Cloud Atlas

A Novel

By: David Mitchell

Narrated by: Scott Brick, Cassandra Campbell, Kim Mai Guest, Kirby Heyborne, John Lee, Richard Matthews

Length: 19 hrs and 48 mins

Publisher's summary

By the New York Times best-selling author of The Bone Clocks

Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize

A postmodern visionary and one of the leading voices in 21st-century fiction, David Mitchell combines flat-out adventure, a Nabokovian love of puzzles, a keen eye for character, and a taste for mind-bending, philosophical, and scientific speculation in the tradition of Umberto Eco, Haruki Murakami, and Philip K. Dick. The result is brilliantly original fiction as profound as it is playful. In this groundbreaking novel, an influential favorite among a new generation of writers, Mitchell explores with daring artistry fundamental questions of reality and identity.

Cloud Atlas begins in 1850 with Adam Ewing, an American notary voyaging from the Chatham Isles to his home in California. Along the way, Ewing is befriended by a physician, Dr. Goose, who begins to treat him for a rare species of brain parasite.... Abruptly, the action jumps to Belgium in 1931, where Robert Frobisher, a disinherited bisexual composer, contrives his way into the household of an infirm maestro who has a beguiling wife and a nubile daughter.... From there we jump to the West Coast in the 1970s and a troubled reporter named Luisa Rey, who stumbles upon a web of corporate greed and murder that threatens to claim her life.... And onward, with dazzling virtuosity, to an inglorious present-day England; to a Korean superstate of the near future where neo-capitalism has run amok; and, finally, to a post-apocalyptic Iron Age Hawaii in the last days of history.

But the story doesn’t end even there. The narrative then boomerangs back through centuries and space, returning by the same route, in reverse, to its starting point. Along the way, Mitchell reveals how his disparate characters connect, how their fates intertwine, and how their souls drift across time like clouds across the sky.

As wild as a videogame, as mysterious as a Zen koan, Cloud Atlas is an unforgettable tour de force that, like its incomparable author, has transcended its cult-classic status to become a worldwide phenomenon.

List of readers:

• The Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing, read by Scott Brick
• Letters from Zedelghem, read by Richard Matthews
• Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery, read by Cassandra Campbell
• The Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish, read by John Lee
• An Orison of Sonmi-451, read by Kim Mai Guest
• Sloosha’s Crossin’ an’ Ev’rythin’ After, read by Kirby Heyborne

This audiobook is available exclusively as an audio download!

Note to customers: The complicated format of this novel makes it seem that the audio may be cutting off before the end of a story, accompanied by a change in narrator. However, this is the author's intention, so please continue to listen, and the stories will conclude themselves as intended.

©2004 David Mitchell (P)2004 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

• 2005 Audie Award Nominee, Literary Fiction

"[Mitchell's] exuberant, Nabokovian delight in word play; his provocative grapplings with the great unknowables; and most of all his masterful storytelling: all coalesce to make Cloud Atlas an exciting, almost overwhelming masterpiece." ( Washington Times)

"[ Cloud Atlas] glows with a fizzy, dizzy energy, pregnant with possibility and whispering in your ear: listen closely to a story, any story, and you'll hear another story inside it, eager to meet the world." ( The Village Voice)

"A remarkable book....It knits together science fiction, political thriller, and historical pastiche with musical virtuosity and linguistic exuberance: there won't be a bigger, bolder novel next year." ( The Guardian)

Great story, mostly good narration

What did you love best about Cloud Atlas?

The story in Cloud Atlas is great, and while every story is archetypal, there all very good.

What other book might you compare Cloud Atlas to and why?

Well, the individual stories compare well to other books, but few other books have such contrasting and stark narratives. The stories set in the distant future are straight Huxley, where as those set in the 19th and early 20th century remind me a lot of David Liss.

What three words best describe the narrators’s performance?

Varied, well done

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

I did not have an extreme reaction. Laugh? Sometimes. I really liked the Somni (sp, audio book) chapters set in the distant future. I thought, by and large, they were great totalitarian future imperfect stories.

Any additional comments?

