The Neutronium Alchemist

The Night's Dawn Trilogy, Book 2

By: Peter F. Hamilton

Narrated by: John Lee

Length: 40 hrs and 22 mins

Publisher's Summary

The ancient menace has finally escaped from Lalonde, shattering the Confederation's peaceful existence. Those who succumbed to it have acquired godlike powers but now follow a far-from-divine gospel as they advance inexorably from world to world. On planets and asteroids, individuals battle for survival against the strange and brutal forces unleashed upon the universe. Governments teeter on the brink of anarchy, the Confederation Navy is dangerously overstretched, and a dark messiah prepares to invoke his own version of the final Night.

In such desperate times, the last thing the galaxy needs is a new and terrifyingly powerful weapon. Yet Dr. Alkad Mzu is determined to retrieve the Alchemist so that she can complete her 30-year-old vendetta to slay a star. This means that Joshua Calvert has to find Dr. Mzu and bring her back before the Alchemist can be reactivated. But he's not alone in the chase, and there are people on both sides who have their own ideas about how to use the ultimate doomsday device.

©1997 Peter F. Hamilton (P)2016 Tantor

Critic Reviews

"[A] solid space opera best suited to readers familiar with the first book, The Reality Dysfunction." ( Publishers Weekly)

Editing was bad .... again

Editing bad, story great, better character voices.

Story was easier to follow this time and didn't get confused nearly as much as with book 1.

It's because of the bad editing. Maybe if there was a 2 second pause between the story line changes, the listen would have been a lot better. Instead, the story line changes in what most time felt like mid sentence.

It brought the over all experience down about 40% to be honest.

Took Me a While

It has taking me a while to finish the second book of The Night's Dawn Trilogy. "The Neutronium Alchemist" is a tab bit shorter than "The Reality Dysfunction", only by less than 50 minutes, but if you are listening over 40 hours in audio, who is counting. I hope that I'm not losing my interest in this series.

The second book is just as good as the first. Whenever I am reading anything from this author, I need to switch off my other thoughts and be more aware in what is going on in the plot. It's a long one needless to say, but like all of his books, the story goes by quick and it feels like you are reading 10 stories into one.

I'm really enjoying on how Peter F. Hamilton is defining religions in a scientific matter.

Reading this series has become a full time job. I can't wait to spend another 40 hours plus overtime in the last and final book of this series.

Scifi meets techno-theology

I'm done with this trilogy after book two. The premise is similar to the Dreaming Void and Commonwealth series, but with this absurd spiritual element thrown in. There are souls and ghosts and Satanists... It really feels like an immature story reaching for some kind of gravity in the reader's mind. Hamilton is better than this series.

Fantastic Adventure with lots of detail!

This second book in the Night's Dawn series was even better than the first with more of the story being divulged along with John Lee's fantastic character voice talent.

John Lee could read a phone book

And make it compelling. this is no phone book. the first volume of the series was slow and bothered me with all the unexplained stuff. it really picks up steam in volume two, however, pushed forward with shockingly good diction.

Did anybody edit this?

A good story, ruined by redundant sub-plots. There are no transitions, from one storyline to the next, by either author or narrator. It makes for an unnecessarily difficult listening experience. I did enjoy the accents performed by the narrator. I got through book one, but find that. though within four
hours of the end of this second book, the slog is more than I'm willing to continue. I find I don't care much what happens to these characters or their respective world-views. The writing is brilliant in places, lacking only a competent editor to make this series a five star winner.

What an epic!!

This book feels like your listening to 5 different audiobooks that all tie together. so good! if u like sci-fi then this is a must. I can't believe it took this long for audible to recommend it to me!

Great second in a series.

A mix of si-fi and phantasy expanded into a massive space opera that is hamiltons signature.

still confusing

I really enjoy the common wealth universe from PFH. This is set in a seperate universe but has many similarities so I am confused why I don't really care for this series. I find following the characters very tedious. Almost to the point where I want to skip the chapter if I don't recognize the character name immediately. I feel something has been lost in the transfer from the written product. the story is good and the narration is amazing but for whatever reason I am struggling with this one.

Replace Narrator

Really enjoyed the story, but the narration is terrible. Most characters sounded so similar and transitions so quick that it was very difficult to follow at times. I hope they republish this book and give it the preformance it deserves.