
World Engines
A post climate change high concept science fiction odyssey
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.99/mo for the first 3 months

Buy for $21.81
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Penelope Rawlins
-
Christopher Ragland
-
Damian Lynch
-
Stephanie Racine
-
By:
-
Stephen Baxter
About this listen
Trapped on an alternate Earth, the combined crews of a crashed Russian spaceship, a British expeditionary force and a group of strays from the future must work together to survive, escape and discover what led them to this point. All are from parallel universes where small changes in history led to different realities, and the tensions between the groups are rising.
But some changes were not small. The solar system has been altered, changed, shaped in the various realities, and the World Engineers - unspeakably powerful, completely unknown - are still active. Why have they populated this planet with humanity's ancestors and dinosaurs? What is on the moon of Saturn that gives off such an odd light? And even if they can be found, can they be stopped - and should they be?
Malenfant, Deidra and the rest of their party must find a way off the planet, back into space, and into the many dimensions seeking the answer....
©2020 Stephen Baxter (P)2020 Orion Publishing GroupListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Thousand Earths
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Caitlin Shannon, David Monteith
- Length: 17 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hackett, in his trusty ship the Perseus, is not just a space traveller—beginning his travels with an expedition to Neptune and back—but, thanks to the time-dilation effect, a time traveller as well. His new mission will take him to Andromeda, to get a close-up look at the constellation which will eventually crash into the Milky Way, and give humanity a heads-up about the challenges which are coming. A mission which will take him five million years to complete. Not only is Hackett exploring unknown space, but he will return to a vastly different time.
-
-
Another Epic Hard Sci-Fi Novel from Baxter
- By Jeff Koeppen on 11-09-22
By: Stephen Baxter
-
Voyage
- The NASA Trilogy, Book 1
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Kevin Kenerly
- Length: 24 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An epic saga of America’s might-have-been, Voyage is a powerful, sweeping novel of how, if President Kennedy had lived, we could have sent a manned mission to Mars in the 1980s. Imaginatively created from the true lives and real events, Voyage returns to the geniuses of NASA and the excitement of the Saturn rocket and includes historical figures from Neil Armstrong to Ronald Reagan who are interwoven with unforgettable characters whose dreams mirror the promise of a young space program that held the world in thrall.
-
-
Borrrring
- By Robert on 09-11-21
By: Stephen Baxter
-
Proxima: Book 1
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Kyle McCarley
- Length: 17 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The very far future: The galaxy is a drifting wreck of black holes, neutron stars, and chill white dwarfs. The age of star formation is long past. Yet there is life here, feeding off the energies of the stellar remnants, and there is mind, a tremendous galaxy-spanning intelligence each of whose thoughts lasts a hundred thousand years. And this mind cradles memories of a long-gone age when a more compact universe was full of light... The 27th century: Proxima Centauri, an undistinguished red dwarf star, is the nearest star to our sun. How would it be to live on such a world?
-
-
No Sense of Conclusion
- By Lisa Davidson on 04-24-16
By: Stephen Baxter
-
The Medusa Chronicles
- By: Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds
- Narrated by: Peter Kenny
- Length: 12 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Howard Falcon almost lost his life in an accident as the first human astronaut to explore the atmosphere of Jupiter - and a combination of human ingenuity and technical expertise brought him back. But he is no longer himself. Instead he has been changed into an augmented human: part man, part machine, and exceptionally capable.
-
-
Almost stopped listening. Glad I didn't.
- By cek on 08-21-16
By: Stephen Baxter, and others
-
Eversion
- By: Alastair Reynolds
- Narrated by: Harry Myers
- Length: 10 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the 1800s, a sailing ship crashes off the coast of Norway. In the 1900s, a Zepellin explores an icy canyon in Antarctica. In the far future, a spaceship sets out for an alien artifact. Each excursion goes horribly wrong. And on every journey, Dr. Silas Coade is the physician, but only Silas seems to realize that these events keep repeating themselves. And it's up to him to figure out why and how. And how to stop it all from happening again.
-
-
An entirely new level of science fiction
- By Possum Bean on 01-08-23
-
The Light of Other Days
- By: Arthur C. Clarke, Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Dick Hill
- Length: 11 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Light of Other Days tells the tale of what happens when a brilliant, driven industrialist harnesses the cutting edge of quantum physics to enable people everywhere, at trivial cost, to see one another at all times: around every corner, through every wall, into everyone's most private, hidden, and even intimate moments. It amounts to the sudden and complete abolition of human privacy - forever.
-
-
When Seeing All is not Understanding All
- By Lisa Callihan on 11-30-08
By: Arthur C. Clarke, and others
-
The Thousand Earths
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Caitlin Shannon, David Monteith
- Length: 17 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hackett, in his trusty ship the Perseus, is not just a space traveller—beginning his travels with an expedition to Neptune and back—but, thanks to the time-dilation effect, a time traveller as well. His new mission will take him to Andromeda, to get a close-up look at the constellation which will eventually crash into the Milky Way, and give humanity a heads-up about the challenges which are coming. A mission which will take him five million years to complete. Not only is Hackett exploring unknown space, but he will return to a vastly different time.