There are 5 or 6 narrators in this book and only the Louisa Ray narrator stands out as being bad, in my opinion. For chapters that should be filled with over-emphasis, like an airport bookstore mystery novel, they're read like a computer program. Although that was probably my least favorite section in the book anyway, because it kept going on and on... But from the very start I didn't like how that chapter was read, too sterile, without the right pacing. But, otherwise, the book is very well read.

Great listen!

Would you listen to Cloud Atlas again? Why?

The novel is very well written, both intricate and captivating.
At the end of each part, my mind raced in an attempt to put all the pieces together.

To describe this book in a few succinct words, I would say, philosophical, enlightening, and masterful.

What did you like best about this story?

The genial use of language.

Each part was beautifully narrated with such colorful lexicon; I truly felt a shift in time and reality with each change in narration.

Any additional comments?

I do not wish to tell too much, as part of Cloud Atlas' charm is it's ability to make the listener want more.

All I can say though, a good read/listen.

Ingenious, Fascination, Captivating

After listening to the audio I had to buy two hard copies. One for my book shelf to read in the future. One to lend to friends. I have never read a book of this genre. Each segment is a story on its own. There is a thin thread that runs through each segment,connecting them. The stories travel through centuries, starting in the past and going far into the future, then loops back around picking up each story where it left off. Completing each segment. The book has everything, intrigue,science fiction,philosophy, romance, history, music.Mitchell writing in insightful and keeps you thinking long after you finish this book.

The narrators were wonderful. I could listen to "Timothy Cavendish" forever and would love to listen a full novel about that character alone. I did have a hard time with the voice of "Robert Frobisher". I had to keep in mind Frobisher was a young man, the voice sounded like someone older.

Intriguing

Different from any other book I’ve “read”. Narration was excellent for all characters. Though it seemed at first to be a long listen, time flew by and the story was over before I knew it. The last passage should be quoted frequently, especially in our current political and social climate.

Wonderful array of characters

The narrators capture the unique voices of the characters, making this a book you'll want to listen to again and again.

I thousand times better than the movie

Truly a masterpiece. I was surprised how many times it made me genuinely laugh. Very special story

Challenging, but worth it

I listened to Cloud Atlas and think it's a 5-star book with 5-star narration. That said, I don't think it's likely to please everyone. In fact, now I need to read the book to put some things together that went by too quickly in the spoken version. The novel is structured as a series of loosely related stories, which start, are interrupted, and then conclude. The characters are very interesting, and some appear more than once. My favorite character is Zachry, an islander living in post-apocalyptic Hawaii. Some of the characters/stories are a little tiresome. For me, those are the Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish and Letters from Zedelghem. A movie adaptation is supposed to be released in late October this year.

You might want to read the wiki article for a non-spoiler roadmap before you tackle this one.

Loved it. A very enjoyable read.

Would you consider the audio edition of Cloud Atlas to be better than the print version?

Better in many ways. I have both the print and listened. Having the different stories read by different performers really helped. And the language flows well.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Sonmi-451. It was the most gripping story, and I sympathized with her the most.

Timothy Cavendish was another great character. His story was well done and very funny, though completely different.

They all are very good stories on their own and different.

Have you listened to any of the narrators’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

No

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

Sonmi and the statue of Siddharta

Any additional comments?

Wonderful puzzle of a book, interweaving the six very good stories in simple and complex ways.

It took me a while before I realized that the 451 in Sonmi-451 was a harkening to Fahrenheit 451 classic.

Captivating

The juxtaposition of these stories, loosely related and with a tenuously c'mon thread, is done superbly. Mitchell is a fine weaver of yarns.

Definitely worth your time and money.

much better than the movie

Where does Cloud Atlas rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

this is the best book i have listened to on audible

What other book might you compare Cloud Atlas to and why?

none. this was an amazing book that stands alone

What about the narrators’s performance did you like?

The narrator does an amazing job reading pidgin .. at first your so confused, what's going on, i can understand, but I know I shouldnt be able too, then after listening for a while you're completely and totally hanging on every word, waiting for the next bit of information..

Who was the most memorable character of Cloud Atlas and why?

the two pidgin speaking characters.. but this is such an amazing book they're all great