Idlewild

By: Nick Sagan

Narrated by: Clayton Barclay Jones

Length: 8 hrs and 10 mins

Publisher's summary

He wakes alone, nameless, in a strangely bucolic day-after-tomorrow world. His amnesia is near-total; he cannot remember his name and doesn't recognize anything around him, but he knows with absolute certainty that someone has tried to kill him and will surely try again.

Not knowing who, if anyone, he can trust, he reacquaints himself with eight companions, all of whom are being trained (for what?) at an esoteric academy run by a cryptic superintendent named Maestro. As he tries to discover the identity of the person who wants him dead, he quickly begins to unravel a series of sinister truths, which make it clear that the ramifications of his search are far greater than he could ever have imagined. Much more than his own life is at stake.

Idlewild takes the best of its genre and transcends it, creating a story that will appeal to readers far beyond the traditional science fiction fan base.

©2003 Damned If I Don't Productions (P)2003 HighBridge Company

Critic reviews

"Sagan may have more imagination than he knows what to do with a wonderful thing in a new author." (Kirkus Reviews)

Non-English majors need not apply

This story appears to be a "stream of consciousness" which takes full attention to follow. I am unable to say what the plot even is after trying to start three times. This is a read for English majors only. I don't think the rest of us need waste our time or credits.

Didn't Like It

For me, this is the sort of story that I need in printed form. I kept getting lost in the various virtual worlds and was never really sure when the real world appeared. I'm still not sure we ever left the virtual world. Not sure I would want humanity repopulated from the nutty characters in the story.

getting to the good parts...

if there are any...seems impossible. This is one of the most annoying books that I have ever tried to read. I started it a couple of times, put it away, and now its too late to return it or I would do so. AND I resent the reference by another reviewer along the lines of "60 year old grandmothers" not appreciating it. Many 60 year old grandmothers (and grandfathers) grew up in the heyday of the great science fiction writers - Clarke, Heinlein, Brunner, too many to mention, - and this writer is simply not in their class. If you go ahead and buy this showy piece of jumpy junk, don't let the "return by" date pass you by.

better ending than beginning

not terrible, definitely caught my attention towards the end. somewhat hard to follow. wasn't what I expected per the description.

What the heck is this story?

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

If I could have figured out what this story was about.

What do you think your next listen will be?

Not sure until I buy it.

What did you like about the performance? What did you dislike?

The performance... hard to describe... it was Ok

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Idlewild?

The entire story line, or I would have put more clues. I didn't know if it was fantisy, scifi, mystery, or what.

Any additional comments?

Nope.

pretentious adolescent angst

Imagine having to hang out for seven hours with a pretentious nephew, who continuously expounds on the philosophical nuances of "The Matrix," talks about jonesing for cloves and, oh yeah, has some lame vocal affectations... and you have an idea of what listening to this is like. For the most part, it just seemed like pseudo-intellectual rambling and, if I weren't a completist I would have quit this 20 minutes into it.
The vocal affectations were sometimes distracting and came off as pretentious (think of a friend going to England for semester abroad and returning only to refuse to use the words 'sweater'or 'flashlight' when they can say 'jumper' and 'torch.'). The narrator continually pronounces the word "bury" as "burry" (rhymes with "flurry")... for fun go to 4h50m and listen to him say "burry" about twenty times in the space of a minute and then you'll get an idea. There are a number of other mispronunciations that were, to a lesser degree, also annoying. It's the audio equivalent to not having a copy editor I guess.

I found the snotty adolescent narration so distracting, that I think it's hard to tell whether the book itself had much merit. In any case, I found the whole Matrix-theme a little cheesy and I had no sympathy with any of the characters.

Ok, but boring at times

Dark and slow. Narrator, again, doesn't know how to pronounce contractions - makes him sound like a little kid who has not learned to speak correctly which, I guess, is the case. Pronounces 'didn't as 'dent' and 'wouldn't' as ' wood dent'

Takes a long time to get anywhere. Spend your money elsewhere.

Cannot identify with protagonist

If I were to awaken with amnesia in an unfamiliar world, I'd make it a top priority to discover some information. I wouldn't destroy anything that tried to communicate with me.

The author's creative use of language and simile had me smiling and kept me listening for a while after I decided that I didn't care whether the protagonist lived or died, so long as he'd quit whining and proceed to some rational action.

This is a series of events without reason, or structure. Mostly though the book lacks narrative drive - anything which would cause me to turn another page, or to choose to listen to this.

The Unfinished!

The narration for this book is so bad that it's the only book I haven't finished! The premise is actually okay but the weak characterizations and poor pronunciation of the narrator drove me to distraction - especially after listening to the Dune prequels - which were great.
Give this one a pass.