Revenant Sun

By: Eric Danhoff

Narrated by: Sean Duregger

Length: 11 hrs and 49 mins

Publisher's Summary

Stanley Gabrels has been online for most of his life, living in a makeshift paradise hovering above those left behind for the sake of progress, shoulder to shoulder with thousands of others like him, working nonstop, guided in everyday life by the world's most advanced artificial intelligence.

As passionate as he is for the latest technology and augmentation, he also longs to escape from the constant barrage of information that is stripping away his humanity. When offered to crack a code that could make him a fortune, he becomes involved in a deadly game of cat and mouse that will forever change him and the world as he knows it.

©2015 Eric Danhoff (P)2020 Eric Danhoff

Entertaining, Complex Sci-fi

This is the first book that I have read/listened to written by Eric Danhoff. He has quite the imagination and did an effective job presenting this complex futuristic world governed by technology. The characters were nicely developed and the plot moved along at a steady pace. This story was well written and told with a perspective that made me question the possibilities. Sean Duregger's narration complimented the story and added to my listening pleasure. I was provided a free review copy of this audio book and am voluntarily leaving this review.

Great story, masterfully narrated

I recommend this book to sci-fi and cyberpunk fans. The story is engaging and filled with interesting characters who inhabit a vivid and fascinating cyberpunk world.
The narration is outstanding. Sean Duregger brings this unique world to life in an unforgettable way.
I highly enjoyed listening to this audiobook!

Solid, and complex, SF

While I enjoyed the book overall, I did have trouble following it at times. Sometimes that’s on me, and sometimes that’s on how the book comes across in audio. In this case I think it was a bit of both. The concepts presented were interesting, and I enjoyed many of the characters and settings. The narration was good, many of the voices were very distinct, which helped with a cast as big as this. If you enjoy a dystopian future with a cyber-punk flavor, this may well be the book for you. I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

Well written, interesting concepts

I couldn’t engage with the characters. May have just been me. Well written book. Interesting concepts.
Excellent voice artist.

Dark SciFi

The concept was great. Overall I enjoyed it. The book felt slow in places and rushed towards the end. It was a pretty dark story but not without hope. The narration was solid and seemed to fit well with the characters.

Extremely Intriguing Sci/Fi

The story opens well with much detail throughout. This is not a “lightweight” narrative, but requires much attention in order to truly appreciate it. The Narrator used excellent vocal pressure in a most professional manner.
I would recommend this audiobook for ages 17 and older due to tense situations, violence, language, and some sex scenes.
I was given this audiobook for free and I freely give it my rating and opinion

GOOD READ!

I enjoyed it! The narration was good and kept me entertained. The author did a good job with the character builds and plot! This was my first book by this author but definitely not my last! I look forward to reading more books from this author! I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

Good story, poor translation to audio

I think I was confused more often than not while listening to this audio book.
Sounded like a good story that I really felt drawn to but was often too confused to follow along.
This may have been due to a reasonably common issue I have had with the audio book world.
This audio book is a another example of the difference between reading a book, even a kindle book, and listening to that same book when narrated.

When reading a book, there are visual clues as to how we read and interpret the text. Common things like periods, sentence structure, and paragraphs will change how a subject is communicated.

When listening to an audio book, we depend on the narrator to provide us those clues as we listen to the story. Any decent narrator is reasonably proficient with these devices. This is not my issue and I don't believe that my issue is truly the narrators fault. Or the authors fault either.

In many stories there are chapter breaks. Some stories have time breaks within chapters and some stories even have complete subject/context changes inside of a chapter. An example would be that a chapter starts out following one person while that person is doing something. A time break means that we are still following the same character, but, that character is now somewhere else doing something else. A noticeable amount of time has passed. On the written page there is often a large break in the text to show this time jump. Later on in the chapter, we may switch to a different character. This is similar to a time jump but also includes a character change as part of the jump. It is also signaled in a similar way on the written page.

The problem that I am having, and happens often in this book, is that there is no cue to the listener that such an event has occurred. When listening to a story, the only clues to even a paragraph change is is the subject of the paragraph and you have to listen for that . But a paragraph change really does not matter when listening unless a major change has occurred. Like a time jump. Two characters in the middle of a conversation... one falls silent... the other, after a pause, asks whats the matter? This is common with narrators. A simple pause in speaking deals with this pause in the dialog. But what if the next words in the conversation are weeks later? The same two people are speaking. The same questions are being asked. A similar conversation is taking place. But the time has jumped. When listening to the narration there is no difference between this time jump pause and the simple pause in the dialog of the prior conversation. Until the story literally tells us that time has passed we have no idea and this can often cause issues tracking with the story. I often hear no pause at all for chapter breaks, time jumps, character changes, or anything else you can imagine that is commonly shown on the written page that does not translate to the narrated page.

Some stories actually state the chapter breaks. I like this practice because when I hear this I can start looking for what has changed for the new chapter. I understand that it can be jolting in some stories but it is a needed tool for the listener to follow the story as the reader would.

