The Quantum Thief

By: Hannu Rajaniemi

Narrated by: Scott Brick

Length: 10 hrs and 53 mins

Publisher's summary

The Quantum Thief is a Kirkus Reviews Best of 2011 Science Fiction & Fantasy title. One of Library Journal's Best SF/Fantasy Books of 2011.

Jean le Flambeur is a post-human criminal, mind burglar, confidence artist, and trickster. His origins are shrouded in mystery, but his exploits are known throughout the Heterarchy - from breaking into the vast Zeusbrains of the Inner System to stealing rare Earth antiques from the aristocrats of Mars. Now he’s confined inside the Dilemma Prison, where every day he has to get up and kill himself before his other self can kill him. Rescued by the mysterious Mieli and her flirtatious spacecraft, Jean is taken to the Oubliette, the Moving City of Mars, where time is currency, memories are treasures, and a moon-turned-singularity lights the night.

What Mieli offers is the chance to win back his freedom and the powers of his old self - in exchange for finishing the one heist he never quite managed. As Jean undertakes a series of capers on behalf of Mieli and her mysterious masters, elsewhere in the Oubliette, investigator Isidore Beautrelet is called in to investigate the murder of a chocolatier, and finds himself on the trail of an arch-criminal, a man named le Flambeur....

The Quantum Thief is a crazy joyride through the solar system several centuries hence, a world of marching cities, ubiquitous public-key encryption, people communicating by sharing memories, and a race of hyper-advanced humans who originated as MMORPG guild members. But for all its wonders, it is also a story powered by very human motives of betrayal, revenge, and jealousy. It is a stunning debut.

©2010 Hanni Rajaniemi (P)2011 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

"He's spectacularly delivered on the promise that this is likely the more important debut SF novel we'll see this year." ( LOCUS)

What a ride!

I struggled with the beginning chapters; then it started to make sense, then I struggled once more.

Narrator did a Wonderful Job

Would you consider the audio edition of The Quantum Thief to be better than the print version?

Yes, Scott Brick did a magnificent job. His voice and presentation fit perfectly with this world. It sounded as if Dr. Manhattan was reading it, his voice was just what I would expect from this world of the Oubliette.

What other book might you compare The Quantum Thief to and why?

This book has some similarities to the Commonwealth Saga (Pandora's Star is the first, by Peter F. Hamilton). In that it has very high technology, post-human scheming using thoughts and abilities beyond 'normal' humans.

What about Scott Brick’s performance did you like?

The way he read made it sound like Jean Le Flambeur was actually talking to me.

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

I never laughed or cried, but it did make me pause the audiobook at times to reflect on what had just been said, and attempt to decipher the small clues thrown in.

Any additional comments?

Can't speak higher on Scott Brick's performance, get the book to hear his narration!

A fantastic, if challenging, listen

In this series, we have The Quantum Thief, The Fractal Prince, and The Causal Angel. There is so much to love in Hannu Rajaniemi’s books. It is almost an embarrassment of riches. It would’ve been enough if he could tell a good tale, and he does. It would be enough if he had rich, vibrant, palpable detail in his books and he does. It would be geeky cool if he could toss off some references to quantum theory and, oh, does he. It would be coolly retro if he could loosely base a character on a 19th century French gentleman thief (Maurice Leblanc’s Arsène Lupin), and he does. It would be amazing if he could have a spaceship that has more personality than its captain, and he does. The truly stunning accomplishment of this series is that he melds all of this together as a seamless whole that makes sense. I could thoroughly enjoy the descriptions of Game Theory puzzles without ever knowing anything about Game Theory, Hawking drives without knowing anything about blackhole event horizons, and gentlemen thieves without ever having read M. LeBlanc. Knowledge of those things certainly adds layers of enrichment, but it is not essential to enjoying the story. I fear that a number of people might be intimidated by Hannu Rajaniemi’s series due to the sheer volume and esoteric nature of Mr. Rajaniemi’s references. You really do have everything here, whether it’s a an aside to Sherlockian quote or references to particle physics, string theory, game theory, quantum mechanics and logic puzzles. It is a geek’s paradise, but not reserved strictly for geeks. In other words, you do not need to get every reference to enjoy this book. Does it add some to the experience? Absolutely. May the book be thoroughly enjoyed without it? By all means.

As I indicated above, I listened to the audiobook. Because it’s dense material, I don’t recommend that be your only way of taking in the content, despite it being an excellent recording. Scott Brick does his usual fabulous job narrating. Mr. Brick is up there in the pantheon of favorite narrators and hits all the right notes on this one. His pacing, emphasis, and enunciation are nearly flawless, which is a particularly challenging feat since it’s loaded with technical material and new terms. The good news is that he also narrates The Fractal Prince. The bad (and, quite frankly, puzzling) news is that he does not narrate A Causal Angel.

For full review: wp.me/p2XCwQ-16A

It's heavy-handed, but has its merits.

The worldbuilding was quite good, but the way it was presented made it seem like the author was trying too hard to make the setting different from ours. The scarcity of non-humanoid aliens is kind of strange because of this. There was some queer representation, which is nice, and some diversity, though not as much as I would have liked. The abundance of French in names and whatnot added to the "trying too hard" feel of it. The hero is a major Mary Sue of the rugged variety, but I liked the heroine a lot. You have to infer nearly all aspects of the world through context, which leads to a lot of confusion, but becomes interesting once you've figured out what everything is and what's going on. The plot is complex, but interesting.

an elequant acid trip into the depths of adventure

easily one of the most provocative pieces if SF I have read in a great while. truly expansive is the world spun up in this tech-heavy universe. it reads like poetry, leaving the impression of a delicate toiling, a beautifully resolved surface.

Very solid

Stumbled on this very solid a little wet behind the ears but shows all the signs of an author worth reading!

Needs two listens I think

I lot of new concepts/words and factions with strange names and I was only able to partially understand it on the first listen. But I conclude from my first listen that a second listen is worthwhile.

B-O-R-I-N-G

If I had a book group, I suspect we could pull a lot out of this book. I did Torah study for many years and, given time and intelligent friends, you can have a lot of good thoughts based on obscure prose. But, as with the Torah, it's not very much fun to simply read.

If you are not going to study this book, read, re-read and think long and hard about the themes, characters, etc (hint, the color blue definitely means something; I don't know what, but it's mentioned very significantly), then don't bother.

That said, inch by endless inch, it's a pretty cool book. I'm pretty sure that he has fabricated a really interesting world. It's just that it's too hard to figure out.

And too long. And completely unsatisfying. GAK!!

quantum comics

I listened to this book on the hope that technical inventiveness and well plotted intrigue would overcome the plot entanglements warned against by previous reviewers. Fortunately the initially annoying entanglements became palatable, and intrigue eventually creeped in. The level of quantum inventiveness, though driven by a consistent view of quantum computing, was narrowly focussed, and far less inventive and entertaining than say Lian Banks in the Culture Series. But more damning, the characters were juvenile, shallow, and unconvincing, their emotions as boring and simple and as their schemes were supernaturally complex. In the end, the characters seemed straight from a Saturday morning kids cartoon. Maybe the author is a real scientist with a level 3 case of Aspergers.

amazing story.

wow this book wad interesting. a little hard to fallow but what a great story and the characters were awesome.