had a license to kill.
Somewhere among the hordes of humans out there, lurked several rogue androids. Deckard’s assignmet–find them and then.. .”retire” them. Trouble was, the androids all looked exactly like humans, and they didn’t want to be found!

Joy–finally an unabridged version of this PKD classic!  And now two from one of the best (if not the best) small audiobook publishers.

Beyond the Aquila RiftBeyond the Aquila Rift
By Alastair Reynolds; Read by Tom Dheere
1 CD – 72 min [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Infinivox
Published: Feb 22, 2008
ISBN: 9781884612770

Beyond the Aquila Rift. It’s shorthand for the trip no one ever hopes to make by accident. The one that will screw up the rest of your life, the one that creates the ghosts you see haunting the shadows of company bars across the whole Bubble. Men and women ripped out of time, cut adrift from families and lovers by an accident of an alien technology we use but rarely comprehend.


Science Fiction audiobook - Cost to be Wise by Maureen F. McHughThe Cost to Be Wise
By Maureen F. McHugh; Read by Venessa Hart
2 CDs – 135 min [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Infinivox
Published: 2007
ISBN: 188461275X

Set on a distant planet, this is a gripping tale about Sckarline, a colony that believes in “appropriate technology adoption.” A heavily armed clan arrives at the colony while it is being visited by off-world anthropologists. Sckarline’s technological beliefs are put to the test when events spiral out of control. Told from the viewpoint of a young woman, she soon learns just how high the price of wisdom can be.

Science Fiction audiobook - Diplomatic ImmunityDiplomatic Immunity
By Lois McMaster Bujold; Read by Grover Gardner
9 CDs – 11 hrs [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audiobooks
Published: 2008
ISBN: 9781433213144

A Miles Vorkosigan audiobook never disappoints.

A rich Komarran merchant fleet has been impounded at Graf Station in distant Quaddiespace after a bloody incident involving the convoy’s Barrayaran military escort. Lord Miles Vorkosigan and his wife, Lady Ekaterin, have other things on their minds, such as getting home in time to attend the long-awaited births of their first children. But when duty calls in the voice of Barrayar’s Emperor Gregor, Miles, as imperial auditor, has no choice but to answer. Waiting on Graf Station are diplomatic snarls, tangled loyalties, old friends, new enemies, racial tensions, lies and deceptions, mysterious disappearances, and a race with time for life against death in horrifying new forms. The downside of being a high-level troubleshooter comes when trouble starts shooting back.

Science Fiction audiobook - Halo Contact HarvestHalo: Contact Harvest
By Joseph Staten; Read by Holter Graham and Jen Taylor
10 CDs – 11 hrs [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Macmillan Audio
Published: 2008
ISBN: 9781427202499

This is how it began… It is the year 2524. Harvest is a peaceful, prosperous farming colony on the very edge of human-controlled space.But we have trespassed on holy ground–strayed into the path of an aggressive alien empire known as the Covenant.What begins as a chance encounter between an alien privateer and a human freighter catapults mankind into a struggle for its very existence. But humanity is also locked in a bitter civil war known as the Insurrection.So the survival of Harvest’s citizens falls to a squad of battle-weary UNSC Marines and their inexperienced colonial militia trainees.In this unlikely group of heroes, one stands above the rest…a young Marine staff sergeant named Avery Johnson.

New Audiobook Imprint Available for Public Libraries

SFFaudio News

Recorded BooksEditor, anthologist and blogger John Joseph Adams points us to this February 15th 2008 press release…

Recorded Books, LLC, the world’s premier publisher of unabridged audiobooks since 1979, announces the release of a new imprint of audiobooks that will be available for immediate release to public libraries—Science Fiction. With the growing popularity of the science fiction and fantasy genres, fans are demanding more sci-fi literature on audiobook. The Sci-Fi imprint from Recorded Books features many award-winning authors, including Piers Anthony, Terry Brooks and Ursula K. Le Guin. Among the current releases are Now and Forever by Ray Bradbury, The Accidental Time Machine by Joe Haldeman, and Blindsight by Peter Watts. Recorded Books, which operates a New York City recording studio, employs award-winning Broadway and Off-Broadway actors to record some of the world’s most popular and critically acclaimed titles.

Thanks JJA!

Posted by Jesse Willis

LibriVox: She by H. Rider Haggard

SFFaudio Online Audio

LibriVoxShe is a classic of the imagination, a milestone and foundation stone of a whole sector of fantastic novels upon which others have built and still build novels of wonder. The sector is that of the lost land, the lost race, the wonder that lies over the next mountain or beyond the farthest sea.” – Donald A. Wollheim (author of H. Rider Haggard’s Empire of the Imagination)

Complete and unabridged, H. Rider Haggard’s She! What’s that you say? You’ve been hankering for a story about a lost civilization ruled by gorgeous 2000 year old female-despot? That’s even what you thought the word Fantasy meant for all these years? Don’t know what I’m talking about?

