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Pastwatch  By  cover art

Pastwatch

By: Orson Scott Card
Narrated by: Scott Brick, Christopher Cazenove, Gabrielle de Cuir, Arte Johnson, Moira Quirk, Stefan Rudnicki, Orson Scott Card
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Publisher's summary

In a not-too-distant future that is not quite ours, there has been a major scientific breakthrough. It is a way to open windows into the past, permitting historical researchers to view, but not participate, in the events of the past.

In one of the most powerful and thought-provoking novels of his remarkable career, Orson Scott Card interweaves a compelling portrait of Christopher Columbus with the story of a future scientist who believes she can alter human history from a tragedy of bloodshed and brutality to a world filled with hope and healing.

©1996 Orson Scott Card (P)2005 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

"A bold and compassionate alternative history filled with believable historical and fictional characters." ( Library Journal)

What listeners say about Pastwatch

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars

SIFI reader

I loved all the other books I read for OSC, however, this one was a disappointment for me! The reason is that is crosses a fine line between fiction and distorting historic facts and at times, trivializing certain beliefs and religious symbols and facts. I'm all for fictional history with good twists, but to use actual historic figures (like Noha), and distorting the historical facts in all religious books is another matter! After going to almost quarter of the book I couldn't go any further and I was very uncomfortable with the connotation and the clear distortions and intentional misinterpretations of the past!
For example, to say that the Muslims were enslaving people in Africa is a clear example of Olsen’s own prejudge towards Islam! One of the main messages of Islam is that everyone is equal in the eyes of God and it put a lot of rules to reduce slavery that existed long before Islam came.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

OSC Good one

I know i've said he's let me down before but i'm a sucker for a good, moderately reasonable time travel tale. This one is very interesting and actually hits on a smart moral point. Intention versus results.I kinda dug it. Especially nice was the more conciliatory look at the Spanish conquests as religiously driven from the point of view of they did think it was a positive move despite the greed, violence and intolerance... interesting.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

horrible

boring, tedious and badly narrated. gave up after 3 hours, wast of a credit!

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Leaves a lot to be desired

The reading it self of the book was ok not bad. The voices kept changing with the story which made it difficult to keep track of the characters in the book. Not my best choice for an audiobook.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Too bad.

I tried two times to get into the book, yet it was not to be.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

When does it begin?

I've listened to 3/4 of this. I't all people talking. In an altered time line where one person can destroy and unravel the timeline and kill all people, a new Hitler type person emerges. A new 'better' world emerges where some people must die or put into non-existance for the 'greater good'. This book disgusts me.

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

Woke liberal tripe!

This was a woke liberal’s fantasy. You have it all. Evil Western Europeans reeking havoc on all of the peace loving idealistic civilizations of the world. The demonic white men destroying everything in their path including the earth to satisfy their lust for riches while using their religion as a means to justify all of their evil acts. Meanwhile, all of their victims are portrayed as peaceful, loving societies who’s minor indiscretions such as genocide, slavery, mass human sacrifice, cannibalism, are easily ignored, excused, or readily and easily corrected by our heroes unlike those inherently evil Western European devils who are for the most part irredeemable monsters who can only be stopped from destroying everything by killing everyone and destroying the world created through their misguided ideals. In order to justify killing everyone in the world and everyone who had lived for the last 500 years they had to create a scenario where evil people from the future had already tipped the tables to give unfair advantage to the tens of millions of 15th century renaissance Europeans to survive the advance of a basically Stone Age civilization that at its best had pushed the limits of its empires for a few hundred miles. To believe any of this you would have to ignore almost as much history, and fact as the pile of BS the author asks you to accept. Even the biggest rubber band will only stretch so far.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Excellent story and performances

I had read the print version of this book a few years ago, and love it in both versions. It is a very thought-provoking story, and the narrators (all of them) do it justice.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

one of the best ever

an incredible combination of alternate history, time travel and prescient reckoning with the devastation of the planet. beautiful prose, soulful relationships and important insights about the genocide of the Americas. too many of the aspects of the future Card imagined are eerily similar to the pandemic-laden, doomed environment we live in today. dozens of lessons that could make a difference if we take them to heart. the most important? history is not inevitable. the slightest push on a different domino would’ve changed everything we know

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

a freat story every time i hear it

I've listened to this story I don't know how many times I enjoy it every time I get choked up at the end it makes great sense I don't know how historically factual it is but if it is it makes you understand the past just a little bit better and how we apply current standards to bygone eras

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1 person found this helpful