Zoe's Tale

Old Man's War, Book 4

By: John Scalzi

Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert

Length: 10 hrs

Publisher's summary

How do you tell your part in the biggest tale in history?

I ask because it's what I have to do. I'm Zoe Boutin Perry: A colonist stranded on a deadly pioneer world. Holy icon to a race of aliens. A player (and a pawn) in a interstellar chess match to save humanity, or to see it fall. Witness to history. Friend. Daughter. Human. Seventeen years old.

Everyone on Earth knows the tale I am part of. But you don't know my tale: How I did what I did—how I did what I had to do—not just to stay alive but to keep you alive, too. All of you. I'm going to tell it to you now, the only way I know how: not straight but true, the whole thing, to try make you feel what I felt: the joy and terror and uncertainty, panic and wonder, despair and hope. Everything that happened, bringing us to Earth, and Earth out of its captivity. All through my eyes.

It's a story you know. But you don't know it all.

©2008 John Scalzi (P)2008 Macmillan Audio

The weakest of the series

It's a nice idea and fills some gaps, but Scalzi doesn't quite capture the inner workings of a teenaged girl. He gets so many points for trying, but this one doesn't really work. There's also a Hail Mary ending that he really should have known better than to throw at fans.

okay. I got through the teenager

I struggle to finish. But since I've started the series I wanted to finish. it wasn't bad I just didn't care reading the kind of teenage wit, yet NOT; it wasn't easy with the sarcasm and stuff.

Valley Girl SciFi

Well developed, entertaining, but generally predictable storyline; several unexpected plot twists and turns. Audible performance was perky in a 'valley girl' sort of way ...

skip

As previous commenters have said, this is a teenage retelling of The Lost Colony with some minor, poorly written, additional drama that was only alluded to off screen in TLC.

Personally I was not a fan of the narrator. Every male character sounded like he had a sore throat.

I'd skip this one.

Fresh perspective

I was very pleased with how this booked provided a fresh perspective on the events described in earlier books. it also introduces and fleshed out some very colorful characters.

Great look into an existing story

This was a lot more fun and interesting than I thought it'd be. Despite knowing most of the plot points from "The Last Colony," Zoe's new perspective added enough to keep it fresh and interesting. One major event even managed to strike with more impact because of the characters' connections, even though I knew it was going to happen going in. Tavia Gilbert did a great job putting emotion into this young girl, her friends and family, and even the proper amount of non-emotion into the Obin characters.

However, something has to be said about her pronunciations. The previous three books were narrated by William Dufris and he had to figure out how to pronounce the new alien races and character names. Had this been the first book, Gilbert's different pronunciations would be perfectly fine, but after three books of hearing some of these terms, hearing Gilbert say them differently was very jarring. It was distracting and someone, be it the narrator or a producer, should have taken note of this.

Most distracting was the main character Zoe's original last name, Boutin. After two characters in two previous books, hearing "BOOT-in" rather than Dufris's "boo-TAN" was more annoying than anything else.

Eh..... Skipable

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

No, its a rewrite of book 3 from a different point of view

If you’ve listened to books by John Scalzi before, how does this one compare?

Doesn't really stack up

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

Not likely

Any additional comments?

You can skip this one. This book mostly focuses on what its like to be a teenage girl who is at the center of attention and has alien races who will risk their lives for her and all she wants is to be a normal bratty teenage girl with no responsibilities. If you like the Twilight series this book might be for you.

Scalzi phoned this one in. Too much like book 3

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

Scalzi phoned this one in. Too much like book 3, if you are catching up on the series you will be disappointed. No real suspense no real drama, if you finished book 3 you know the outcome of everything in this book. It's a good concept for a book, to tell it for a different angle, but following it right after the prior book and with someone so connected to the main story of the prior book doesn't work.

Would you ever listen to anything by John Scalzi again?

Yes, I've liked his other books. This was just a concept that didn't work.

What does Tavia Gilbert bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

Tavia was good, I enjoyed the narration.

Do you think Zoe's Tale needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

No, I think the book about the book I just finished concept didn't work.

meh

overall, it was an entertaining look into the story behind a secondary character in the Old Man's War series. the struggle for me was staying invested in the story with the narration. Tavia did a fine read, but when the pronunciation of some of the words are changed between narrators in a series, the pronunciation of the words became a distraction from the story and overall impacted the experience.

Why would the narrator not listen to the books?

What did you love best about Zoe's Tale?

It was a good addition to the universe and had its own point of view it also answered a few questions.

Who was your favorite character and why?

I didn't really have a favorite character. So I guess Zoe the main character.

How could the performance have been better?

The performance was absolute garbage. The narrator did not go back and listen to the other books in the series narrated by William Dufris. Zoes last name is pronounced different. William Dufris pronounced it Bu-tan this narrator says Boot-in, same with the dog, and whole races of of aliens. This for some reason infuriated me. It just made me feel like the narrator is lazy. You would think the producer would make sure things like this didn't happen but NOPE.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

Not really. I honestly think this book could be skipped since its just a rehashing of a previous story just with some added details. It does answer a few questions but not many.

Any additional comments?

If you are really in love with this series then this book is worth it. If you are questioning if it is worth buying then don't. You won't miss anything.