-
-
Another Epic Hard Sci-Fi Novel from Baxter
- By Jeff Koeppen on 11-09-22
By: Stephen Baxter
-
Voyage
- The NASA Trilogy, Book 1
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Kevin Kenerly
- Length: 24 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An epic saga of America’s might-have-been, Voyage is a powerful, sweeping novel of how, if President Kennedy had lived, we could have sent a manned mission to Mars in the 1980s. Imaginatively created from the true lives and real events, Voyage returns to the geniuses of NASA and the excitement of the Saturn rocket and includes historical figures from Neil Armstrong to Ronald Reagan who are interwoven with unforgettable characters whose dreams mirror the promise of a young space program that held the world in thrall.
-
-
Borrrring
- By Robert on 09-11-21
By: Stephen Baxter
-
Proxima: Book 1
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Kyle McCarley
- Length: 17 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The very far future: The galaxy is a drifting wreck of black holes, neutron stars, and chill white dwarfs. The age of star formation is long past. Yet there is life here, feeding off the energies of the stellar remnants, and there is mind, a tremendous galaxy-spanning intelligence each of whose thoughts lasts a hundred thousand years. And this mind cradles memories of a long-gone age when a more compact universe was full of light... The 27th century: Proxima Centauri, an undistinguished red dwarf star, is the nearest star to our sun. How would it be to live on such a world?
-
-
No Sense of Conclusion
- By Lisa Davidson on 04-24-16
By: Stephen Baxter
-
The Medusa Chronicles
- By: Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds
- Narrated by: Peter Kenny
- Length: 12 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Howard Falcon almost lost his life in an accident as the first human astronaut to explore the atmosphere of Jupiter - and a combination of human ingenuity and technical expertise brought him back. But he is no longer himself. Instead he has been changed into an augmented human: part man, part machine, and exceptionally capable.
-
-
Almost stopped listening. Glad I didn't.
- By cek on 08-21-16
By: Stephen Baxter, and others
-
Eversion
- By: Alastair Reynolds
- Narrated by: Harry Myers
- Length: 10 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the 1800s, a sailing ship crashes off the coast of Norway. In the 1900s, a Zepellin explores an icy canyon in Antarctica. In the far future, a spaceship sets out for an alien artifact. Each excursion goes horribly wrong. And on every journey, Dr. Silas Coade is the physician, but only Silas seems to realize that these events keep repeating themselves. And it's up to him to figure out why and how. And how to stop it all from happening again.
-
-
An entirely new level of science fiction
- By Possum Bean on 01-08-23
-
The Light of Other Days
- By: Arthur C. Clarke, Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Dick Hill
- Length: 11 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Light of Other Days tells the tale of what happens when a brilliant, driven industrialist harnesses the cutting edge of quantum physics to enable people everywhere, at trivial cost, to see one another at all times: around every corner, through every wall, into everyone's most private, hidden, and even intimate moments. It amounts to the sudden and complete abolition of human privacy - forever.
-
-
When Seeing All is not Understanding All
- By Lisa Callihan on 11-30-08
By: Arthur C. Clarke, and others
-
Rendezvous with Rama
- By: Arthur C. Clarke
- Narrated by: Peter Ganim, Robert J. Sawyer - introduction
- Length: 9 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At first, only a few things are known about the celestial object that astronomers dub Rama. It is huge, weighing more than ten trillion tons. And it is hurtling through the solar system at inconceivable speed. Then a space probe confirms the unthinkable: Rama is no natural object. It is, incredibly, an interstellar spacecraft. Space explorers and planet-bound scientists alike prepare for mankind's first encounter with alien intelligence.
-
-
Domo Arigato Mr. Roboto
- By Fredrik Pettersen on 08-03-09
By: Arthur C. Clarke
-
Portals
- By: Douglas E. Richards
- Narrated by: Johnathan McClain
- Length: 12 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Noah Harris and Ashley Flynn are field agents for a powerful organization tasked with protecting humanity from the misuse of game-changing technology. But when they discover hidden portals that link Earth to numerous planets, they are thrust into a maze of deception and intrigue they can't begin to understand....one that not only has them battling for their very lives, but that will decide the fate of worlds. Because, inexplicably, each of the planets contain human civilizations, and the rulers of our nearest portal neighbor have come up with a brilliant, twisted plan to conquer ours.
