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Pay attention, kids.

Posted on 2011-09-17 at 11:52 by Sam

sadrobotinabowlerhat:

It’s really emotionally draining when your beloved partner on the kind of fake detective force is slowly turning into a mushroom creature whose eyes might be cameras, but that doesn’t mean you stop caring.


#lessonslearnedfromtheweirdboo​kimreading

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Audible.com release day: The Vaults by Toby Ball (Iambik Audio)

Posted on 2011-09-16 at 16:03 by Sam

Link: Audible.com release day: The Vaults by Toby Ball (Iambik Audio)

Today sees the Audible.com release of The Vaults by Toby Ball narrated by Michael Agostini:

Also available directly from Iambik Audio, this is the September 14, 2010 debut novel for Ball, with starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Library Journal, and some good reviews over on its Amazon.com page (The Vaults by Toby Ball, St. Martins Press).

 Here’s the Iambik description:

In a dystopian 1930s America, a chilling series of events leads three men down a path to uncover their city’s darkest secret.

At the height of the most corrupt administration in the City’s history, a mysterious duplicate file is discovered deep within the Vaults—-a cavernous hall containing all of the municipal criminal justice records of the last seventy years. From here, the story follows: Arthur Puskis, the Vault’s sole, hermit-like archivist with an almost mystical faith in a system to which he has devoted his life; Frank Frings, a high-profile investigative journalist with a self-medicating reefer habit; and Ethan Poole, a socialist private eye with a penchant for blackmail.

All three men will undertake their own investigations into the dark past and uncertain future of the City—-calling into question whether their most basic beliefs can be maintained in a climate of overwhelming corruption and conspiracy.

The sample seems quite well-narrated, and I hope to find time to sneak this one into my listening before the year is out.

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Previewing September 2011 in audiobooks

Posted on 2011-09-15 at 15:53 by Sam

August was jam-packed with wonderful audiobooks, and September looks every bit as crowded. Still, my most anticipated title is REAMDE by Neal Stephenson, coming September 20 from Brilliance Audio:

I’ve deliberately avoided learning too much about the novel; it’s enough for me that it’s by Stephenson, who always seems to be writing the book I am ready to read. Whether it was The Diamond Age, Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon, The Baroque Cycle, or his most recent novel, the stunning Anathem, I’m more than willing to follow him wherever he’d like to go. I’ve heard that there’s a bit of a “thriller” feel to this novel, which is really not at all what I generally go for. But, hey. Lev Grossman liked it, too: “It’s a truly fantastic book. I feel like he’s the only novelist working today who properly writes about the present day — the real present day where we are all embedded in this technological world.” Am I’m set to actually review this one as a review copy from the publisher, my very first audiobook review copy ever. So a trifecta of expectations!

But like I said: there’s a lot to like in September (and beyond). Thanks to Omnivoracious, Cybermage, Ranting Dragon, Library Journal, and io9 (among others) for so many good book suggestions.

As this “preview” is (again) coming well into the second full release week in September, there have already been some releases, both as part of the Audible.com “First Friday” and last week’s lineup of Jedis, alternative history, Marla Mason, and more. Additionally, Kiteworld by Keith Roberts narrated by Gideon Emery, Roberts’s linked-story collection originally published in 1985, was added September 1 to Audible.com, yesterday the much-anticipated The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern led the Tuesday big releases, and earlier today saw Lauren Beukes’s Moxyland among others.

MORE IN SEPTEMBER:

Read more...
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Currently listening to: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

Posted on 2011-09-15 at 03:19 by Sam

Link: Currently listening to: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

Finished up John Hornor Jacobs’s Southern Gods and while I’ll have more to say before too long, I was very satisfied with how he ended the novel. Raised questions, let characters give their answers, and an ending that feels solidly right for the story that precedes it is a rare enough thing that, well, I wanted to note that before moving on. As a shorter listen (8-9 hours or so) it was worth the time.

But oh, moving on! To The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern narrated by Jim Dale:

“Anticipation…” this novel certainly pulls you right in. Looking forward to seeing if it can live up to the hype that has been building up around it. So far, a few chapters in, it is delightful, part… Hm. It’s part… well, that’s hard. Some bits Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell? Some bits The Prestige? Kind of, but these are not getting to what I want to get to. It’s its own bird, lovely language, a delicious sense of anticipation permeates the present tense (“he says” not “he said”) novel.

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Audible.com's "Win-Win" $4.95 audiobook sale, now through September 20

Posted on 2011-09-14 at 15:32 by Sam

Link: Audible.com’s “Win-Win” $4.95 audiobook sale, now through September 20

200+ books at $4.95 each, organized by author last name. Here are some of the sf/f titles, with a couple of non-fiction stuck in there for good measure. There’s Scalzi read by Wheaton, there’s the METAtropolis: Cascadia anthology, there’s … well, it’s a long list:

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Happy audiobook release day, Lauren Beukes's MOXYLAND!

Posted on 2011-09-14 at 13:59 by Sam

Well, it’s Wednesday September 14, and Wednesdays tend to see some “odd” titles filter in after the “big new releases” on Tuesdays. Today is no exception, with a major new audiobook along with with three medium-length titles which all look pretty interesting.

The one I’ve been waiting for is Moxyland By Lauren Beukes Narrated by Nico Evers-Swindell. It’s the first of Beukes’s books to come to audio, with her award-winning Zoo City slated to come soon as well, again from “Angry Robot on Brilliance Audio” — a partnership I hope continues for many, many titles.


