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The Mote in God's Eye  By  cover art

The Mote in God's Eye

By: Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle
Narrated by: L J Ganser
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Publisher's summary

Writing separately, Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle are responsible for a number of science fiction classics, such as the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Ringworld, Debt of Honor, and The Integral Trees. Together they have written the critically acclaimed best-sellers Inferno, Footfall, and The Legacy of Heorot, among others.

The Mote In God's Eye is their acknowledged masterpiece, an epic novel of mankind's first encounter with alien life that transcends the genre. No lesser an authority than Robert A. Heinlein called it "possibly the finest science fiction novel I have ever read".

©1991 Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle (P)2009 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

  • All-Time Best Science Fiction Novels (Locus Magazine)

What listeners say about The Mote in God's Eye

Average customer ratings
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  • 4 out of 5 stars
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    3,250
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  • 3 Stars
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Story
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  • 2 Stars
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  • 1 Stars
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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

1st contact,18th century meets 24th centuryscience

Somewhat tedious .Characters are two dimensional. I never developed any caring or feeling for them. Very provincial medieval 18th century kingdom society with 24th century technology. Though I listened to the whole production over numerous listenings I never felt the anticipation of picking up the story at each session. The reader did a nice job. I know this is aclassic and said to be one of the best SF novels ever. Not so in my opinion. The Rama series is much better.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

One of the best I've ever heard!

The story is great, the science, the characters, just brilliant. Defenetly recommend. Hh gg ghj jgth hyty

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

A good Space Opera

It's a pretty good old fashioned space Opera. A little hard to follow at times.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

loved it!

I haven't read this book in about 30 years. I had forgotten how rich in detail it was - and how so many of the details turned into reality.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Great story.

great story with a nice squeeze of humor . will recommend to everyone who loves sci-fi, and i will deffinately look for more from Thea writers.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Slow start... After the first hour it gets good.

Epic story. A few silly details like all cities are called New Something (New Paris, New London, etc). Otherwise genuinely unique storyline.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

An old favorite

Great reading of one of my long-time favorites. Ganser's voice characterizations add to a very worthy performance of this classic story. "TMIGE" is the very epitome of science fiction.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Great sci fi and a window into the author's time

Niven and Pournelle always put detail and characters of many different perspectives in their novels. in Motes, they raise a challenging situation with few good solutions regardless of the perspective, which makes it an interesting read. It's also a but of a journey into the last, reflecting the authors' context wrt the role of men and women and a lack of diversity in the human characters. Was an interesting journey.
#FirstContact #Dated #Conundrum #Aliens #Wormholes
#tagsgiving #sweepstakes

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Over rated, but not bad.

Would you consider the audio edition of The Mote in God's Eye to be better than the print version?

Yes.

What was your reaction to the ending? (No spoilers please!)

Disappointed. It seemed to fall flat.

What does L J Ganser bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

He did a fabulous job differentiating between the aliens and the humans.

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

No. Too long.

Any additional comments?

I thought it was a good story, but all the reviews I had read made it sound like it was the best first alien encounter ever. I did not agree.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

still an amazing read!

test you mind against the moties! such a great story action and suspense. one of the classics

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