I am thinking we need some tool for these other breaks as well.
I simply must say that there is a problem when the listener can not tell the difference between a period and a time jump let alone a character change or even a chapter break.

I must say that I thought the narrator did a good job with this story. I don't think a different narrator would have read this any differently. Although, if a narrator was aware of these issues they could likely create some ways to make the listener aware of such changes as mentioned above.

I was given this free review copy audio book at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

Hard to follow

I enjoy cyber-punk so I was hoping to really enjoy this based on the description, however the story feels overly complex and is frankly hard to follow. You can get there but it takes an effort.

Narration is good, putting feeling and emotion into the story and a good fit for the feel of the story as a whole.

I received a copy of this book at my request in exchange for a fair review.

Not for me

I couldn't get past the narrator to enjoy the story. His style seemed to set me on edge. I'm going to read the story on KU.

Cyberpunk for the thinker

This book is full of ideas and very densely packed at times. I enjoyed the book but was sometimes a little impatient for it to move the story along faster. I don't need car chases or anything, but the story did take its time getting to the point at times.

I've read a lot of the classic cyberpunk books when they came out in the heyday of the genre in the 80's. Some of which can be almost funny now with assumptions in technology progress. I think this book avoids a lot of this with keeping a lot of the tech vague but functional. I'm happy to view the book as a very good new chapter in cyberpunk and I will await other books from this author with interest.

The narrator was very good and the voices were very clearly defined.

A deep, rich and engaging Cybertale.

As a teenager, I read Neuromancer by William Gibson and this (along with his other works) left me with a real appreciation for the Cyberpunk genre and even affected my social life when it led me to run the role playing game Cyberpunk 2020 for groups of friends.

The problem is, it is really hard to write good Cyberpunk as all too often I come into a story expecting great things and end up finding that the setting is used purely as an excuse to justify flying car chases, cyborg battles and oversized weapons but wholly lack a realistic world for them to exist.

I find that the genre has, ever since GIbson, lacked a world-builder like Tolkien is to Fantasy and Lovecraft to horror and so I admit that I fully expected the same here but thankfully, for once, I was mistaken.

This is not a book for action fans,let's get the out there straight away. Don't come into this expecting the aforementioned car chases, gunfights in Zero-G or Cyborgs punching holes through walls, this is more like a mix of Minority Report and Gibson's fantastic short story Johnny Mnemonic (with a bit of Winter Soldier thrown in for good measure).

The story is based in a world not unlike where our own is slowly heading. The inhabitants day-to-day lives are automated through Adam, an AI whom they communicate with via a wetware mental link like a more advanced Alexa or Siri.

In this world we find Stanley, a pretty normal man living a perfectly normal, safe life as a journalist but who starts to experience blackouts and waking to find himself in strange places and unusual, dangerous situations. Slowly, he begins to realise that there is someone else in his head and they are intend of wrestling control of his body from him.

What begins is a journey through the shining world of the future, weaving through a city all too familiar at times both in its reliance on technology but also in the conditions that the different parts of a society exist, all while seeking to understand what is happening to his slowly fracturing mind. With the aid of some unlikely allies, he comes to realise the truth behind both of the voices in his head and the larger implications it has for all of society.

I admit that initially I was a little worried by the slow start of the story and felt this might be one of those books that takes so long to get going that, by the time we get anywhere, the story has ended. Thankfully, before too long the mystery began to unfold and it had its hooks in me good and proper.

A dialogue heavy book with a wide-ranging plethora of characters, it's a testament to both the writing and the narration that I was able to follow the story so easily. Never once did I find myself unsure as to the route the story was taking or whom was involved and throughout all near-12 hours I was confident in my understanding of the characters and their choices.

While I think that this book isn't for everyone, as again I highlight the lack of any grand action sequences, for those who prefer a rich world and deep, engaging story I can't recommend this highly enough.

A Blackbird's Wings.

Set a century in the future, one man, augmented and successful in his fast paced world, begins to experience strange dreams and feel a sense of madness when a voice starts talking to him in his head. A mysterious message asking him if he is ready to play the game further destabilized him as he struggles to find out what is going on. A complex and confusing cyberworld, this is nevertheless a powerfully visual book and one which will linger in this reader's mind for a long time into the cuture.

Narration is fast, almost too fast at the beginning, but it suits the style of the author. Sean Duregger voices his protagonists and slides through the web of words with a skill electric and he takes the reader with him through this tale of depravity, and selfishness, and the terror of losing one's mind and being. This is not an easy read, it needs concentration, but it is totally consuming.

My thanks to the rights holder of Revenant Sun, who, at my request freely gifted me with a complimentary copy via Audiobook Boom. It is an astonishing piece of science fiction, one which I know I will read again. And recommend to those who enjoy there science fiction to get inside their heads.

good

this was a little confusing at times but well written by Eric Danhoff and superbly narrated by Sean Duregger xxxx