Red Rising

By: Pierce Brown

Narrated by: Tim Gerard Reynolds

Length: 16 hrs and 12 mins

Publisher's summary

Darrow is a Red, a member of the lowest caste in the color-coded society of the future. Like his fellow Reds, he works all day, believing that he and his people are making the surface of Mars livable for future generations. Yet he spends his life willingly, knowing that his blood and sweat will one day result in a better world for his children. But Darrow and his kind have been betrayed. Soon he discovers that humanity reached the surface generations ago. Vast cities and sprawling parks spread across the planet.

Darrow - and Reds like him - are nothing more than slaves to a decadent ruling class. Inspired by a longing for justice, and driven by the memory of lost love, Darrow sacrifices everything to infiltrate the legendary Institute, a proving ground for the dominant Gold caste, where the next generation of humanity's overlords struggle for power. He will be forced to compete for his life and the very future of civilization against the best and most brutal of Society's ruling class. There, he will stop at nothing to bring down his enemies...even if it means he has to become one of them to do so.

©2013 Pierce Brown (P)2014 Recorded Books

The Peerless Scarred

Would you consider the audio edition of Red Rising to be better than the print version?

I have not read the print version, but the audio performance is superb. The accents of the poor wretches at the beginning are perfect and striking, and when the book goes to school it may lose that charm, but is still perfectly executed.

What other book might you compare Red Rising to and why?

This book has echoes of Dune, the Hunger Games and even Ender's Game, but one day will be considered the equal of the first and far superior to the other two.

What does Tim Gerard Reynolds bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

He does the aforementioned beginning extremely well, and the various characters at the 'school' very well. You really feel how well he performs them whether they are an aristocratic bastard or one of the gritty 'howlers'.

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

Few tears and laughs, but few books will ever give you that feeling of strength and rebellion in the face of evil and injustice as this one. Makes you feel like you are 10 years old again and ready to follow Darrow against the oppressors to free your people. This feeling is where he reaches the level of Dune and leaves books like The Hunger Games, Ender's Game, or other various series like the Divergent ones behind.

Any additional comments?

Pierce Brown has some sleepless nights ahead of him in trying to write an appropriate sequel, but at least the next step seems to be this "Academy"... he has time to have his story reach its eventual rebellious conclusions without it seeming fake and contrived.

Live for more!

This is the start of a wonderful, wonderful trilogy set in a dystopian society of the future revolving around a group of kids who are 16 as the story opens. I'm a huge fan of this genre but this series definitely outshine the rest. A cleverly conceived society structure, some amazing technology, and insane, against all odds, action packed scenes of great heroism and courage all set against the backdrop of gripping story arc. But what really makes this series great is the collection of main characters drawn with such depth and their interactions and relationships that continue to grow, shape and develop throughout the trilogy. These books are a joyous thrill ride from start to finish brought to life by an absolutely masterful narration!! Enjoy!

Slow start but well worth it

Story starts slow but once things get set into motion, you won't want to stop listening!!

Excellent! Just go for it.

What a great book! Engaging story, great character development, excellent descriptors of place and time, and the narration was divine. Don't let talk of a YA genre deter you, this definitely doesn't read as YA Lit. Go ahead and give it a spin.

Great story great performance

I wasn't expecting this to be so good. I ended up binging the book in 2 days.

Fantastic and Exciting

This story is a story of life, love and struggles far into the future yet perfectly mimics the real life around us. Everything here grabs, it took me 2 chapters to get used to the narrator but after those the story simply could not be told by another. The flow is perfect; at the instant I felt a drag it picks up leading me to want more. Prime my friends, Prime.

this book is good

I liked how the book was good. it made me happy while listening to it.

Breathtaking

absolutely breathtaking, from start to finish i was immersed into a rollercoaster ride of emotions. i can hardly wait to start the next one.

Listened non stop except to sleep!

Wow, this was so good. It’s rare to listen to such a good story and have an amazing narrator. A couple times I got lost on who was speaking but it didn’t matter. Still my new favorite.

A Prime Debut

I'm not sure how I've missed Red Rising for as long as I have. The science fiction novel and first in a trilogy of novels was released in 2014 and has been receiving accolades ever since. Somehow though it managed to quietly drift in my "to-read" list for the last year or so up until a couple of weeks back when I really started to hanker for a good science fiction novel.

If you've read anything about Red Rising you've undoubtedly heard the comparisons between it and The Hunger Games. The comparison is both apt and slightly misguided. This is a novel about a young-man Darrow who rises from the bottom of Mars to the top with a piece of luck and a ton of heart. The novel starts off in one of the most gut wrenching segments I've ever began a novel with. The author builds the world on Mars so quickly that you instantly connect with Darrow, his wife, and his family and their day-to-day lives. The book quickly upends that and sends you on a roller-coaster ride that I never wanted to get off.

Sadly on the novels third act things begin to take a turn for the worse. This is where a lot of the Hunger Games comparisons come in as Darrow is now at a school for the elite where he must compete to become Primus. This doesn't feel as well fleshed out nor as engaging as the more personal stories that the novel begins with. And yet even for its faults I couldn't help but push through. Pierce Brown does a "prime" (if you read the novels you will understand the word choice) job of character development and world building but a middling job on the action set pieces. There were also a handful of times that I had a hard time believing some of the side characters actions both of obedience and of rebellion.

At the end of the day Red Rising still was one of my favorite reads of 2016. It was so good that I've already purchased the last two books in the trilogy, something I've only done for Game of Thrones. A very solid science fiction novel that I hope continues to grow and get better in the next books.