Permutation City

De: Greg Egan

Narrado por: Adam Epstein

The good news is that you have just awakened into Eternal Life. You are going to live forever. Immortality is a reality. A medical miracle? Not exactly.

The bad news is that you are a scrap of electronic code. The world you see around you, the you that is seeing it, has been digitized, scanned, and downloaded into a virtual reality program. You are a Copy that knows it is a copy.

The good news is that there is a way out. By law, every Copy has the option of terminating itself, and waking up to normal flesh-and-blood life again. The bail-out is on the utilities menu. You pull it down...The bad news is that it doesn't work. Someone has blocked the bail-out option. And you know who did it. You did. The other you. The real you. The one that wants to keep you here forever.

©2013 Greg Egan (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

On Sale....for a reason

The story is great...the reader is terrible. Dante has a level in Hell where you are made to listen to this reader.

Absolutely Amazing

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

I would recommend this book to anyone.

Have you listened to any of Adam Epstein’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

Adam Epstein did an excellent job. I can see some of the negative reviews on here about him and quite frankly I'm left scratching my head. I actually can't imagine a better narrator for this book, Adam Epstein did an excellent job I thought. He really breathed life into this book.

Any additional comments?

I was a bit concerned by the negative reviews regarding the narrator (Epstein) but I've found they were completely unfounded, he did a great job. Permutation City is one of the best books I've ever read (listened to). I've been contemplating the subject of mind uploading for quite a long time and Greg Egan did an excellent (!!!) job fleshing this topic out. What an amazing thinker. I especially loved the way he depicted how humans would modify themselves to live in isolated digital environments for thousands of years. One of the most fascinating books I've ever read, for sure.

Love the story, hate the performance

The book itself is great, however, the narrating makes it almost impossible to enjoy it. Monotonous nasal voice with the same exact intonation pattern for every sentence. Whenever he switches to female roles it is pure torture. After reading some reviews here I set the speed to 1.25x and it made it a little more tolerable, but still, I would suggest looking for a different version or just reading the book instead

Listen at 1.4 speed.

I know the narration can be a struggle. But I promise it's much more tolerable and normal if you adjust the speed in your audible app.

Exploring simulated life

There are lots of wild and scary ideas presented in the book about simulated life. Sometimes these ideas are a bit hard to follow, or to make sense of, but listening to this book is guaranteed to make you think and wonder about the future.

One of the best!

Would you consider the audio edition of Permutation City to be better than the print version?

Yes. His voice has become hypnotizing (in a good sense).

Who was your favorite character and why?

Paul Durham

What about Adam Epstein’s performance did you like?

Yes.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

YES. I didn't read the last 2 chapters for months because I didn't want to leave this Universe.

Any additional comments?

This is my favorite author favorite book.

literally the worst narrator i have ever heard

love egan's ideas enough to make up for it. there's a 15 word minimum for reviews so here are some extra words.

Moral dilemmas of digitalization

This exploration of digital consciousness is heavier on the philosophy than hard SF, although enough near-future exposition and tech is provided to support the premise: supercomputers allowing for digitization of living minds. Once that platform is established, Egan is free to play with all the high concept questions that result from a physics-free playground subject to will and desires. In the virtual environments that these uploaded consciousnesses inhabit, every sensation and perception can be modified to the individual’s tastes, as can those tastes and indeed- the individual’s own personality. The story’s drama comes, in part, from characters altering their very selves to accommodate circumstances. Additional moral questions come into play when system-generated additional personalities are introduced to provide community, and when intelligent life evolves from scratch in the VR and begin to seek their own origin. When these intelligences come into conflict with one another, or with the outside world, where the same computer resources are in demand for improving life for the billions of our reality, additional dilemmas ensue. All in all, the novel does a great job extending the trope and giving it the full examination it deserves, although it’s a bit weak on the characters or action.

Horrendous Narration Ruins Any Story

Narrator rendered it impossible to continue, returning. Story up to point of departure was very interesting.

narrator was distractingly bad

narrator's tone and delivery were mostly flat but inconsistent, with a noticable amount of mispronunciation, and extremely poor non-English accents.

i listened anyway because I enjoyed the story.