Seveneves

A Novel

By: Neal Stephenson

Narrated by: Mary Robinette Kowal, Will Damron

Length: 31 hrs and 55 mins

Publisher's summary

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Anathem, Reamde, and Cryptonomicon comes an exciting and thought-provoking science fiction epic - a grand story of annihilation and survival spanning five thousand years.

What would happen if the world were ending?

A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.

But the complexities and unpredictability of human nature coupled with unforeseen challenges and dangers threaten the intrepid pioneers, until only a handful of survivors remain....

Five thousand years later, their progeny - seven distinct races now three billion strong - embark on yet another audacious journey into the unknown...to an alien world utterly transformed by cataclysm and time: Earth.

A writer of dazzling genius and imaginative vision, Neal Stephenson combines science, philosophy, technology, psychology, and literature in a magnificent work of speculative fiction that offers a portrait of a future that is both extraordinary and eerily recognizable. As he did in Anathem, Cryptonomicon, the Baroque Cycle, and Reamde, Stephenson explores some of our biggest ideas and perplexing challenges in a breathtaking saga that is daring, engrossing, and altogether brilliant.

©2015 Neal Stephenson (P)2015 Brilliance Audio, all rights reserved.

Odd narrator choice

Is there anything you would change about this book?

This is a tough one to rate. There are long stretches of the book that are fascinating and fast moving. And there are stretches that feel even longer that are dishwater dull. Stephenson is usually able to keep technical discussions interesting -- Cryptonomicon, for example, deals with heavily complex subjects but doesn't get boring. Seveneves does.

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Mary Robinette Kowal and Will Damron ?

Not sure about who I'd have read it instead, but Ms. Kowal made some very strange choices for main characters' voices. The producer/recording engineer/whoever was sitting in the booth also wasn't paying close attention--there are more than the usual number of garbled and mispronounced words. I get it; it's a long book. But this is not anywhere close to the best of all possible recordings.

So Much Potential

Let me start by saying that up until Part 3, Seveneves was pegging my Top 10 books of all-time. While I first thought the premise was implausible, Stephenson starting working the technology and I gradually became entranced. He has a no holds barred writing style, and the storyline was filled with a continuous “Science the shit out of this” attitude made famous by “The Martian”. As the implausible became plausible, the main characters came to life as they struggled to make this happen. By the time Part 2 ended, I was at the edge of my seat simply amazed by what had taken place. But then it all went wrong.

The jump from Part 2 to Part 3 was simply too big. The emotional connections made to the main characters were lost. The eager anticipation as to what happens next was lost. And ultimately, the storyline was lost. Stephenson tried to tie everything back together, but the gap-filling backstory was too minimal to be satisfying, and a new level of fantastical science fiction reenergized the implausibility meter. The result was a less than compelling storyline filled with characters you cared nothing about.

The detailed application of advanced technology is what I love best about Stephenson’s books. In this regard “Seveneves” does this well at first, but then goes off the deep end. He’s a tremendous writer who is fearless at exploring new boundaries. But Part 3 should be a separate book, and its replacement needs to continue the excellent storyline developed in the first two sections. That is the story that I wanted to hear.

In summary, this book was totally worth one credit and I thought the first 2/3s was brilliant. I will definitely continue to buy and read Stephenson's books. I'm just sad for what this book could have been. And for those who criticize the narration, the only I can say is get over it. My experience is that woman have a tougher time doing men's voices. But it's mind over matter - if you don't mind, it doesn't matter. It was correct to have the first two sections narrated by a woman.

Almost unlistenable

What didn’t you like about Mary Robinette Kowal and Will Damron ’s performance?

Terrible narration. Really grim. She can't do accents or male voices without sounding like she's mocking them. All the men sound like pompous douchebags and they all have the same uncomfortable faux british accent. If the story wasn't so fantastic i would have stopped listening within the first hour. As it is, after three hours I'm on the fence.

If you liked THE MARTIAN.....

What made the experience of listening to Seveneves the most enjoyable?

I liked the science. It seemed researched and thorough and plausible. And fascinating. Got me interested. Some sections are less riveting, but they play into a general feeling of the book being thorough and comprehensive.

