Revelation Space Audiobook By Alastair Reynolds cover art

Revelation Space

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Revelation Space

By: Alastair Reynolds
Narrated by: John Lee
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Nine hundred thousand years ago, something annihilated the Amarantin civilization just as it was on the verge of discovering space flight. Now one scientist, Dan Sylveste, will stop at nothing to solve the Amarantin riddle before ancient history repeats itself.

With no other resources at his disposal, Sylveste forges a dangerous alliance with the cyborg crew of the starship Nostalgia for Infinity. But as he closes in on the secret, a killer closes in on him because the Amarantin were destroyed for a reason. And if that reason is uncovered, the universe - and reality itself - could be irrevocably altered.

©2008 Alastair Reynolds (P)2008 Tantor Science Fiction Space Opera Hard Science Fiction Fiction Funny Epic Fantasy Epic Fantasy

Critic reviews

"One of the best books of the year." ( Science Fiction Chronicle)
"Ferociously intelligent and imbued with a chilling logic - it may really be like this Out There." (Stephen Baxter, co-author of The Light of Other Days)
Ambitious Scope • Detailed Worldbuilding • Pleasant Voice • Complex Characters • Thought-provoking Concepts

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This book defeated me, I am ashamed to say. I do most of my audio listening whilst driving, but this requires you too pay too much attention, and thus, while driving you lose important plot points, for two reasons:

1) There is a lot of tech within the book, and diluted time due to near-light speed travel on ships, and there is a lot of scene-shifting within chapters, which leads me to...

2) Other reviewers have alluded to it already, but it was a bad move not to have some sort of pause or audio-cue when scene-shifting between chapters. What happens is that John Lee (whose other stuff is ok, in my opinion), moves between scenes without taking a breath and you completely lose where you are whilst driving.

Shame I have to give it up, it's supposed to be a classic series. But them's the breaks.

Defeated

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OK so it goes without saying that if you read this book you have to read the other 2 (Redemption Ark, and Absolution Gap) as well as these ones (The Perfect[which is a prequil to all the all], and Chasm City[which is a prequil to RS])

do you like Peter F. Hamilton? - they you should like these books

Revelation Space starts off with three seemingly unrelated narrative strands that eventually meet and merge as the novel progresses. This plot device is characteristic of many of Reynolds' works.

Its the year 2524 on Resurgam, a planet considered a backwater on the edge of colonized human space. Dan Sylveste, an archaeologist, leader of the colony, and wealthy scion of a prominent scientific family, leads a team excavating the remains of the Amarantin, a long-dead, 900,000-year-old civilization that once existed on Resurgam. As a violent dust storm threatens to temporarily shut down the excavation, Sylveste discovers new evidence that the entire Amarantin race was wiped out in a single mysterious cataclysm, which happens to coincide with the Amarantin's advancement to a starfaring culture.

As Sylveste and the crew of the Nostalgia for Infinity approach Cerberus, Sylveste realizes the massive celestial body isn't a planet at all but rather, a massive technological beacon, aimed at alerting machine sentience to the appearance of new star-faring cultures. It is this beacon, Sylveste belatedly realizes, that alerted a machine intelligence known as the Inhibitors to the presence of the Amarantin, and ultimately caused the demise of that race.

must read the other books after this one

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I was initially unimpressed by the writing and the voice acting. Jumps between storylines was at times quite confusing. But as the story progressed, you get used to the narrative, and then you really appreciate the story. It's a long book, and it's deliciously sci-fi all the way through. Really recommend this book to anyone who likes sci-fi!

good

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It starts out slow but once it gets moving its pretty enjoyable. Also the small number of characters make the story easy to follow.

nice sci fi story

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You probably investigated the Relevation Space universe by now and this I will forgo an explanation of the plot other than to say it can be prodding and beautiful. But the narration is horrible. There is no coice characterization which makes listening very difficult when (1) the names are not common, (2) there is little identification of the speaker in conversation making it difficult at times to know who said what, and (3) there is NO signposting of when the story arch changes and thus you confuse two of the three stories. I can't help but think the book would have been better with a better narration.

I read this book first since it was the first in the trilogy. But there are several prequels I will try first since it seems the best reviewed is Chasm City.

Performance suffers

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