The Warehouse

A Novel

By: Rob Hart

Narrated by: Emily Woo Zeller, Jason Culp, Karissa Vacker

Length: 13 hrs and 8 mins

Publisher's Summary

Cloud isn’t just a place to work. It’s a place to live. And when you’re here, you’ll never want to leave.

“On the surface, The Warehouse is a thrilling story of corporate espionage at the highest level, but dig a little deeper and you’ll find a terrifying cautionary tale of the nightmare world we are making for ourselves.” (Blake Crouch, New York Times best-selling author of Dark Matter)

Film rights sold to Imagine Entertainment for director Ron Howard!

Named One of the Best Books of the Year by Financial Times • Real Simple • Kirkus Reviews 

Paxton never thought he’d be working for Cloud, the giant tech company that’s eaten much of the American economy. Much less that he’d be moving into one of the company’s sprawling live-work facilities.

But compared to what’s left outside, Cloud’s bland chainstore life of gleaming entertainment halls, open-plan offices, and vast warehouses...well, it doesn’t seem so bad. It’s more than anyone else is offering.  

Zinnia never thought she’d be infiltrating Cloud. But now she’s undercover, inside the walls, risking it all to ferret out the company’s darkest secrets. And Paxton, with his ordinary little hopes and fears? He just might make the perfect pawn. If she can bear to sacrifice him. 

As the truth about Cloud unfolds, Zinnia must gamble everything on a desperate scheme - one that risks both their lives, even as it forces Paxton to question everything about the world he’s so carefully assembled here. 

Together, they’ll learn just how far the company will go...to make the world a better place. 

Set in the confines of a corporate panopticon that’s at once brilliantly imagined and terrifyingly real, The Warehouse is a near-future thriller about what happens when Big Brother meets Big Business - and who will pay the ultimate price. 

Advance praise for The Warehouse

“A fun, fast-paced read [that] walks a fine line between a near-future thriller and a smart satire...makes you wonder if we’re already too far into a disastrous future, or if there’s still some hope for humanity.” (NPR)

“Holy hell, The Warehouse is our future, isn’t it? Imagine that one day we screw up the world and our country so damn bad that we all have to live where we work in what amounts to a modern variant on indentured servitude, and then layer on top of that a bleeding-edge thriller set inside a massively autocratic corporate entity, and you still haven’t seen just how sharp, or scary, this book is.... Taut, tense, and masterful.” (Chuck Wendig)

“Wildly imaginative yet terrifyingly real, The Warehouse is both a gripping thriller and an alarming glimpse into what could soon be our future.” (Riley Sager, New York Times best-selling author of Lock Every Door)

©2019 Rob Hart (P)2019 Random House Audio

Critic Reviews

"A compelling and intriguing thriller that holds up a black mirror to our own frightening state of affairs.... [Hart’s] tapped a real vein of the zeitgeist with this stand-alone thriller about the future of work that reads like a combination of Dave Eggers’ tech nightmare, The Circle, the public’s basic impression of an Amazon fulfillment center, and Parzival’s infiltration of IOI in Ready Player One. A hell of a prosecution of modern commerce and the nature of work, all contained in the matrix of a Cory Doctorow-esque postmodern thriller that might not turn out the way you hoped. Part video game, part Sinclair Lewis, part Michael Crichton; it adds up to a terrific puzzle.” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review) 

“What if the totalitarian regime controlling people’s lives was a mega-corporation rather than a fascist government? That’s the conceit of this intelligent Orwellian thriller by Hart, who imagines an all-too-plausible near-future.... Hart’s detail-oriented world- building, which credibly extrapolates from the Trump administration’s antiregulatory agenda, makes this cautionary tale memorable and powerful. This promises to be Hart’s breakout book.” (Publishers Weekly, starred review)

“An enjoyable mystery that’s hard to put down... Highly recommended for dystopian fiction fans.” (Library Journal,starred review) 

Gave it a shot.

when I picked this book up, I didn't know what to expect. it had no reviews. I didn't know the author. now, sitting here having listen straight through, I can tell you it's an excellent book. slightly dystopian, a little unnerving, and it leaves you wanting more. I very rarely rate books, but I'll give this one five stars.

If you start this...

...nothing else will get done until this book is fully read/listened to. And don’t bother reading detailed opinions or descriptions, let the whole story surprise you as it unfolds. My sister and I agree on very little but we both highly recommend The Warehouse.

Soylent Green meets a Sam Walton Biography

Evil corporation destroys world... Capitalism is bad... Soylent Green is made of people...oh, wait, wrong book...

If you enjoy reading books on why your life is miserable because big corporations have sucked off the backs of the working man, then you will love this book. If, like me, you believe in free market capitalism and and not thinking the world owes you everything just because your mom had sex with your dad and made you...then probably not...

The only reason this is at all suspenseful is the narrator reads it as such.

I would give it one star, however it was well written, just boring...and this story has been told. Nothing new here.

Freedom is yours until you give it up

A well-told story of how one man, ruling over one company, can make other businesses virtually obsolete. It goes beyond parody and toward prediction of what happens behind the scenes in huge, warehouse-based enterprises. The intrigue and subplots make this a good listening or reading experience.

Love this unsettling, dystopian future

I can't help but think of amazon gone horribly horribly wrong while reading about this dystopian future! (YIKES!) I feel like this premise/storyline is under-written about as of yet, would love to see more stories about this. Very unsettling and you can't help but wonder if something like that could every happen!?? The male character was a bit on the naive/trusting side which was slightly annoying but other than that, great read! It ended sort of abruptly to my dismay, but still good!

Nothing happens!!!

I have three hours and nine minutes left, tried really hard, but can’t take the boredom. Don’t know if the breathy narrator helped make it unbearable (a great voice, but for a story where something actually happens...Not here, where her intonations seem to suggest something is ABOUT TO, but doesn’t). Such a disappointment. Started out great.

only thing disappointing was that the book ends

compulsively listenable with fantastic narration and well-fleshed out protagonists. eery, times terrifying sense of the realism of this potentially not-far-fetched dystopia--i like i book that makes me reflect while still being grippingly entertaining. i was so engrossed i was not prepared for the story to end; it left me wanting much more from this author.

This is not a subtle book

First off, the narrators were wonderful. I am always fearful when its more than one on a title, but they did a good job.

Now onto the book itself.

This was not what I expected to be honest. I was expecting a more horrific story but it was not to be.

Amazon, oops I mean The Cloud, now pretty much rules the world. The 2 main characters begin the story by applying for and getting jobs within one warehouse of Cloud. The details on where and how they work are wonderful, the people themselves dont feel real. There a little back story, but not enough to make them real. Some of the decisions made during the book make no sense and I did not really expect the ending to happen as it did.

I want more!

This book was so real and so believably creepy. Caution: If you enjoy happy endings, keep moving.

A poignant thriller

This dystopian world painted an all to possible view of the not-to-distant future. The characters were interesting and knowable. I recommend it highly!