Shroud

De: Adrian Tchaikovsky

Narrado por: Sophie Aldred

On a planet shrouded in darkness, a stranded crew must fight for survival. But, the darkness may have plans of its own in this wildly original story from Adrian Tchaikovsky, Hugo and Arthur C. Clarke Award-winning author of Children of Time.

They looked into the darkness and the darkness looked back . . .

New planets are fair game to asset strippers and interplanetary opportunists–and a commercial mission to a distant star system discovers a moon that is pitch black, but alive with radio activity. Its high-gravity, high-pressure, zero-oxygen environment is anathema to human life, but ripe for exploitation. They named it Shroud.

Under no circumstances should a human end up on Shroud’s inhospitable surface. Except a catastrophic accident sees Juna Ceelander and Mai Ste Etienne doing just that. Forced to stage an emergency landing, in a small, barely adequate vehicle, they are unable to contact their ship and are running out of time. What follows is a gruelling journey across land, sea and air. During this time, Juna and Mai begin to understand Shroud’s dominant species. It also begins to understand them . . .

©2025 Adrian Tchaikovsky (P)2025 Orbit

Reseñas de la Crítica

"The most inventive alien world I've ever encountered in SF... Pure Tchaikovsky. I swear the man is some kind of genius."—Peter Watts, author of Blindsight

"Adrian Tchaikovsky explores worlds where no one else would dare to go, and the unimaginable becomes believable... This is hard-edged science fiction that never loses its soul."—Sue Burke, author of Semiosis

"Crunchy, conceptual SF at its best...the best alien contact novel I've read since Peter Watts' Blindsight, and that is high praise indeed."—Richard Morgan, author of Altered Carbon

Engrossing Visuals

Tchaikovsky’s writing style allows for easy listening while simultaneously building a world of visuals inside your head that keep you entertained throughout.

The best book I've read so far in 2025

I loved the world building and the characters. The ending made me want to go back to the first chapter and start it all over again

Possibly my new favorite Tchaikovsky novel.

Familiar themes and story patterns for Tchaikovsky’s science fiction, if you’re familiar with them, but probably the most personally cathartic one I’ve encountered. I was practically crowing in certain places near the end of the book. Very fun.

The idea of it—the 2 kinds of mind, trying to imagine each other.

This book is a remarkable journey of 2 kinds of mind trying to imagine each other. The idea, the story, and the narration— all excellent.

Maybe the series gets better?

But as a standalone book it was not my favorite.
It’s a “crash-land and don’t get eaten” survival story with an amorphous consciousness arising in the background. It portrays humans so cynically there were maybe ~1.5 people who I even cared if they survived, and their best hope was to return to being slaves of their awful space mining corporation.
The alien life was too abstract to really function as a character.
I don’t get it. Tchaikovsky *knows* how to do characters, even out of radically different forms of emergent consciousness.

Unique Story

An enjoyable and imaginative sci-fi from Adrian Tchaikovsky. Where I thought it would go, it went somewhere better, how I thought it would be end, it did better. How does he continue to come up with such intriguing SciFi?! There should be movies inspired by his works.

The most alien of aliens

Love this book so much. The aliens are extraordinarily bizarre and unlike any life on earth. It was really refreshing. The two female protagonists are complex and interesting and earn the reader’s attention, respect, and compassion. Definitely passing the Bechdel test. I only wish it was longer or part of an ongoing series. It ends rather abruptly and while I don’t like endings that tie everything neatly into a bow I feel that this did just kind of stop at a point where there was so much room to expand the story.

Awesome

For some reason I haven't really enjoyed most of the author's fantasy books all that much.
His sci-fi books, however, are masterpieces, and this book is amongst them.
The narration is also excellent.

I'm really hoping this ends up being a series.

Great delivery - highly recommend.

Great delivery - highly recommend. The story plot is very interesting. well written. A good dystopian POV…I sure hope it never comes true.

Another Win for Adrian Tchaikovsky!

So excited to be starting a new series from one of SciFi’s masters! But Adrian, a cliffhanger? Really?

A little slower than most of his work, but fascinating and instantly engaging. I find this authors breadth of knowledge and his ability to communicate it to be astounding and I must admit somewhat intimidating… not enough to stop me from reading/listening mind you, just impressed.

If you have enjoyed any of this other work, you’re going to love it.