She was a 19th century best-seller from the author of King Solomon’s Mines, its another tale set in Africa. A mysterious African kingdom in fact. It explores themes of “imperial arrogance, sexual obsession, power and isolation” and it’s all wrapped up in a high adventure format. Best of all, it’s out now in the form of a Public Domain audiobook from LibriVox!

Fantastic Adventure Audiobook - She by H. Rider HaggardShe
By H. Rider Haggard; Read by various
29 Zipped MP3 Files or Podcast – 11 Hours 36 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: February 2008
At 5 years old Leo Vincey is left in the care of a Cambridge professor by the name of Horace Holly. His father leaves him a strange casket which he is to open on his 25th Birthday. On opening the Casket Leo and Horace discover the strange history of Leo’s ancestors. Leo and his adoptive father Horace must travel all the way to Africa in order to uncover the solve his family’s strange history.

Podcast feed:

http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/she-by-h-rider-haggard.xml

Posted by Jesse Willis

LibriVox and Edgar Rice Burroughs’ “John Carter / Barsoom” books

SFFaudio Online Audio

Edgar Rice Burroughs (1875-1950) is best known for his Tarzan series of books. His second best known series is our topic for the day. The first three books in the John Carter of Mars series (AKA The Barsoom Series) are available via the tireless volunteers at Librivox! Enjoy…

LibriVox audiobook - A Princess Of Mars by Edgar Rice BurroughsA Princess of Mars (book one in the John Carter series)
By Edgar Rice Burroughs; Read by various readers
29 Zipped MP3 Files or Podcast – [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: May 2006
“Part One of Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Mars-Series. Easy, swank, pulp read about an omnipotent gentleman teleported to Mars, finding an outlandish society of ape-, tree- and lizardmen, red-, white-, yellowmen, brains on legs, strange bastions and curious apparatuses, where the strongest survives and women are needy beauties to be saved. How can something be so platitudinous and at the same time so imaginative and enthralling?”

Podcast feed:

http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/a-princess-of-mars-by-edgar-rice-burroughs.xml

LibriVox audiobook - The Gods Of Mars by Edgar Rice BurroughsThe Gods Of Mars (book two in the John Carter series)
By Edgar Rice Burroughs; Read by JD Weber
22 Zipped MP3 Files or Podcast – Approx. 7 Hours 41 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: November 2006
“The Gods of Mars is a 1918 Edgar Rice Burroughs science fiction novel, the second of his famous Barsoom series. It can be said that the novel set the tone for much science fiction to come. Its influence can clearly be seen in franchises such as Star Trek and Farscape. While Burroughs no doubt borrowed liberally from the pulp fiction of his day, particularly westerns and swashbuckling tales, the pacing and themes set the tone for the soft science fiction genre. The protagonist, John Carter, with his proficiency in hand-to-hand combat and flirtations with beautiful alien women, could be said to have set the mold for later influential icons like Captain James T. Kirk and James Bond. At the end of the first book, A Princess of Mars, John Carter is unwillingly transported back to Earth. The Gods of Mars begins with his arrival back on Barsoom (Mars) after a ten year hiatus, separated from his wife Dejah Thoris, his unborn child, and the Red Martian people of the nation of Helium, whom he has adopted as his own. Unfortunately, John Carter materializes in the one place on Barsoom from which nobody is allowed to depart: the Valley Dor, which is the Barsoomian heaven.”

http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/the-gods-of-mars-by-edgar-rice-burroughs.xml

LibriVox audiobook - The Warlord Of Mars by Edgar Rice BurroughsThe Warlord Of Mars (book three in the John Carter series)
By Edgar Rice Burroughs; Read by JD Weber and Kara Shallenberg*
16 Zipped MP3 Files or Podcast – Approx. 5 Hours 24 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: August 2007
“Warlord of Mars is an Edgar Rice Burroughs science fiction novel, the third of his famous Barsoom series. John Carter continues his quest to be reunited with his wife, the princess Dejah Thoris, and discovers more fantastic creatures and ancient mysterious Martian races.”* One point of interest, the reader for Warlord, JD Weber, mysteriously disappeared before recording the last chapter. After waiting several months, Kara Shallenberg recorded the last chapter.

Podcast feed:

http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/the-warlord-of-mars-by-edgar-rice-burroughs.xml

Posted by Jesse Willis