The Terror: Booktrack Edition

A Novel

By: Dan Simmons

Narrated by: Tom Sellwood

Length: 28 hrs and 28 mins

Publisher's summary

The Terror: Booktrack Edition adds an immersive musical soundtrack to your audiobook listening experience!

The men on board the HMS Terror have every expectation of finding the Northwest Passage. But what they don't expect is a monstrous predator lurking behind the Arctic ice. When the expedition's leader, Sir John Franklin, meets a horrifying end, Captain Francis Crozier takes command, leading his surviving crewmen on a last desperate attempt to flee south across the ice.

But another winter is rapidly approaching, and with it, scurvy and starvation. Crozier and his men may find that there is no escaping the terror stalking them southward. And with the crushing cold and the fear of almost certain death at their backs, the most horrifying monster among them may be each other.

Booktrack is an immersive format that pairs traditional audiobook narration to complementary music. The tempo and rhythm of the score are in perfect harmony with the action and characters throughout the audiobook. Gently playing in the background, the music never overpowers or distracts from the narration, so listeners can enjoy every minute. When you purchase this Booktrack edition, you receive the exact narration as the traditional audiobook available, with the addition of music throughout.

©2007 Dan Simmons (P)2019 Little, Brown & Company

Critic reviews

"The Terror is nothing less than a revelation. Dan Simmons is a giant among novelists, and I am in awe of his achievement." (Lincoln Child)

"Dan Simmons writes with the salty grace and precision of Patrick O'Brian. But in piling supernatural nightmare upon historical nightmare, layering mystery upon mystery, he has produced a turbocharged vision of popular doom." (Men's Journal)

"The best and most unusual historical novel I have read in years." (The Boston Globe)

Overall Excellent Book

I thoroughly enjoyed the book, although there were some parts where it felt slow-paced. The narrator's performance was outstanding, except for one particular annoyance that bothered me throughout. The word "cache" appeared countless times in the book, but the narrator consistently pronounced it as "cachet." It surprised me that no editor caught this mistake.
Despite that, the book had compelling characters, an incredibly sad yet captivating story, excellent character voicing, and the addition of Booktrack ambient sound, all of which made it a fantastic read.

Outstanding!!!

This might be favorite book currently. Watched the series on AMC when it was first aired. Read the book and now listened to it. The booktrack version is by far the best. It really sets the tone of the story. The narrator does an excellent job of telling the story through the eyes of the different characters. Well written characters that even the tv series cast right. Dan Simmons’ best work!

what a great tale!!!!!

Dan Simmons took an historical real life marine expedition and created an epic tale of what harrowing weather and and woefully limited preparation faced this doomed arctic expedition. I enjoyed every minute and will continue to think about Captain Crozier and his crew

the best book yet.

This is by far and away the best book I have ever listened to on audible.

very good narrative

narrator and music work well together and Dan Simmons blends history with horror well. the different perspectives come across clearly.

wonderfully produced.

Tom sellwod does a good job narrating this, and the sound design overall is good .

So sad so terrible I couldn’t stop listening

This book book Hass to be one of the saddest stories I have ever listen to, but it was just so good I’m coming from watching the show on AMC first, then watching several documentaries on this actual Franklin expedition, before listening to this and I recommended anybody who likes horror/survival stories? I don’t know much of Dan Simmons work, but this is an absolute winner.

Simmons knows how to write atmospheric horror!

Hyperion is one of my favorite books, I really like stories from the Victorian era, and I enjoy tales of sea voyages. This book manages to combine them all! The Shrike didn't make an appearance, but his brother the Tuunbaq did. Admittedly there is little "seafaring" in this story of stuck ships in the ice. The creeping dread associated with this story is palpable, and it's hard to tell what is scarier: the unforgiving environment, inevitable human nature, or the mysterious "goings on" in the story. I think Simmons meant for them all to be interwoven, and it was successful for me. More than once I found the hairs on the back of my neck standing up at some creepy thing or another happening in the story.

The narrator did a first rate job bringing all the characters to life, including unique accents, etc. The cast of characters is very large, and some blend together a little, but I suspect that is exactly how it would be observing the people from a mono-culture like Great Britain in that era first hand. I can't judge the accuracy of the Inuit pronunciations, but they seemed very fluid from the narrator.

My only complaint (and it is minor) is on the length of the book and its use of long lists of inventories, people, longitudes & latitudes, geographies, etc. These do give a very real feel to the narrative, but they can be tedious to get through.

Patience and Flexibility Required

As a longtime history buff who has a special love of true adventure tales set in the polar regions of our planet, I have read numerous books about the great Arctic/Antarctic explorers. Many of those recountings have been autobiographical or contemporaneous. Therefore, I am familiar with the style of writing and storytelling prevalent during the era of early polar exploration. Dan Simmons recreates the historic ambiance of that era perfectly. Unfortunately, that means that many modern readers who are not acquainted with patience will find the literary style too plodding and stolid. Even if equipped with an uncommon amount of endurance, readers of this intriguing tale will need to have the flexibility to accept a narrative timeline which skips, jumps, and doubles back on itself like a spastic serpent having a seizure. Personally, I didn't find it bothersome at all and I rather liked the challenge of keeping everything in context. Mr. Simmons' research into the Franklin Expedition is excellent and his based-on-real-people characters felt genuine and believable. Fans of historic fiction will be quite captivated and those with a discerning taste in horror literature will find this story a very satisfying dish. My only complaint is the final part of the tale which swerves off into a strange narrative which is half indigenous peoples' survival how-to and half febrile hallucination. I really don't think it needed to get quite as weird as it did. Still, I would recommend this book to those who don't want their scary tales dumbed down.

Amazing!

With the narrators voice acting there were scenes that nearly had me in tears with how extremely powerful the emotions were. All in all great narrator and great story!