The Worldship Humility

By: R. R. Haywood

Narrated by: Colin Morgan

Length: 13 hrs and 58 mins

Publisher's Summary

About the audiobook:

The Worldship Humility is the start of The Code trilogy, written exclusively for audio by sci-fi author R. R. Haywood. Narrator Colin Morgan brings the colourful characters and treacherous escapades of The Worldship Humility to life, a gripping space adventure which will appeal to fans of Ready Player One, Bladerunner and Haywood’s previous best-selling works, Extracted and The Undead. 

Summary:

It’s been 120 years since the 50 or so worldships containing the few million survivors set off after planet Earth was destroyed by a meteor. 

On the Worldship Humility, Sam, an Airlock Operative, is bored. Living in space should be full of adventure, except it isn’t, and he fills his time hacking 3-D movie posters. 

Petty thief Yasmine Dufont is also from the WS Humility, but she is not bored. Growing up in the Elfors, the lawless lower levels of the ship, has seen her surrounded by violence and squalor since birth, and now she wants out. She wants to escape to the luxury of the Ab-Spa on top of WS Abstinence, where they eat real food instead of rats and synth cubes. 

Meanwhile, the sleek-hulled, unmanned Gagarin has come back from punching out ahead of the fleet in the ever-continuing search for a new home. Nearly all hope is lost that a new planet will ever be found, until the Gagarin returns with a code of information that suggests a habitable planet has been found. This news should be shared with the whole fleet, but a few rogue captains want to keep the information to themselves and colonise the new planet. 

When Yasmine inadvertently steals the code, she and Sam become caught up in a dangerous game of murder, corruption, political wrangling and...porridge, with sex-addicted Detective Zhang Woo hot on their heels, his own life at risk if he fails to get the code back. 

About the author:

R. R. Haywood is the author of Amazon UK’s number one horror series The Undead, which propelled him into the top 20 best-selling Amazon authors in the UK. Haywood is a Washington Post best-selling author and both the Undead series and the Extracted trilogy are Audible best sellers. 

About the narrator:

Colin's television credits include Humans, The Living and the Dead, The Fall and Merlin. His film credits include Benjamin, The Happy Prince, Legend and Testament of Youth. Theatre credits include Translations (The National Theatre); Gloria (Hampstead Theatre); Mojo (Harold Pinter Theatre); The Tempest (Shakespeare's Globe); Our Private Life (Royal Court); A Prayer for My Daughter and All About My Mother (The Old Vic). 

©2019 R. R. Haywood (P)2019 Audible, Ltd

Haywood has the most enjoyable characters.

Huge fan of extracted series and see the same likeable and funny characters in this series. Too many really likeable characters to name one. very enjoyable read. I was hesitant from the off choice of narrators. He has a very heavy accent. Odd choice. His range of voices is pretty incredible though and did a great job. Outside of the Harry Potter Jim Dale reading this was the best range of male and female characters I have heard. Good book, good narration skills. Sad it ended with so little resolved and so many loose ends.

My 1st "6 Star" Rating in Two Years--fun, smart

Some books are great because they introduce a new sub-genre. This book is about world ships leaving the Earth on a long, long voyage after a cataclysm--so it is not new ground. Some books are great because they touch us with their connection to the plot and characters that stirs deep feelings and thoughts. This is a good, fun plot and has engaging characters, but it will not move your interior world. And then there are the books which hit just the right combination of humor, dialogue, story and performance -- they just feel great. This is a longer book (14 hours) which manages to feel great even though it treads somewhat familiar ground. First, if you enjoy classic science-fiction, the author's insights and voice feel like going home to a well-liked and well-enjoyed place. Second, you will enjoy the characters. Third, while it presents a mystery, an exploration and surprises, it is not too sweet or too dark.

I would also like to note that this book was done to be performed. It is an Audible-Only book. The narrator is perfectly matched to the book -- and pulls off a performance that is almost worth the listen. While being very different, the perfect match between performance and story reminds me of Great North Road by Peter F. Hamilton, or some of Charles Stross' earlier books.

Long on character development, short on plot

Some parts are laugh out loud funny. But you can only deal with so much character development. Many times I felt like screaming "I get it already. I know what this character is like. Can we please move on!" This is obviously destined (needlessly) for a Trilogy when it could easily have been a fantastic single novel. The narrator is excellent and the plot, once they eventually get to it, has the makings of an excellent story. I just don't think I can spend another 2 books (i.e. 26 hrs) waiting for the author to finally get to the point.

Terrific

Entertaining story and excellent narration. It kept me glued to my headphones.
I can't wait for the next book ( at least I hope the story continues).
Note: There are many rave reviews, and sometimes a well reviewed title can be trashed by a particularly bad review, at least for me. In this case another reviewer complained about "info dumps", so I was prepared for a lengthy lecture on the background of the story. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The information you need to get up to speed is presented by a character that makes perfect sense, and later is integral to the story. The efforts by the author to get you up to speed are well done. It's a shame to see potential listeners scared away by this.

Wow

Fun story but “beware” no holds barred when it comes to sex, language and expletives!

Good Story, Even Better Narration

Action from start to finish. The story is well-written, and the characters really grow on you. But it's really Colin Morgan who makes this story worth listening to. He has the perfect voice for narration, and the number of different voices and accents he can perform is staggering, enriching the story and bringing the characters to life.