What other book might you compare Seveneves to and why?

Well, for me it is a good follow up to THE MARTIAN. Science oriented with modern day humans looking to current technology for solutions to thorny problems.

Would you be willing to try another one of Mary Robinette Kowal and Will Damron ’s performances?

I would avoid Ms. Kowal like the plague. I have never encountered a stranger narrator choice. Her sections of omniscient narrtion are perfectly good - a bit robotic, but it works. But her "voices" are preposterous and distracting. How the author could have okayed this narrator is beyond me. Every male character sounds like he is participating in a bad community theater production of a Gilbert and Sullivan musical. She can't do a British accent without making everyone sound like Colonel Fudgewiggens. Which really destroys all men as romantic creatures. Her accent work is appalling. I really can't say enough- every voice - male and female is distracting and aritificial. She needs to receive a cease and desist order NOW. It's a shame because she reads the narrative well. She should just skip voices altogether. Nod to them, so to speak, without attempting to do them. I almost want people to listen just to be amazed.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Well to the narrator, yes. I gasped and continue to gasp every time a new accent arrives.

Any additional comments?

I think I have made my point.

My first ever Audible.com refund.

I've read some terrible books, this one takes the cake. There is very little story, the majority is less fun than your longest most boring advanced science course in college. I really tried to like it, but eventually was just wishing for the apocalypse to really happen. On the plus side, you could turn it into a drinking game. Take a shot each time you hear the word "exponential".

This is my "Six Star" Choice for 2015

First, this is a great book. Great performances as well.

Consider the quandary of being Neal Stephenson. You have written several of the longest, most complex and most bleeding-edge books of the past 20 years. There are characters and ideas so abstract that perhaps only three or four other writers are in your league now: Peter F. Hamilton (Void Series), Dan Simmons (Hyperion), Alastair Reynolds (Revelation Space Trilogy, Terminal World), Richard K. Morgan (Altered Carbon) and most recently Charles Stross. (Halting State and Rule 34.)

In 1992, Snow Crash mixed cyberpunk, memetics and Sumerian myths against a virtual landscape. 1995's Diamond Age was steampunk before it existed and wildly imaginative. Reamde and Cryptonomicon were as detailed and complex as books can be; some of the best writing ever -- and that is not limited to Sci-Fi. I'm not even sure they were Sci-Fi.

So now it is now. What is it like to be him and read the gushing of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic books that are neither clever nor visionary? I think that he thought two things here: (1) I can do better, and infuse this concept with actual ideas, and (2) crap, I HAVE GOT to write a more accessible book -- one that you don't have to have a masters degree in history or math to get through the initial chapters. (I think this is what happened with Hamilton in Great North Road as well.)

Voila ! A book that anyone can get into from page one. A book that starts from almost a tribute to a 1960's/Heinlein sensibility and slowly draws the reader into a more complex story without either historical or scientific prerequisite courses. I hope and believe that this book, though not Baroque in complexity, will allow more people to read this author -- to appreciate good ideas and a clever vision. To everyone (including myself) who wants an eventual post-Cryptonomicon tome-epic....this may not be it, but I don't think it was intended to be that book.

For what it is....it is just right. Its is a great, fun read.

great idea - poor execution

The premise for this book is amazing, but the characters are flat, the scientific explanations are showy and usually unnecessary, and the metaphors are condescending to the reader. I listened to the whole thing hoping it would pay off, I don't think it did.

Bad production values

Is there anything you would change about this book?

I am only a couple of hours into it but the recording quality and narration are distractions.

Would you be willing to try another book from Neal Stephenson? Why or why not?

I usually enjoy reading Stephenson. This is the first of his I have tried as an audiobook. I'd be reluctant to try another Brilliance Audio production if this performance is representative.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

First, the recording has a tinny quality to it that is off-putting. Second, the narrator so far (MRK) has poor dialog skills with respect to switching gender and using a British accent. Her regular narration is pleasant enough and I would be enjoying the story more so far if she had stuck to that voice when doing dialog.

Was Seveneves worth the listening time?

It remains to be seen. I am sticking with it so far.

