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Embassytown
- Narrated by: Susan Duerden
- Length: 12 hrs and 23 mins
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Publisher's summary
China Miéville doesn’t follow trends, he sets them. Relentlessly pushing his own boundaries as a writer - and in the process expanding the boundaries of the entire field - with Embassytown, Miéville has crafted an extraordinary novel that is not only a moving personal drama but a gripping adventure of alien contact and war.
In the far future, humans have colonized a distant planet, home to the enigmatic Ariekei, sentient beings famed for a language unique in the universe, one that only a few altered human ambassadors can speak. Avice Benner Cho, a human colonist, has returned to Embassytown after years of deep-space adventure. She cannot speak the Ariekei tongue, but she is an indelible part of it, having long ago been made a figure of speech, a living simile in their language.
When distant political machinations deliver a new ambassador to Arieka, the fragile equilibrium between humans and aliens is violently upset. Catastrophe looms, and Avice is torn between competing loyalties - to a husband she no longer loves, to a system she no longer trusts, and to her place in a language she cannot speak yet speaks through her.
Critic reviews
“A breakneck tale of suspense...disturbing and beautiful by turns. I cannot emphasize enough how terrific this novel is. It's definitely one of the best books I've read in the past year, perfectly balanced between escapism and otherworldly philosophizing.” (io9)
“Embassytown is a fully achieved work of art…Works on every level, providing compulsive narrative, splendid intellectual rigour and risk, moral sophistication, fine verbal fireworks and sideshows, and even the old-fashioned satisfaction of watching a protagonist become more of a person than she gave promise of being.” (Ursula K. Le Guin)
“Brilliant storytelling... The result is a world masterfully wrecked and rebuilt.” (Publishers Weekly [starred review])
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Variable Star
- By: Robert A. Heinlein, Spider Robinson
- Narrated by: Spider Robinson
- Length: 11 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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At his death in 1988, Robert A. Heinlein left a legacy that almost single-handedly defined modern science fiction. But one of Heinlein's masterpieces was never finished. In 1955, he began work on Variable Star, a powerful and passionate tale of two young lovers driven apart by pride, power, and the vastness of interstellar time and space. Now, the Heinlein estate has authorized award-winning author Spider Robinson to expand his outline into a full-length novel. And the result is vintage Heinlein.
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Spider WHO
- By Randall on 04-25-09
By: Robert A. Heinlein, and others
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The City & The City
- By: China Mieville
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 10 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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When a murdered woman is found in the city of Beszel, somewhere at the edge of Europe, it looks to be a routine case for Inspector Tyador Borl ú of the Extreme Crime Squad. But as he investigates, the evidence points to conspiracies far stranger and more deadly than anything he could have imagined. Borl must travel from the decaying Beszel to the only metropolis on Earth as strange as his own.
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Reviews, Dishonesty and The Emperor's New Clothes
- By Robert on 01-27-13
By: China Mieville
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Legacy
- A Prequel to Eon
- By: Greg Bear
- Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki
- Length: 15 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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In this prequel to Eon, Greg Bear continues to explore the possibilities presented by the asteroid Thistledown, a remnant of a lost human civilization. The Way is a tunnel through space and time that leads to other worlds, some more like planet Earth than Earth itself. It is perhaps the most formidable discovery in Thistledown and with it come disputes as to the nature of the Way and how it should be used. The Way can be reached only through Axis City, the only space station of Thistledown.
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Barely related to Eon and Eternity
- By David A. Kingston on 02-21-15
By: Greg Bear
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London Falling
- The Shadow Police, Book One
- By: Paul Cornell
- Narrated by: Damian Lynch
- Length: 13 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Detective Inspector James Quill is about to complete the drugs bust of his career. Then his prize suspect, Rob Toshack, is murdered in custody. Furious, Quill pursues the investigation, co-opting intelligence analyst Lisa Ross and undercover cops Costain and Sefton. But nothing about Toshack’s murder is normal. Toshack had struck a bargain with a vindictive entity, whose occult powers kept Toshack one step ahead of the law - until his luck ran out. Now, the team must find a 'suspect' who can bend space and time and alter memory itself. And they will kill again.
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Team Quill
- By Tango on 05-03-15
By: Paul Cornell
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The Just City
- Thessaly, Book 1
- By: Jo Walton
- Narrated by: Noah Michael Levine
- Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Created as an experiment by the time-traveling goddess Pallas Athene, the Just City is a planned community populated by over 10,000 children and a few hundred adult teachers from all eras of history, along with some handy robots from the far human future - all set down together on a Mediterranean island in the distant past.
