The Oracle Year

A Novel

By: Charles Soule

Narrated by: Charlie Thurston

Length: 12 hrs and 8 mins

Publisher's summary

From best-selling comic-book franchise writer Charles Soule comes a clever and witty first novel of a 20-something New Yorker who wakes up one morning with the power to predict the future - perfect for fans of Joe Hill and Brad Meltzer or books like This Book Is Full of Spiders and Welcome to Night Vale.

Knowledge is power. So when an unassuming Manhattan bassist named Will Dando awakens from a dream one morning with 108 predictions about the future in his head, he rapidly finds himself the most powerful man in the world. Protecting his anonymity by calling himself the Oracle, he sets up a heavily guarded website with the help of his friend Hamza to selectively announce his revelations. In no time global corporations are offering him millions for exclusive access, eager to profit from his prophecies.

He's also making a lot of high-powered enemies, from the president of the United States and a nationally prominent televangelist to a warlord with a nuclear missile and an assassin grandmother. Legions of cyber spies are unleashed to hack the Site - as it's come to be called - and the best man hunters money can buy are deployed not only to unmask the Oracle but to take him out of the game entirely. With only a handful of people he can trust - including a beautiful journalist - it's all Will can do to simply survive, elude exposure, and protect those he loves long enough to use his knowledge to save the world.

Delivering fast-paced adventure on a global scale as well as sharp-witted satire on our concepts of power and faith, Marvel writer Charles Soule's audacious debut novel takes listeners on a rollicking ride where it's impossible to predict what will happen next.

©2018 Charles Soule (P)2017 HarperCollins Publishers

Critic reviews

"Narrator Charlie Thurston carefully leads the listener down the story's path with subtle intonations suggesting that our hero is never quite sure he is doing the right thing....  From the author of Marvel comic series such as Daredevil and She-Hulk, this is outstanding work that challenges the listener's idea of right and wrong." (AudioFile)

Wish it were more

I was excited about this, because it was highly rated through the "book of the month" club. . I kept waiting for this book to get better, but if anything, it just got worse. Predictable, one dimensional characters. Also dragged on way longer than it needed to. I thought the pacing was terrible. I would not recommend using a credit for this, maybe check out at your local library. Left unsatisfied and disappointed.

One of the worst books Ever

I try to finish most books I start. This has been excruciating books I’ve ever read. It’s terrible and trying at best. And the finish plunged through my heart at how outright mediocre it was. Please, do not read this if you still have the chance.

It's starting to get tedious

Well, let's first start with the voice actor. He does a fine job on the male voices. Though he speaks a little slowly. When he speaks as a woman it sounds comically bad. So that makes it a little difficult to digest the story but I suppose it works. I'm 6 hours and with 6 hours to go and I'm not sure if it's worth my time to finish the book. The pacing is slowing down a lot and it's just getting really tedious and boring. It starts off strong but as some other reviews said begins to dwindle I guess I will try a couple more hours of this book at the most and see if it's worth continuing.

The hero is a baffoon

The hero in this book is detestable. He's whiny, inconsiderate, greedy, and careless. He needlessly puts his friends' lives at risk. We know almost nothing about him and have little reason to care about him to begin with, but as we learn about his demeanor we find that there's little to like.

So, there's not much to root for in this book. The premise was very interesting. The execution was bad. Pass on this one.

What would you do if you knew

A very interesting premise - what happens when you know 108 facts about the future? The story follows this problem that Will Dando has. It does it in a compelling manner and always entertaining. The suspense is solid and the conclusions are logical. The knowing of the future doesn't make you an oracle - only telling someone does.

Oh so good!

Cryptic from the beginning, I was hooked from page one. Definitely a good story. Highly recommended.

Entertaining, but missing something

Part 1&2 are slow, but then the book picks up speed. Without giving anything away, I can say at least one BIG question goes unanswered!

Started out Good but ends flat

Fun story but a bit to lite and unbelievable. Seemed like the story would end with a mystery solved but instead ends stupidly.

Ending just ignores the entire rest of the story

Ending ignores the entire rest of the story. They explain everything like there’s something the protag needs to fight or fix and then he does exactly what he was fighting against and the story acts like that’s what he was suppose to.

waste of time

I listen to at least one audio book a week and this one stands out as a boring waste of time.

A great story - had me hooked from the start

I've been a fan of Charles Soule's comics and thought I'd give his novel a go. Boy am I glad I did! A great story, interesting characters, and intriguing themes.

A gripping story.

I really enjoyed this. The Oracle Year has a great premise that of a young guy mysteriously receiving 108 predictions about the future that start to become true. And the storytelling holds up to the interesting premise. We're genuinely sucked into the the lives and story of the characters and the pace of the storytelling compels you to want to discover more of the fate of 'The Oracle' and how things play out.
It's great to discover a story that has such a different premise to everything else out there. Charles Soule's style gives the story a great pace and supports the suspension of disbelief perfectly in a gripping adventure.
The reading of the story only grated on me in parts. I'm not a fan of some of the voices put on by the narrator but that's more a personal preference and I know it helps to identify the characters speaking. But the breathy voice whenever a woman is talking and the hilarious Dick Van Dyke-esk British sailor accent took the edge off the overall performance.
Knowing Charles as a comics writer some of these comic storytelling elements snuck in early on in the story. It's easy to slip into exposition via the characters speech. When you have the breathing space in a novel you can just to explain this to the reader and render the dialogue more natural, but this only occurs a couple of times early on. I didn't notice it so much later.
I'll totally be recommending this book and look forward to discovering more of the the writers work.

If I Could See The Future

If I could see the future I probably wouldn't have finished this book because although it starts very well it's downhill from about two hours in.

Let me make my own prediction. You WILL be disappointed by the ending.