Good hard sci-fi with a human touch

Seveneves will rightly take its place in the sci-fi cannon as one of the best post-apocalyptic novels written. From the demolition of the moon, the abandonment of earth, settlement in space and the troubling re-claiming of earth, Stephenson's saga gives the hard sci-fi lover exactly what they crave in terms of exquisitely researched, cogently fictionalized detail of space-flight, orbital physics, and planetary geology while, at the same time, providing with fans of soft, social science-fiction with a nuanced glimpse into the personal, socio-political and even genetic and epigenetic ramifications of an apocalypse. Some may quibble about the science, or Stephenson's extrapolations, but no one can accuse him of not having expended serious levels of effort in gaming out all the possibilities.

That being said, Seveneves does suffer slightly from some long, dry bits of character introspection and some divergences that could have benefitted from an editor's pen. Nor can anyone accuse Stephenson of attempting much in the way of artfulness when it comes to the prose. But on the whole, it is a competently told story. Structurally, it might have benefitted from some timeline insertions. The first two thirds of the novel chronicles the expanded space-station's survivors landing on a suitable chunk of the fractured moon and then jumps five thousand years into the future, when the ancestors of those early exiles return to a revitalized earth. Although an attempt is made to fill in the gulf with some rather telling flashbacks in the third part, it does suffer a little from some rather blatant info-dumps that occur a little too conveniently to hide their necessity.

Seveneves provide the reader with some strong characters at both the beginning and in the later part of the story. One cannot accuse Stephenson of producing characters with great psychological depth, but neither can he be accused of producing altogether cardboard heroes or villains. Its fair to say that, sometimes, the choice of which characters he chooses to provide rounded portraits for are not always as narratively satisfying as they could be.

Stephenson takes on some very interesting social themes, from the uses, abuses and limits of power to the consequences of directed genetic manipulation. He also does a good job of extrapolating on the evolution of connectivity, social media and the part narrative plays in shaping our expectations of the future as well as the way we look at our histories.

If I had to put my finger on what prompted me to leave off a star from what, in all fairness, is a pretty magnificent book, it was the ending. It is an iconically satisfying hollywood ending in which all major threads are almost too neatly tied up. And, of course, we are left with the tease of a whole parallel survival saga to be satisfied in a sequel

None of my criticisms should put you off reading this novel if you're a fan of hard sci-fi or post-apocalyptic fiction. Its structural and narrative flaws don't outweigh its merit as one of the very best treatments of the end of world scenario.

Narration: the female narrator's attempt at regional and foreign accents poor and sometimes a little frustrating, but it wasn't enough to put me off listening.

What happened to the end of the story?!?

This book was very interesting with great characters and plot. It's super long and you really get into it. However you get towards the end and all this development is still happening and bam it just ends. Maybe I missed somewhere that this was going to be a series. But if not this book ends like the author was tired of writing so he just quit. Hopefully it is a series and I'm just stupid.

A story of faith

Like all Stephenson novels, opinions differ wildly. Writers like him should be applauded at the very least for even an attempt at something of this size and scope. I got the edition narrated by Kowal and Damron, which worked very well indeed.

Underneath the science this is a simple story of faith, in that humankind has the ability to rise above the idiosyncrasies of 'type', even though resorting to 'type' in the novel was the device by which there was a chance at survival.

Stephenson is a mesmerising storyteller, and this ranks alongside Reamde and The Cryptonomicon as a favourite.

Good Story, but bad character accents.

What disappointed you about Seveneves?

The narrator does all the British accents as if they are semi royalty, as a British person listening to this performance is really off-putting, and ruins the immersion of the story. There is no way that these characters would speak in the way that they are portrayed.

Would you be willing to try another one of Mary Robinette Kowal and Will Damron ’s performances?

Only if there are no British characters, or Mary Robinette Kowal stops trying to do British accents.

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

Very dissapointed, the story as usual from Neal Stephenson was excellent, but the narration completely spoils it.

Another Neal Stephenson epic

my only complaint is that it finished too soon

He left it open for a, if not sequel, companion novel from a different perspective.

I hoope so.

Brilliant and epic story

Thoroughly enjoyed another brilliant story from Neal Stephenson, I was completely gripped, the audiobook was compelling and loved both narrators performances.