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Could Not Get Past Mispronunciations
- By Martha K. on 04-22-17
By: Jo Walton
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Distress
- By: Greg Egan
- Narrated by: Adam Epstein
- Length: 14 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Investigative reporter Andrew Worth turns down a documentary on a mysterious new mental illness - "Distress," or acute clinical anxiety syndrome, for another assignment. He's on his way to the artificial island of Stateless, where the world's top physicists are gathering to decide on a new TOE, or Theory of Everything, to replace Einstein's outmoded legacy.
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A good book ruined by a poor (and strange) reading
- By David on 12-06-13
By: Greg Egan
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The LonTobyn Chronicle, Books 1-3
- By: David B. Coe
- Narrated by: Pete Cross
- Length: 64 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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This bundle includes Children of Amarid, The Outlanders, and Eagle-Sage.
By: David B. Coe
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Ghost of A Chance [Dramatized Adaptation]
- Ghost Finders, Book 1
- By: Simon R. Green
- Narrated by: full cast, Nanette Savard, Matthew Keenan, and others
- Length: 6 hrs and 14 mins
- Original Recording
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The Carnacki institute exists to do something about ghosts. Lay them to rest, send them packing, or kick their nasty ectoplasmic arses with extreme prejudice. The institute’s operatives are the best of the best. JC Chance: sharp, brave, charming, and almost unbearably arrogant; Melody Chambers: science geek, techno-wizard extraordinaire who keeps the antisupernatual equipment running smoothly; and Happy Jack Palmer: the telepath with the gloomy disposition, the last person anyone would want navigating through their head.
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good lord I love this.
- By Kuehnau on 01-05-24
By: Simon R. Green
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Fear the Sky
- The Fear Saga, Book 1
- By: Stephen Moss
- Narrated by: R.C. Bray
- Length: 20 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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From the Audie-nominated narrator of The Martian. In eleven years' time, a million members of an alien race will arrive at Earth. Years before they enter orbit, their approach will be announced by the flare of a thousand flames in the sky, their ships' huge engines burning hard to slow them from the vast speeds needed to cross interstellar space. These foreboding lights will shine in our night sky like new stars, getting ever brighter until they outshine even the sun, casting ominous shadows and banishing the night until they suddenly blink out.
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Audible Where Are The Rest?!
- By ByEqualMeasure - julie on 09-14-15
By: Stephen Moss
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Bright of the Sky
- The Entire and the Rose, Book 1
- By: Kay Kenyon
- Narrated by: Christian Rummel
- Length: 17 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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In a landlocked galaxy that tunnels through our own, the Entire is a bizarre and seductive mix of long-lied quasi-human and alien beings gathered under a sky of fire, called the "bright". A land of wonders, the Entire is sustained by monumental storm walls and an exotic, never-ending river. Over all, the elegant and cruel Tarig rule supreme. Into this rich milieu is thrust Titus Quinn, former star pilot.
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8 hours in, and going no further
- By A reader on 10-02-08
By: Kay Kenyon
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A great follow up to October
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The renowned fantasy and science fiction writer China Mieville has long been inspired by the ideals of the Russian Revolution, and here, on the centenary of the revolution, he provides his own distinctive take on its history. In February 1917, in the midst of bloody war, Russia was still an autocratic monarchy: nine months later it became the first socialist state in world history. How did this unimaginable transformation take place? How was a ravaged and backward country, swept up in a desperately unpopular war, rocked by not one but two revolutions?
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Can living artwork die?
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There have always been whispers. Legends. The warrior who cannot be killed. Who’s seen a thousand civilizations rise and fall. He has had many names: Unute, Child of Lightning, Death himself. These days, he’s known simply as “B.” And he wants to be able to die.
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For 40 years, Colony 3245.12 has been Ofelia’s home. On this planet far away in space and time from the world of her youth, she has lived and loved, weathered the death of her husband, raised her one surviving child, lovingly tended her garden, and grown placidly old. And it is here that she fully expects to finish out her days - until the shifting corporate fortunes of the Sims Bancorp Company dictates that Colony 3245.12 is to be disbanded, its residents shipped off, deep in cryo-sleep, to somewhere new and strange and not of their choosing.
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Grandmother Wisdom Wish Fulfillment
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Looking for Jake
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What William Gibson did for science fiction, China Miéville has done for fantasy, shattering old paradigms with fiercely imaginative works of startling, often shocking, intensity. Now from this brilliant writer comes a groundbreaking collection of stories, many of them previously unavailable in the United States, and including four never-before-published tales - one set in Miéville’s signature fantasy world of New Crobuzon.
