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Pastwatch  By  cover art

Pastwatch

By: Orson Scott Card
Narrated by: Scott Brick, Christopher Cazenove, Gabrielle de Cuir, Arte Johnson, Moira Quirk, Stefan Rudnicki, Orson Scott Card
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Publisher's summary

In a not-too-distant future that is not quite ours, there has been a major scientific breakthrough. It is a way to open windows into the past, permitting historical researchers to view, but not participate, in the events of the past.

In one of the most powerful and thought-provoking novels of his remarkable career, Orson Scott Card interweaves a compelling portrait of Christopher Columbus with the story of a future scientist who believes she can alter human history from a tragedy of bloodshed and brutality to a world filled with hope and healing.

©1996 Orson Scott Card (P)2005 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

"A bold and compassionate alternative history filled with believable historical and fictional characters." ( Library Journal)

What listeners say about Pastwatch

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    4 out of 5 stars

Interesting Alternative History Time Travel Romp

After my experience with his Wakers, I'm glad I jumped back in to Card's bibliography and listed to Pastwatch. I found it to be a great time travel adventure centered around the great explorer and controversial historical figure, Christopher Columbus. The Audible production was excellent and featured seven narrators, including the author himself, for each of the different points of view.

This was written in 1996 and apparently supposed to be the first of a series of Pastwatch books but no others were written.

This novel is a mix of historical fiction centered around Columbus' life in the fifteen century with some near future time travel science fiction. Card takes us from Columbus' childhood until his famous 1492 voyage west and that's where the time travel kicks in. In the not too distant future humans have invented a method to view past events for historical research purposes until the technology is eventually advanced to the point where people can actually travel in time. The time travel group on earth discovers that alternate timelines can and have been created so a group of three time travelers are sent back to the Caribbean area in the Americas where Columbus is due to land in hopes of changing history - as in their (and our) time line humanity is facing natural disasters, and we all know how the history of the Americas was changed after 1492. The goal of the future time travelers was to create a time line which featured a stable civilization in the Americas driven by the native population rather than Europeans.

Card really develops his main characters well and gives us an interesting glimpse in to what Columbus' life was like. The chapters were long (at least in the audiobook) but jumped around from narrator to narrator often which kept the listening experience fresh. I'm not a huge fan of historical fiction but found these parts to be interesting due to the subject matter, and felt the novel really took off once Columbus reached the Caribbean and the time travelers started going to work. The novel focuses on its characters rather than the mechanics and technology of the time travel bits, as the science is left in the background and not explained very well. The story telling is what makes this novel great - it is really deep, there is much more to this than what appears on the surface, and Card really sweeps you away with his what-might-have-been scenario

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Entertaining, engaging and a great story

I loved this book. It was well written and well narrated. The best part was the amazing story. So much history and plot, so easy to follow it sucks you in and you dont want to stop listening. It also has many thought provoking aspects. It's very timely for today's world, and I think will be for a long time to come.

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one more time

I have now listed to this book for the 3rd time. one of my favorites of all time.

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Troublesome and mediocre

It’s unbelievable that this was written by orson Scott card. It leaves extremely dangerous messages, filled with arrogance. At the core of the message, it seems that Wiping out the entire humanity is “good”, and could be “for the better” of the human race. Not even thanos (Marvel’s vilest villain) came up with that plan. And the decision is just made by a bunch of bureaucrats. So absurd too. Luckily he also wrote “Treason” and the ender saga…

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Stellar. Another masterpiece.

I'm not a normal reader for this genre, but OSC nailed it. The story is compassionate, riveting. and of course - thought proviking.

Parts of it were a bit much in detail but that's history and didn't take away from the story at all.

If it weren't free, it'd still be worth a credit.

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My first Orson Scott Card Book

I cried, I laughed and I was entertained the entire time. What more can you ask for?

I love alternative history. If only things had happened this way. How much better would things be now?

The synopsis for this book doesn't do it justice. While light on sci-fi, any fan of time travel or alternative history should take part in this experience.

The narration is above average as is the story, but as so often happens, the overall experience is greater than the sum of its parts.

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Performance Issues

Interesting story exploring issues of equality and how far science should go. However, there are frequent changes of readers which don’t always seem to connect to the story.
Some of the readers are excellent and some are very poor performers, more like those on LibriVox.
I don’t care for having readers speak English with an accent of whatever language the character would be speaking. Columbus did not speak English with a Spanish accent.

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Great book with.a great lessons

This book examines some very tough issues that plague the world in our time and our past. I feel that this book should be required reading in every place of learning throughout every nation, every land on this earth. I would hope and pray that all you reads or listen to this book take the hard lessons in it to heart.

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Brilliant plot and story line

I thoroughly enjoyed this audible, as Orson Scott Card is a wonderful writer. This story was thought provoking, and very entertaining. I liked the male narrators, but the female narrator was a bit monotone.

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Innovative yet Slanted

This is a marvelously written novel. No question. The plot is gripping and unexpected at many points. The characters are deeply relatable and engaging, and the world is all believable.

However, I cannot help but notice various atheistic, feminist, and other politically left positions that were woven throughout. I confess it was dramatically more mild than the sort of racist vitriol that is leveled at anyone saying anything positive about Christopher Columbus today, yet it certainly was not absent. Blaming private property, for instance, for injustice is utter nonsense. The statement that tribal people's who were utterly pagan would teach those who claimed to be Christians to be "real" Christians, is absurd.

The reality is that there has always been and always will be, two kinds of Christians: one who is a cultural Christian--someone who says one thing at church but does another Friday night; who uses religion as little more than a tool for power, influence, control over others, wealth, social status, or even just acceptance. The other, is one who truly believes that the Bible is the infallible Word of God and lives out that belief as well as they are able with sincerity, dedication, and humility. The former is what made up most of historic "Christiandom," and they remain numerous today. The remnant, however, still live on and more than make up for their lack in numbers with the strength of their faith. This distinction is entirely absent from this book-as it usually is anytime Christianity is ever mentioned anywhere. And while many good things can be learned from peoples of other lands, learning of the realities of God and what it means to walk with Him cannot be taught by those who do not know Him.

All in all, I enjoyed it. It does lean politically left in various ways, but not unreasonably so. Definitely worth it.

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