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The Peshawar Lancers  By  cover art

The Peshawar Lancers

By: S. M. Stirling
Narrated by: Shaun Grindell
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Publisher's summary

In the mid-1870s, a violent spray of comets hits Earth, decimating cities, erasing shorelines, and changing the world's climate forever. And just as Earth's temperature dropped, so was civilization frozen in time. Instead of advancing technologically, humanity had to piece itself back together....

In the 21st century, boats still run on steam, messages arrive by telegraph, and the British Empire, with its capital now in Delhi, controls much of the world. The other major world leader is the Czar of All the Russias. Everyone predicts an eventual, deadly showdown. But no one can predict the role that one man, Captain Athelstane King, reluctant spy and hero, will play....

©2002 Steven M. Stirling (P)2017 Tantor

Critic reviews

“An irresistible read." ( Booklist)

What listeners say about The Peshawar Lancers

Average customer ratings
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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Narration should be redone

I gave up after a couple of chapters due to the narration. I had read this book when it came out and enjoyed, it so I was looking forward to listening to it. The narrator’s inflections, pauses and odd emphases are so distracting I could not follow the story. I give the story five stars to credit the authors original work but I can not recommend it as an audiobook as currently recorded.

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5 people found this helpful

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

Great Alternative History

I’m only sad it’s the only one, but it’s elegant and exciting. This is a story that will appeal to anyone who’s ever been interested in alternative history. It has military and political technicality, well written romance, and exciting action!

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4 people found this helpful

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

Poor narration

A great book nearly spoiled by a bad reading.
Narrator said EACH sentence in the EXACT same cadence and inflection

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4 people found this helpful

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

Great Book ruined by narrator

The narrator places so many weird emphasis and inflection points in his speech pattern listening to him for more than 30 seconds gives me anxiety attacks.
I would literally rather listen to my 9 year old read it.
This is a dog eared favorite in hard copy and I was thrilled to see it on audible and bought it instantly, only to discover that it was unusable. Avoid like the plague, go get anything else by S. M Stirling. The author is great and the rest of his stuff here is narrated well.

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3 people found this helpful

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

Save Your Money and Save Your Time.

This book wasn’t for you, but who do you think might enjoy it more?

Orcs deep in a mine who have no entertainment at all may have enjoyed this book if they were tied down and beaten with whips and forced to listen to it.

Has The Peshawar Lancers turned you off from other books in this genre?

It almost turned me off from books and living... really living.

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Shaun Grindell?

The Narrator is great.

What character would you cut from The Peshawar Lancers?

I would cut all of them and cut off the finger that pressed the mouse when I ordered this.

Any additional comments?

the UN may investigate this book as a war crime

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3 people found this helpful

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

Narration Hurts My Ears

I can not listen to this book. The way the narrator speaks with weird (multiple) emphases throughout each sentence makes this unlistenable. I really can't speak to the story or any other aspect of the book.

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2 people found this helpful

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

One of the best alt-history books I've read!

Take something in history that made a change in the world, and then change that event. Or, add a large impacting event to the world's history at a point previous to current time and extrapolate where the world might be based on the change. Plotlines and ideas like this, can be fascinating. If that is of any interest to you, I would highly recommend reading this book.

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2 people found this helpful

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

Outstanding reimagining of history

Stirling's Ember Verse series is one my favorites. Here he goes straight alternatives history. He paints a great picture. His characters are multidimensional and believable . Did not want to stop listening.

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1 person found this helpful

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

Good but...

This is a good book but it suffers from poor scene transitions that make it confusing at times. The editors should have added a short pause. there's none and it seems that many times the narrator goes form one sentence to the next when it's actually a completely different story branch. The 2 starts above are not for the narrator poor performance, it was good, but for the editors poor work

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

Love the story, the narrator - not so much

What made the experience of listening to The Peshawar Lancers the most enjoyable?

I have been waiting for this book to be available!

Would you be willing to try another one of Shaun Grindell’s performances?

No

Any additional comments?

As a huge fan of S.M. Stirling, I was very excited when I saw this audio version of Peshawar Lancers was available. I love his stand alone novels. But after listening to the recording, I still love the story, but was turned off by the performance. As a Russian speaker (2nd language), his portrayal of the Russian accents and the pronunciation of Russian words was very distracting and wasn't even close to being correct. A lot of the accents, Russian included, sounded as if the portrayed speaker was French.

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1 person found this helpful