Inferno

By: Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle

Narrated by: Tom Weiner

An unearthly voice hisses unholy welcome, and the late, great Allen Carpentier begins his one-way journey into the dim nether regions where flame-colored demons wield diabolically sharp pitchforks and tormented vixens reign forever in a pond of sheet ice. Here, in this land of torment and terror, he discovers the amazing truth of the ultimate adventure that lies beyond the grave.

After being thrown out of the window of his luxury apartment, science fiction writer Allen Carpentier wakes to find himself at the gates of Hell. Feeling he’s landed in a great opportunity for a book, he attempts to follow Dante’s road map. Determined to meet Satan himself, Carpentier treks through the nine circles of Hell, led by Benito Mussolini, and encounters countless mental and physical tortures. As he struggles to escape, he’s taken through new, puzzling, and outlandish versions of sin recast for the present day.

©1976 Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle (P)2008 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

“Tom Weiner adopts a gruff, cocky, and impatient manner for Carpentier. His strong pace is effective in depicting Carpentier’s arrogance and the extent to which that arrogance is modulated as he moves through his journey and develops a fondness for Mussolini. The residents of hell whom Carpentier encounters illustrate various sins relevant to the twentieth century. Weiner relies on a range of expressive accents in portraying them.”

(AudioFile)

“A dazzling tour de force.”

(Poul Anderson, Hugo and Nebula Award–winning author)

“A fast, amusing, and vivid book, by a writing team noted for intelligence and imagination.”

(Roger Zelazny, Hugo and Nebula Awardwinning author)

“Inferno is quite literally a cake walk through hell…Pournelle and Niven have had the chutzpah to re-write Dante’s Inferno…You are right there in the nether-reaches of the ultimate Sam Peckinpah movie with all the matter-of-fact solidity of a Hal Clement novel. It gets to you, it really does. This being lunacy of a transcendent order.”

(Norman Spinrad, Prix Apollo–winning science fiction writer)

Dante's Inferno, the sequel...

Interesting read, well written and humorous. I found it entertaining to listen to, and was well read. It is not as detailed as Mr. Nivens other novels, but worth the listen. This is a short review, I am aware, but I am not inspired to write a longer one. It is about one guys travel through hell, the people he meets and his personal discovery, which is a large part of what hell seems to be about.

Awesome

I loved every second of the story. The ending was well worth all the eternal pain and torment.

This is my favorite book and it is narrated well

A thought provoking take on the old Dante story. The narrator does a great job of separating the character's voices in an obvious way and conveying the emotion durung key moments. I would highly recommend this.

Second Read

This was a great read the first time. To hear it read made it so much better.

Where am I going and why am I in this hand-basket?

What did you love best about Inferno?

A modern-day journey through hell with Benito Mussolini as your guide? What could be more bizarre. Revisiting this story 45 years after I first read it? Priceless! Listening to if after re-reading Dante's Inferno? The best.

What other book might you compare Inferno to and why?

Dante's Inferno, of course. This is a bizarre twist on that tale with a science fiction writer as the protagonist.

What about Tom Weiner’s performance did you like?

This was a pretty straight-forward reading. There really wasn't anything special about it.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

No, because I was paying close attention to correct my 45-year-old memory of this book.

Any additional comments?

I don't know whether this book is a classic or not, but was a great read. A journey of growth on a trip through hell. Even though hell isn't real and there is no life after death, it's a great topic for fiction.