Arctic Rising

By: Tobias S. Buckell

Narrated by: Carolyn Michelle Smith

Length: 8 hrs and 37 mins

Publisher's Summary

Global warming has transformed the Earth, and it's about to get even hotter. The Arctic Ice Cap has all but melted, and the international community is racing desperately to claim the massive amounts of oil beneath the newly accessible ocean.

Enter the Gaia Corporation. Its two founders have come up with a plan to roll back global warming. Thousands of tiny mirrors floating in the air can create a giant sunshade, capable of redirecting heat and cooling the earth's surface. They plan to terraform Earth to save it from itself—but in doing so, they have created a superweapon the likes of which the world has never seen.

Anika Duncan is an airship pilot for the underfunded United Nations Polar Guard. She’s intent on capturing a smuggled nuclear weapon that has made it into the Polar Circle and bringing the smugglers to justice. Anika finds herself caught up in a plot by a cabal of military agencies and corporations who want Gaia Corporation stopped.

But when Gaia Corp loses control of their superweapon, it will be Anika who has to decide the future of the world. The nuclear weapon she has risked her life to find is the only thing that can stop the floating sunshade after it falls into the wrong hands.

©2012 Tobias S. Buckell (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

Critic Reviews

“Buckell represents an important force behind the genre’s change. Buckell’s work deals with complex racial issues in a way worthy of the self-proclaimed ‘literature of ideas’: head-on, with no visible flinching, while still managing to give its readers a rollicking good time.” (The Seattle Times)

Plausible & interesting first 1/3; then falters

The premise and the setting were fascinating: UN Polar Guard airships over the now ice free areas above Canada. And the idea that there would still be smuggling and intrigue -of course, and with energy at the heart. But then both the technology and the plot went pretty far away from plausibility AND the characters felt like they were just speaking their lines. Couldn't finish it and didn't care too much how it ended. I DID like that the heroine is a Nigerian lesbian.

Near/medium future climate change winners/losers

Thrillers aren't generally my bag, though I found a lot more to like, sf-wise, in Arctic Rising than in Neal Stephenson's ???Reamde???, another "sf/thriller" hybrid of recent memory. (This isn't a fault necessarily of ???Reamde???, it is after all set in a future as near as next year.) For ???Arctic Rising???, I very much enjoyed Smith's narration, my first experience with her as a narrator. She handled African and Afro-Caribbean accents well enough, along with a clear mainline narration, though her Russian accents left a little more to the imagination. Story-wise, an interesting and sophisticated near/medium future of a climate change with winners and losers is marred only a little by the incredulous parade of near-deaths and escapes which drive Anika to and fro. 3.5 to 4 stars, somewhere in there.

Fiction concept was well thought out.

Buckell's story line holds your interest. The narration was not quite up to par. I would consider both author and narrator again.

wouldn't recommend

Unfortunately had to give up listening after about hour in to the story, mostly due to narrators accent. She was constantly switching to some jamaican/south american pronunciations which was very hard to understand and more so was taking away from story, which seemed to be very plain.

Impressive world building, plotting and action.

Any additional comments?

I am not sure why I put off listening to Arctic Rising other than I was busy and initially did not want to think about climate change. When I finally did get around to listening, I was impressed by the ingenuity of working it into a cohesive story. The characters, plot and action scenes were handled deftly. The shifted centers of military and economic power were believable.

Narrator issue

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

This narrator would be excellent for children's books. I think this may have been a better listening experience if a person could tell if it was a serious story,..........or a child's fantasy book. Except for the swear words.

Fast moving and great characters

Good book for listening. Narrative is straight forward without multiple plot linesso focus stays on story. Main character is likable and interesting. Fast paced.

I wanted to like this book.

I had heard a review of Arctic Rising, and liked the idea of a suspense novel combating eco-terrorism in the newly ice-free Arctic. Set in the near future, it has a few new technologies, but is more a chase book than sci-fi. I wanted to like the book. Instead, I couldn't make myself finish it, which is pretty unusual for me. If a reader cannot truly master accents, she should just read the story straight. I spent the first few pages wondering where in the world the main character was from-- Japan? England? Africa? It was soon revealed that she was from Nigeria-- this worked some of the time-- again it would have been better read without the attempt. Her other female characters generally sounded like "Valley Girls" who one suspected were chewing gum at the same time and ready to say "ya know?" Other voices were inconsistent, making it hard to figure out who was talking.

In fairness, the story wasn't that great either. Meandered all over, a lot of talk, talk, talk. Wished I'd given it a pass.

absolutely horrible, a waste of a credit

Any additional comments?

Not only is the book a GIANT propaganda rag, it is full of these weird utopian descriptions of the near future. Everyone uses airships ie blimps. Somehow there is this extremely rapid change in climate (not weather) that somehow makes everyone in the world live a better life because of ease of access to natural resoures and the use of an orbital mirror? As always I do NOT rate the narrarator. Its not the narrators fault the book is terrible and not the authors fault if the narrarator is poor. I knew up front, given the description that it would contain environmentalist wacko theme, BUT this includes weird economic theory mixed with a bizarre global political framework. Throw in a chase to find a nuclear warhead of course, because otherwise, this book has NO plot to speak of.

Good book

Where does Arctic Rising rank among all the audiobooks you???ve listened to so far?

among top 3 this is one of book.

What did you like best about this story?

Another view of showing the nature. e x c e l l e n t.