The Sam Gunn Omnibus

By: Ben Bova

Narrated by: Richard Brewer, Emily Janice Card, Gabrielle de Cuir, Stephen Hoye, Hillary Huber, Don Leslie, Moria Quirk, Stefan Rudnicki

Length: 29 hrs and 33 mins

Publisher's summary

A hero without peer or scruples, Sam Gunn has a nose for trouble, money, and women, though not necessarily in that order. A man with the ego (and stature) of a Napoleon, the business acumen of a P. T. Barnum, and the raging hormones of a teenage boy, Sam is the finest astronaut NASA ever trained and dumped. But more than money, more than women, Sam Gunn loves justice—and he really does love money and women.

Whether he’s suing the Pope, helping twin sisters entangled in the virtual sex trade, or on trial for his life on charges of interplanetary genocide, you can be sure of one thing: this is one space jockey who’ll meet every challenge with a smile on his lips, an ace up his sleeve, and a weapon in his pocket.

Now, for the first time in one volume, Hugo-winner Ben Bova presents all the tales of Sam Gunn to date, including three never-before collected in book form. Here is the entire chronicle of Sam Gunn, trailblazer and scoundrel, as he scams his way from one end of the solar system to the other, giving bold new meaning to the term venture capitalist.

©2007 Ben Bova (P)2007 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

“Bova has ambitiously and deftly created a three-in-one narrative that satisfies any and all readerly desires to see the life of his signature rogue assembled into coherent form…. Bova has successfully added to the storehouse of a particularly American folklore. Sam Gunn is Mike Fink and Paul Bunyan (although their opposite in size), Rockefeller and Carnegie, Sam Slick and Penrod, the plucky protagonists from Horatio Alger and the irreverent ones from Mark Twain. His exploits… are new manifestations of an eternal archetype in the American psyche." ( SciFi Weekly)

Really great!

A whole slew of short stories, all strung together masterfully and narrated beautifully. Highly recommended.

Sam Gunn - a Legend in his own mind

Thoroughly enjoyed this collection of short stories depicting various timelines in the life of Sam Gunn. I really enjoy the way Bova details the characters to the point where one really feels like they know them. I found that the narration by the ensemble cast was very good. They provided the variety in the storytelling that the story needed. I highly recommend giving this a read/listen. Very entertaining!

you will enjoy this story.

did not think I would like it but, after the first story I was hooked and found it hard to stop listening once I started. simple plot a rogue that entertained you with his hijinks and his flamboyant style. a little dated but you overlook that and you are caught up in the story.

One of the best produced audio books I've ever heard

The book was quite long, but I could not stop listening.
The character buildup and view from so many different prospectives was fascinating.
I highly recommend this book.
A solid performance- A1

Fantastic in every way

Loved this story and as always Blackstone Audio knocks it out of the park. I think they could do an audio book of a telephone directory and still keep us enthralled.

I only wish there was another 30 hours to enjoy. Sam Gunn is my newest hero and I plan on revisiting this story often.

well done

great book, Sam gunn is a legend in his own mind and well worth the read

Absolutely Entertaining!

If you're already a fan then you know! If not then all I can say is 50 hours and I'm still miserable it's over if that's not a review of the great entertaining amusing and yeah sometimes garish humor of Sam Gunn"s life and the amazing way it's presented in this format I simply can't do better!!

Lovable business-minded space scoundrel!

Where does The Sam Gunn Omnibus rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

This is one of the most fun audiobooks I have listened to in recent memory. Sam Gunn is one of those characters that you like even when he's being a complete jerk, and that you find yourself rooting for even when he appears to be acting monstrously.

What other book might you compare The Sam Gunn Omnibus to and why?

While it is not an exact comparison, I did find myself thinking of Catch-22 by Joseph Heller while listening to this book. Sam has Milo Minderbender's business acumen and Yossarian's sex drive. While not quite as absurd, there are definitely moments where the same irony shines through, almost like a French farce.

What about the narrators’s performance did you like?

Multi-narrator books can be dicey, but I think they all worked well. Each account of the escapades of Sam Gunn felt very personal, and they felt more like interviews as a result.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

If you're asking whether or not the book was engaging, then yes, extremely so. But I like sleep, so one sitting would probably have been pretty draining.

The voice actors bring it TO LIFE!

This was an absolute treat to listen to! Couldn’t have asked for a better experience. Unabridged is always best!

Emily Janice Card's Narration = Icepicks in Ears

I had to return this. While I recognize some of my favorite narrators in the list, the first several hours are narrated by a name I didn't recognize: Emily Janice Card, who, it turns out, is Orson Scott Card's daughter. Despite being a grown woman, she has the trendy accent of a millennial teenager: creaky voice, clipped endings of words ending in hard consonants, sssssibilant S's, tortured vowels: "French" is "Franch". "Troubled" is "Trobbled". "Lust" is "Lost". She reads the opening story; after 5 minutes of torture, I decided to skip it and move on to the next. Her again Skip. Again. Again. Again. Now I'm three hours into the narrative and it's still her. I give up.