House of Styx

By: Derek Künsken

Narrated by: Justine Eyre

Length: 14 hrs and 19 mins

Publisher's summary

Brought to you by Penguin.

Life can exist anywhere. And anywhere there is life, there is home.

In the swirling clouds of Venus, the families of la colonie live on floating plant-like trawlers, salvaging what they can in the fierce acid rain and crackling storms. Outside is dangerous, but humankind's hold on the planet is fragile, and they spend most of their days simply surviving.

But Venus carries its own secrets, too. In the depths, there is a wind that shouldn't exist.

And the House of Styx wants to harness it.

©2020 Derek Künsken (P)2020 Penguin Audio and Rebellion Publishing 2020

Imaginative Sci-Fi!

Overall, I enjoyed the story. There were a few lulls in the book, but the story is interesting. I am hoping that in the next installment, we get to explore the most interesting aspect, which I will not spoil in this review. It was talked about, but not yet thoroughly explored. There are multiple LGBTQ characters in the story, which is fine, but not statistically realistic given the population size.
I didn't really like the narrator. Her voice make it sound like she's reading the novel in distress. It puts a general damper on the whole story and makes the characters seem a little more depressing than I thinks was intended.

A fantastic book

I liked the entire book, but Pascal's and Marde's perspectives were especially interesting. Another excellent example of world building from Kunsken and a lively narration by Eyre

tinny performance, book feels padded

Just me or did it sound like the audio fidelity was low? did the narrator have exactly the right higher pitched voice that doesn't record well somehow? it was annoying how loud I had to turn the car radio up sometimes to clearly hear what was going on.
As to the book: it could have been 100 pages shorter if you cut out the surprising amount of teen same sex/trans romance. I don't read straight romance novels either. halfway through it decided to stop being an angst-filled romance novel at which point it got much better. Except it then ends before the really interesting parts! looks like two more books to read. not as continuously fun as the quantum magician stories, but very entertaining and fascinating world building again.

Amazing story full of Triumph and Turmoil

Künsken does an amazing job of building characters with incredible depth and breath in a beautiful science fiction universe. This is a story about family and personal discovery. The far future setting adds to the story with out distracting from it. I have recommended it to numerous people and will certainly read it again.

Unsure if it's just me

I should have loved this, an inclusive hard sci-fi novel, with fascinating world-building, a diverse cast and a deep mystery at it's core. But I spent the first third obsessing at the narrator's distracting vocal tics, and the rest being irritated at the slow plot and lack of enjoyment in the story. Towards the end I forgot the fact the narrator sounded like she was trying to squeeze out a poop at the end of every sentence, and that her french was indecipherable. I started to respect her depth of feeling and commitment to the characters. But the story dragged, and nobody had a good time. Ever. The interesting plot points, the hook I was there for, just never had centre stage. Instead, I got the feeling the author had lost track of what readers want. Long descriptions of every journey through the clouds, never jumping to interesting action, plodding narrator by narrator advancing the plot step by step with no style surprises.

SPOILER:

And then... The death of one of the more positive and interesting characters right before the end... It was such a downer. I don't understand why the author thought it would be a good thing to do. I would have stopped listening there except there was only 15 minutes left. I already had the sense the author didn't know why we were reading on and this just lost my investment completely.

So, maybe it was just me, but I found this dreary and boring. While the plot and action and character development could have gripped me deeply, it felt like the camera was always pointing at the wrong place...

The tale of Venus was a dazzling and emotional.

Will have to spend some time on a detailed review of this, but for now, I'm a bit overwhelmed by the impact this scifi adventure of Venus, as referred to in The Quantum Magician and Quantum Garden. The universe Kunsken created has so much more to show us and reveal. I loved this.

hard start with no end

Difficult starting this with all characters and places having French names. Then it seemed to be a soap opera taking place in the atmosphere of Venus. I was about to give it up until the plot finally kicked in. After a long while, I realized this novel is set in the same universe as the Quantum Magician, though there is no overlap between the stories. Sadly, the book finishes with no ending. I suppose if enough people like it, or if Künsken has already written more, there will be a sequel. I won't be chomping at the bit for one.

liked the story buy did not really like the reader

story interesting, loved the characters, too much love for venues talk 😅 but the reader had a weird voice took a while to get used to.

Usually enjoy his work. This one was vv boring.

About 10-15% of this book is interesting. The rest just seems to drag on and on about various people's problems to the point where I stopped caring about them. You know when you have that friend who complains so much you stop being sympathetic? This felt like that.

Good premise, just could have been shorter by half.

What a great book

This is one of those novels that are so immersive that you feel like you are part of the world. And so we’ll written that you miss the characters when the novel ends. And the narrator was just superb. I hope that this is the beginning of a trilogy