Off Armageddon Reef

Safehold Series, Book 1

By: David Weber

Narrated by: Oliver Wyman

Length: 29 hrs and 58 mins

Publisher's summary

Humanity pushed its way to the stars—and encountered the Gbaba, a ruthless alien race that nearly wiped us out. Earth and her colonies are now smoldering ruins, and the few survivors have fled to distant, Earth-like Safehold, to try to rebuild. But the Gbaba can detect the emissions of an industrial civilization, so the human rulers of Safehold have taken extraordinary measures: with mind control and hidden high technology, they've built a religion in which every Safeholdian believes, a religion designed to keep Safehold society medieval forever.

800 years pass. In a hidden chamber on Safehold, an android from the far human past awakens. This android, Merlin, emerges into Safeholdian society to begin the process of provoking technological progress, which the Church of God Awaiting has worked for centuries to prevent. To conceal his formidable powers he finds a base of operations in Charis, a mid-sized kingdom with a talent for naval warfare, where he plans to make the acquaintance of King Haarahld and Crown Prince Cayleb, and maybe, just maybe, kick off a new era of invention. Which is bound to draw the attention of the Church…and, inevitably, lead to war.

It's going to be a long, long process. And David Weber's Off Armageddon Reef is going to be the can't-miss Sci-Fi epic of the decade.

Listen to more in the Safehold series.

©2007 David Weber (P)2006 Audio Renaissance, a division of Holtzbrinck Publishers LLC

Critic reviews

“Wyman rises nicely to the near Herculean challenge of performing this 30-hour epic. His clear, expressive reading never falters while he skillfully navigates his way through a labyrinth of plot twists and multiple characters. Whether describing high-tech space battles or the covert activities of courtiers and spies, Wyman brings Weber's intricate world of Safehold to life.” —Publishers Weekly

Great book and story

This was a great book 1. Enjoyed the characters and story. Look forward to reading the next book.

Won't Continue Series

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

I bought this as one of the introductions to new series, I also was interested in the fact it was 30 hours. I discovered 30 hours of fighting was 29 hours too much. Also the religious overtones with an attempt to cover them up was just a little too much.

What could David Weber have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

Make the beginning a little more connected it's very disjointed. Come on don't think you are fooling anyone with a modicum of knowledge of the Bible and Religious history by changing the names. It becomes a farce and distracting after awhile.

Which scene was your favorite?

It's so disjointed I'm not sure I can

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

No

Any additional comments?

I will not be continuing this series.

short awesomeness seperated by long borning stuff

well I was not expecting this book to be what it was, I thought it was a sci-fi book about escaping a genocidal alien race - well it was, but there was only a short space battle and that was at the beginning of the book, by time its over there is a little more sci-fi stuff and then strait into medieval 17th century Earth with kings and large boats with cannons and stuff like that

This was not what I was wanting to read, but I decided to stay with it because I wanted to get back into the space battles and anything that was not medieval, well it never came

However this book did impress me with what it could have been, and what the whole story will be when its completed (there are only 4 books so far, and a 5th on the way - probably a min of 2 more, up to even 5 or more knowing this author) but there is way to much religion and politics, and way to little awesomeness in here for me to continue the story as of now - I usually get all of a series and read them all but for now I am done with this

Its like you know when you read a book and they elude to how something in the past was or happened and somewhat go into detail with it enough for you to understand it but not take up a lot of time - well this is as if someone decided to take a 30 min story and turn it into a 30 hour story

Pretty good

A good story, although it isn't finished by a long shot. The narrator however, is truly excellent!

Although it's in the sci-fi section, it's more a medieval-themed story. A hybrid genre, so to speak.

Ditto...

Pretty much agree with what has already been said. As part of a series, there is a lot of potential. Sort of cool historical fiction with a "hostile alien/future world" twist. Interesting premise. Sometimes some of the messages are a bit heavy handed.

Nevertheless, an enjoyable book. I will definitely check future books in this series.

10 Stars

If I could give this book more than 5 stars I would! The ideas, presentation, and narration are absolutely fabulous. I am listening to the 2nd book (having listened to many others in between) and realized how spectacular in comparision not only is the story but the narration - he is the best narrator. How suprised I was to discover the author is the narrator...I was hoping it wasn't because I was going to buy my next book based on the narrator...oh well
This is turning out to be a truely great series!

A Fun Listen

I found this book a fun listen. SciFi and Age of Sail Naval battles. A good-ole fashion swashbuckling tale with some sophisticated scientific twists. What more can you ask for? Can't wait for the next installment.

Starts well but bogs down.

If you're into historical military naval battles this book is for you. Otherwise you may find yourself tuning in and out. I'm still going to read the sequel to see where it goes.

Phenomenal Science-Fiction Fantasy Epic

I originally got the book in Middle School and I read it several times. My dad actually had to ground me from reading it because I was staying up past 4 AM reading it. It's one of my favorite books ever.

Gives you both Science-Fiction and Fantasy all into one. Amazing naval battles and fascinating world building. The author really shows you both sides, and it touches upon the fact that the antagonists aren't truly evil, but they are basically brain-washed. It doesn't go too much into this, but there are characters on both sides that I found myself rooting for. You have the ultimate antagonists, but then you have people just following orders.

That being said, the world building is difficult to keep up with. There are a ton of people introduced and the names are slight variations of regular names we are familiar with. It's difficult to keep up with all the characters and I find myself rereading or re-listening to sections where I'm trying to figure out which characters are which.

The narration is good. I'm not really a Audio book expert. I only started listening to audio books in the past year. There are sections in the book that you can feel jumpy. Almost like they stopped recording for the day and came back to it. The reason you can tell is because the voices the speaking does change slightly and it takes a minute for them to go back to normal. I think it's good otherwise.

Ultimately an excellent read or listen. Great book that provides political intrigue, Science-Fiction, and Fantasy elements. Not too mention amazing naval battles. This story is similiar to the succession of Great Britain from the Catholic church, and the book even acknowledges that.

Would recommend to anyone interested in Fantasy or Sci-Fi!

Fun but at times logically flawed story line

The story is fun and I like the premise but there's just a lot of instances where it seems there would be easier/more solutions to the problems faced by the characters then the author acknowledges, or continuity errors emerge. so as long as you don't question the story too much or have a good memory it's OK. Also the good guys are sometimes just a little unrealistically perfect. There's also one point in the story where merlin users built in sonar abilities and then later laments wishing that he had sonar abilities, confusing. All leading me to the conclusion the book wasn't planned but made up as the author went along.