Stupendous narration

Colin Morgan narrating as brilliant as ever! He narrated so many different characters with accents and tones. He voiced one character Moses so brilliantly that I thought it was another actor Phil Davis but it's all Colin.
The story itself is amazing. R. R. Haywood has done a fantastic job with the words, the plot and the characters. Everything about the book is intriguing.

Not sci fi. Audio problems.

Just because it's set on a spaceship does not make it sci fi. Also the narrator's voice varies from taking under his breath to yelling. Prepare to keep one hand on the volume the whole story. Finally, the repeated "big boobs" descriptions in the character development is juvenile and gratuitous. If you're looking for real sci fi, look somewhere else.

Not really sci-fi but a drama in outer space

If you're looking for cool science which is an integral part the storyline this is not your book. If you want a cozy drama set in outer space it's not bad. Great narrator!

I gave up

I'm seriously starting to question the validity of these reviews. I got this one based on the rave reviews I found for it. And almost asked for a refund immediately.

The book starts out with an info dump. Didn't even attempt to disguise it, just started with a podcast for a history class. Great job of weaving the background of your universe into the story. The phrase "show, don't tell" exists for a reason. This opening info dump is especially egregious since the author does this same dump, of the same information, THREE times in the first hour and forty-five minutes. I use that time point because that's when I gave up. It took that long to complete the introduction of the two main characters, and then we meet the captains from the viewpoint of a third character, where we are introduced to the intrigue I'm guessing is what will be driving the plot.

Yes, that's right, the first plot element isn't even introduced until nearly TWO HOURS into a fourteen hour audiobook. 14% of this book is dedicated to three repetitions of the same historical infodump, a backstory infodump of one of the main characters prefaced by the not-eye-rolling-at-all "and the memories came flooding in," what felt like an eternity of the other main character trying to cheer up a little kid with a hacked advertisement, but the kid (un-named) wasn't paying attention. This was, no kidding, 30 minutes of irrelevance.

Not worth the credit.

Good- but again no ending

It seems to be a common thread.. I listen to a book by RR Haywood, am thoroughly engrossed, then all of a sudden, it's over with no real ending.

I did enjoy this book, but again was thoroughly frustrated by the lack of a full ending. RR can write good plots, but perhaps gets bored as he is writing the last two chapters. And it p*sses me off.

So for now, i'm going to park any new books by this author into my 'nothing else left' corner...

Good story, but lacks an ending

I enjoyed the story, the characters and plot were interesting, I hope there are more stories to be told in this setting. It had a LOT of similarities to Artemis by Andy Weir which I also enjoyed.

Colin Morgan's performance was very good, he did a good job at voicing the female characters, which male performers often struggle with.

My only gripe with the story is that it finishes so abruptly, it's missing an ending. It only needs another chapter or two to tie up some of the loose ends. I don't know if the author was pushed for time and just stopped or had another reasons, it's just a shame it took away from what was an enjoyable listen.

Surprisingly enjoyable

Quirky characters, and brilliantly performed.
This could have been very samey and typical of the genre - all humans clustered on a spaceship seeking new habitable planet - but it wasn’t and I found myself finding excuses to listen longer.

The ending is not a perfect wrap, but it’s tidy enough to work out what might happen, alternatively it’s left the door open for a sequel. We can but hope.

Have enjoyed Colin Morgan since his Merlin days - he may now be included in my list of favourite narrators too.

Never went anywhere

Ending was incredibly poor, rendering the rest of the story pointless. Most characters felt flat with only the reader creating any resemblance of depth. Story felt childish yet was dashed with adult themes. Never quite found its identity.

best ever

I have found my favourite author, what a brilliant book. I cant wait for the next installment. I usually listen in my car whereby I have found myself parked up at home not going in till the chapter finishes!!!!

Loved it!

Loved the performance of characters. Written well and allowed me to visualize the scenes easily. Great story and lots of humour too.

excellent

I only bought this title because it was a daily deal. I absolutely loved it.

Pop Muzik!

There's no doubt that everyone is going to be talking about this, this is the audiobook equivalent of 70s pop music at its zaniest! Haywood has, in my opinion, gone one better than even the excellent Extracted series! In his ragtag fleet of Homeships, he has managed to bolt Judge Dredd's Mega-City One on to the bottom of something like the environment of The Fifth Element. Inside that, he's put together a set of characters ranging from the most desperate and lowly to the upper echelons of a very twisted society.

Yasmine and Sam are unlikely heroes but their struggles with everything from sex-addicted policemen to personal shyness are a joy to behold. The whole thing is infused with Haywood's fast-becoming legendary humour and is brought to life with a bravura performance from Colin Morgan. Haywood presented him with a bizarre challenge with his zany and wildly varied cast and Morgan does a fair impression of one of those old one-man bands as he voices everything from Russian gangsters to English snobs, military women to Chinese detectives.

This is an absolute humdinger of a modern sci-fi heist with mischief, comedy and drama running through its veins in equal measure!

Dumb Entertainment

Enthusiastically narrated, but unfortunately lacking quality writing.
The characters seem not to have any real depth, the plot is predictable and the drama contrived. The main protagonist's vulgar and childish rants don't inspire any enjoyment and simply detract from an already shallow storyline.

It’s Ben , safa and harry in space..... and it’s awesome

Let’s not beat around the bush, the lead characters aren’t just similar to the extracted series characters ... they are them... like exactly them.

Don’t be put off though , because this book really works! Great story, great humour throughout and great interaction between the (very familiar) characters!

Colin Morgan really brings the story to life, great narration!

More of the same please!