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Graze Into It
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By: China Miéville
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In a remote house on a hilltop, a lonely boy witnesses a profoundly traumatic event. He tries - and fails - to flee. Left alone with his increasingly deranged parent, he dreams of safety, of joining the other children in the town below, of escape. When at last a stranger knocks at his door, the boy senses that his days of isolation might be over. But by what authority does this man keep the meticulous records he carries? What is the purpose behind his questions? Is he friend? Enemy? Or something else altogether?
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Only Feeding the Darkness
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By: China Miéville
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Luna
- New Moon
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As the leader of the moon's newest "dragon", Adriana has wrested control of the moon's helium-3 industry from the Mackenzie Metal Corporation and fought to earn her family's new status. Now, at the twilight of her life, Adriana finds her corporation, Corta Helio, surrounded by the many enemies she made during her meteoric rise. If the Corta family is to survive, Adriana's five children must defend their mother's empire from her many enemies - and each other.
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Disappointed.
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Dawn
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When Lilith lyapo wakes from a centuries-long sleep, she finds herself aboard the vast spaceship of the Oankali. She discovers that the Oankali—a seemingly benevolent alien race—intervened in the fate of the humanity hundreds of years ago, saving everyone who survived a nuclear war from a dying, ruined Earth and then putting them into a deep sleep. After learning all they could about Earth and its beings, the Oankali healed the planet, cured cancer, increased human strength, and they now want Lilith to lead her people back to Earth—but salvation comes at a price.
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The Mountain in the Sea
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Rumors begin to spread of a species of hyperintelligent, dangerous octopus that may have developed its own language and culture. Marine biologist Dr. Ha Nguyen, who has spent her life researching cephalopod intelligence, will do anything for the chance to study them. The transnational tech corporation DIANIMA has sealed the remote Con Dao Archipelago, where the octopuses were discovered, off from the world. Dr. Nguyen joins DIANIMA’s team on the islands: a battle-scarred security agent and the world’s first android.
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Enjoyable and interesting
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Too Like the Lightning (Dramatized Adaptation)
- Terra Ignota 1
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Mycroft Canner is a convict. For his crimes he is required, as is the custom of the 25th century, to wander the world being as useful as he can to all he meets. Carlyle Foster is a sensayer—a spiritual counselor in a world that has outlawed the public practice of religion, but which also knows that the inner lives of humans cannot be wished away.
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like a radio play
- By Edmund Goppelt on 05-13-23
By: Ada Palmer
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Ninefox Gambit
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To win an impossible war, Captain Kel Cheris must awaken an ancient weapon and a despised traitor general.
Captain Kel Cheris of the Hexarchate is disgraced for using unconventional methods in a battle against heretics. Kel Command gives her the opportunity to redeem herself by retaking the Fortress of Scattered Needles, a star fortress that has recently been captured by heretics. Cheris' career isn't the only thing at stake. If the fortress falls, the Hexarchate itself might be next.
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Just too confusing with enough context
- By Jose Alvarez on 04-02-17
By: Yoon Ha Lee
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Among Others
- By: Jo Walton
- Narrated by: Katherine Kellgren
- Length: 10 hrs and 36 mins
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Startling, unusual, and yet irresistably readable, Among Others is at once the compelling story of a young woman struggling to escape a troubled childhood, a brilliant diary of first encounters with the great novels of modern fantasy and SF, and a spellbinding tale of escape from ancient enchantment.
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Subtle Character Piece
- By Eoin on 09-15-11
By: Jo Walton
What listeners say about Embassytown
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- E. Golladay
- 07-05-11
Too Confusing
Great Narrator, but this book was so hard to follow. And the craving the Hosts had for a certain thing was not working for me at all. Nor was the relationship between the Hosts and everyone else in the book ever clearly understood. Nor was the whole two-parts to an ambassador thing -- Ez and Ra rather than Ezra. I think this is a book better read than listened to. It is much harder to back up on an audible book than flip back to previous pages when something is confusing which was my entire experience, and I did give it all through Part 1 and through the first third of Part 2. I listen to lots of books and this is the most disorienting book I've listened to.
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2 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Bill
- 05-25-11
Couldn't hold out any longer
Several hours in to this book, essentially nothing had happened. Note that I'm an avid reader/listener of sci-fi, mystery, and literary fiction, and I don't mind a book that eases in to a story gently, but this book was boring beyond belief. It goes on and on about the main character being a "simile," part of the "hosts" language. Great, very clever. Now what is the point please, is anything going to actually happen.