It’s a short to medium listen at a shade under 8 hours, described as: “What’s really going on? Who’s really in charge? You have NO. F***KING. IDEA. In the near future, an art-school dropout, an AIDS baby, a tech-activist, and an RPG-obsessed blogger live in a world where your online identity is at least as important as your physical one. Getting disconnected is a punishment worse than imprisonment, but someone’s got to stand up to Government Inc. - whatever the cost.”

The other three I want to mention are:

  • Demian (1919) By Hermann Hesse Narrated by Jason McCoy — “Emil Sinclair is a young boy raised in a bourgeois home, amidst what is described as a Scheinwelt, a play on words that means “world of light” as well as “world of illusion”. Emil’s entire existence can be summarized as a struggle between two worlds: the show world of illusion (related to the Hindu concept of maya) and the real world, the world of spiritual truth. In the course of the novel, accompanied and prompted by his mysterious classmate ‘Max Demian’, he detaches from and revolts against the superficial ideals of the world of appearances and eventually awakens into a realization of self.”
  • In Search of Sarina: Book Two of the Truth Sayers Trilogy By Sharron Larter Akers Narrated by Stephen Rozzell — Though book one of this trilogy does not appear to be available: “In this postapocalyptic world, tyranny has taken over, and moral conduct has been forgotten. The Truth Sayers have been forced underground to survive, but when two groups joined forces to form the Freedom Fighters and took down the Walled City of the West, they brought a bit of hope back to the families in hiding. Unfortunately on their return from the battle, Sarina McCary, one of the Freedom Fighters, went missing. Now former bodyguard Laird has promised her parents he’ll go In Search of Sarina and won’t return without her.”
  • Levels: A Novel (abridged) By Jim Vuksic Narrated by Stephen Rozzell — “For years, Jonathan has been taught that too much knowledge acquired too soon does more harm than good. That’s what the sacred texts teach. Jonathan knows the sacred texts and the tales of ancient times backward and forward. He has heard them his entire life, and they have shaped his perception of the world. But perception and reality are often very different. Levels follows Jonathan as his formal primary education comes to an end. After a lifetime of learning by rote from the ancient texts and doing whatever his teachers tell him to do, Jonathan now has a chance to explore his world for himself and put the teachings he knows so well to the test.”

Whew. Well, now that September is about half over, maybe it’s time for me to finally post my September “preview” …

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Audiobook release day: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

Posted on 2011-09-13 at 20:36 by Sam

Link: Audiobook release day: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern narrated by Jim Dale is out, from Random House:

I’ve heard a lot of really good things about this book and hope to squeeze it in before getting to Neal Stephenson’s Reamde. (Though I’m not yet halfway through John Hornor Jacobs’s Southern Gods, so… it might have to wait until after. We’ll see!)

Also out today:

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Best of August 2011 in Audible.com SFF: Lev Grossman's The Magician King

Posted on 2011-09-08 at 20:49 by Sam

Link: Best of August 2011 in Audible.com SFF: Lev Grossman’s The Magician King

It’s probably not too much of a surprise for those who have followed this blog that my pick for the Best of August 2011 in Audible.com SFF is The Magician King: A Novel by Lev Grossman narrated by Mark Bramhall:

I reviewed the audiobook on Audible some weeks ago, and was going to use this space to add a few thoughts which did not fit into the 2000-character limit there. However, I’m going to just let a blog post elsewhere suffice, at least for now. In short: it’s brilliant, and Bramhall again is wonderful bringing Grossman’s world to life (though his attempt at an Australian accent for Poppy…).

OTHER PICKS, ADULT:

OTHER PICKS, YR:

ALSO IN AUGUST:

SEEN BUT NOT HEARD:

    Kizuna fiction for Japan

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    A quiet couple of days does include Jonathan Lethem's 1995 novel Amnesia Moon

    Posted on 2011-09-08 at 16:42 by Sam

    Link: A quiet couple of days does include Jonathan Lethem’s 1995 novel Amnesia Moon

     I recently listened to my first audiobook from Jonathan Lethem, Gun, with Occasional Music, and though I’m not sure I’ll be picking up Amnesia Moon, his 1995 novel which is a new Recorded Books production of a Scott Sowers narration, it is the only new sf/f release across the past couple of days at Audible.com so it gets a little time in the spotlight:

     

    There is also a new thriller release that’s come across my radar, Children of Paranoia by Trevor Shane narrated by Steven Boyer and Emma Galvin, out today from Penguin Audiobooks concurrent with the book’s print release from Dutton Adult. The publicity campaign for this one was pretty interesting — a series of postcards with the “rules” of a secret world of assassins and conspiracies layered under and on top of our own:

    All wars have rules.

    Rule Number One: No killing innocent bystanders. Rule Number Two: No killing anyone under the age of 18.

    Break the rules, become the target.

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    Fantasy Literature reviews the recently released audiobook for Kage Baker's The House of the Stag

    Posted on 2011-09-07 at 18:31 by Sam

    Link: Fantasy Literature reviews the recently released audiobook for Kage Baker’s The House of the Stag

    From the article: “Too little of Kage Baker’s work has been produced on audio, so when I saw that Audible Frontiers had recently released The House of the Stag, I snatched it up. It’s read by Sean Crisden, whose voices are perfect for Baker’s dry humor. He’s absolutely hilarious in the scene where the theater manager is explaining the stock characters of epics to Gard.

    I didn’t need the plotline about the promised child, even though it eventually joined Gard’s story. Gard’s adventures were so fascinating that I was always disappointed when the POV switched, but these interludes didn’t last long, fortunately. It’s rare that I say this, but I was sad when The House of the Stag was finished. I wanted more and I felt again the loss of such a brilliant writer.”

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