It just didn't hold my interest, though I gave it several hours.
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Overall
- Robert
- 05-21-11
Excellent Science Fiction
Like all of his books, there is no explanation for what is happening, but the story is so cleverly constructed that partial understanding soon follows. His stories never end with complete explanations and the lack of full understanding is, in my view, one of the hallmarks of his brand of speculative fiction. The prose quality is excellent and the reader is clear and articulate. Mr Mieville's mind and imagination are, as always, outstanding. This is almost as good as the Scar which I believe to be his best. Great listen, well worth the credit and probably essential to read a couple of times.
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- bookgurl
- 11-24-14
Smart Humans-and-Aliens Story
Any additional comments?
Excellent story of two cultures colliding: humans and fascinatingly strange aliens. This story is more focused and tighter than China Mieville's earlier (also excellent) work. Truly great.
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- Carl
- 09-11-12
A Conceptual Story of Inter-Species Communication
Genre: Sci-Fi
Rated: PG13 for violence, strong despairing situations
Static or Dynamic: Relatively static story; there are strong plot arcs but for the most part the story has a localized concept; it's not an adventure book.
1st or 3rd Person: 1st person female
Abstract or Concrete: Leans more towards abstract. Most of the intrigue of the book is what is hypothesized about the actions that happen. The content is intellectually challenging and thrilling. You really have to think about some of the events to get a real appreciation for the book. large chunks of it are hard science but it's not the purpose of the story.
Linear or Non-Linear: Linear; the story progresses firmly down a timeline and tells a story.
Narrator: The story telling is done quite well. At parts I was a little out of touch with the reader but it's a long book and so that should be expected. Her inflections can become emotional though a lot of the story is her internal dialogue which is "cool".
Plot Outline: In a distant space port on the edge of known hyper-space, a race of creatures has a very unique way of communicating that has shaped the culture and epistemology of the local earthen colony. The story progresses as the unique barriers of the communication become more and more complicated.
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- Kristina
- 08-22-12
Oh, Mieville.
So, I gave this 3 stars, and that's not very good. That said, I think this book is probably amazing, but it's just so complicated. Mieville bit off a lot with this exploration of language using aliens. You need to be a reader/listener who can listen to an audiobook attentively enough that you do not miss details. Because I promise you, if you zone out or lose focus, you will have to rewind! For that reason, I feel like this is not a good choice to listen to as an audiobook as opposed to reading as text.
The performance is a little tough for me. The reader is British. I am not British, but I've certainly listened to plenty of audiobooks narrated by British people and enjoyed them. However, in this case, the performance seemed a bit of a British accented drone to me, which made the complex material all that much more difficult to follow in audio format.
My husband and I had long talks after both listening to this book, so despite my negativity here, it is an intellectually stimulating book. If you like Mieville in general you may enjoy this book, but it's not an easy listen.
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- Burt Bergida
- 08-08-12
What is the synonym for:dull
What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?
The author could have showed up in the first 18 chapters.
What do you think your next listen will be?
The Art of War.
What does Susan Duerden bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
I think she was even confused for the first 18 chapters.
What character would you cut from Embassytown?
The author of the book. Oh, that's right he is not a homonym!
Any additional comments?
Dry reading. This book should be used as ..... Whom ever thought, "This author thinks out of the box"; sorry. If young readers were to have to read this book in school; no one would ever want to read another book...ever. Tragic.
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- Vicki
- 09-08-11
A must listen for the Sci Fi genre
Very engaging and challenging. The way the author kept the reader in the dark with the use of Language and language. Similes versus metaphors. It's like a puzzle for the reader to solve while being immersed in a story about a human colony on a alien planet. I listened to this as an audiobook. I can't imagine reading this because of terms. After a slow start, it picked up speed because I wanted to learn about the terms that drove the plot. This was a true production for an audiobook and the narrator was superb.
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- maier
- 09-07-11
a serious work of art
Some need to have everything explained to them with alot of action and movement. This book is like stepping into a real, working culture. It doesnt explain itself, doesnt define its idiomatic expressions or its history to the visitor like a museam exhibit, It just IS and you are left to figure it out. It is like dropping yourself into a foreign country and getting to know it without an interpreter. I loved it.
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- Reid's Reads
- 08-24-11
Definitely a "must listen"!
Not only is this an excellent book with regard to the writing and the story, it is one of the best audiobooks that I have ever heard. Susan Duerden narrates magnificently. And the special treatment given in the narration for "Language" is absolutely spot on. Upon finishing, after I caught my breath, I immediately started a second time through. It is an extraordinary listen!
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