-
-
Fantastic near future techno thriller
- By Jason on 10-26-22
-
Cast Under an Alien Sun
- Destiny's Crucible, Book 1
- By: Olan Thorensen
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
- Length: 15 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Joe Colsco boarded a flight from San Francisco to Chicago to attend a national chemistry meeting. He would never set foot on Earth again. On planet Anyar, Joe is found unconscious on a beach of a large island inhabited by humans where the level of technology is similar to Earth circa 1700. He awakes amid strangers speaking an unintelligible language and struggles to accept losing his previous life and finding a place in a society with different customs, needing a way to support himself and not knowing a single soul.
-
-
Slowly we turn, step by step, inch by inch...
- By Ron on 09-18-17
By: Olan Thorensen
-
Cage of Souls
- By: Adrian Tchaikovsky
- Narrated by: David Thorpe
- Length: 23 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The sun is bloated, diseased, dying perhaps. Beneath its baneful light, Shadrapar, last of all cities, harbours fewer than 100,000 human souls. Built on the ruins of countless civilisations, Shadrapar is a museum, a midden, an asylum, a prison on a world that is ever more alien to humanity. Bearing witness to the desperate struggle for existence between life old and new is Stefan Advani: rebel, outlaw, prisoner, survivor.
-
-
Slow Start, Strong Finish
- By Jacob McCollum on 05-01-23
-
Seveneves
- A Novel
- By: Neal Stephenson
- Narrated by: Mary Robinette Kowal, Will Damron
- Length: 31 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.
-
-
Odd narrator choice
- By Josh Mitchell on 05-30-15
By: Neal Stephenson
-
Ancillary Justice
- By: Ann Leckie
- Narrated by: Adjoa Andoh
- Length: 12 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On a remote, icy planet, the soldier known as Breq is drawing closer to completing her quest. Once, she was the Justice of Toren - a colossal starship with an artificial intelligence linking thousands of soldiers in the service of the Radch, the empire that conquered the galaxy. Now, an act of treachery has ripped it all away, leaving her with one fragile human body, unanswered questions, and a burning desire for vengeance.
-
-
Has some redeeming value, but is deeply flawed
- By Matthew J. Mimnaugh on 08-07-19
By: Ann Leckie
-
Outland
- Quantum Earth, Book 1
- By: Dennis E. Taylor
- Narrated by: Ray Porter
- Length: 10 hrs and 29 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When an experiment to study quantum uncertainty goes spectacularly wrong, physics student Bill Rustad and his friends find that they have accidentally created an inter-dimensional portal. They connect to Outland - an alternate Earth with identical geology, but where humans never evolved. The group races to establish control of the portal before the government, the military, or evildoers can take it away. Then everything changes when the Yellowstone supervolcano erupts in an explosion large enough to destroy civilization and kill half the planet.
-
-
I made myself finish. Glad I did.
- By RJPF on 05-26-19
By: Dennis E. Taylor
-
House of Suns
- By: Alastair Reynolds
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 18 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Six million years ago, at the very dawn of the starfaring era, Abigail Gentian fractured herself into a thousand male and female clones: the shatterlings. Sent out into the galaxy, these shatterlings have stood aloof as they document the rise and fall of countless human empires. They meet every 200,000 years to exchange news and memories of their travels with their siblings.
-
-
Science fiction in Deep time
- By A reader on 05-12-10
-
Infinite
- By: Jeremy Robinson
- Narrated by: R.C. Bray
- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Galahad, a faster-than-light spacecraft, carries 50 scientists and engineers on a mission to prepare Kepler 452b, Earth's nearest habitable neighbor at 1400 light years away. With Earth no longer habitable and the Mars colony slowly failing, they are humanity's best hope. After 10 years in a failed cryogenic bed - body asleep, mind awake - William Chanokh's torture comes to an end as the fog clears, the hatch opens, and his friend and fellow hacker, Tom, greets him...by stabbing a screwdriver into his heart. This is the first time William dies.
-
-
a rather complex science fiction story
- By Midwestbonsai on 12-26-17
By: Jeremy Robinson
-
New York 2140
- By: Kim Stanley Robinson
- Narrated by: Suzanne Toren, Robin Miles, Peter Ganim, and others
- Length: 22 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
New York Times best-selling author Kim Stanley Robinson returns with a bold and brilliant vision of New York City in the next century. As the sea levels rose, every street became a canal. Every skyscraper an island. For the residents of one apartment building in Madison Square, however, New York in the year 2140 is far from a drowned city. There is the market trader, who finds opportunities where others find trouble. There is the detective, whose work will never disappear—along with the lawyers, of course.
-
-
Complex, believable, nuanced, riveting
- By Lois on 04-07-17
-
Wool
- The Silo Saga, Book 1
- By: Hugh Howey
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 15 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The world outside has grown toxic, the view of it limited, talk of it forbidden. The remnants of humanity live underground in a single silo. But there are always those who hope, who dream. These are the dangerous people, the residents who infect others with their optimism. Their punishment is simple. They are given the very thing they want: They are allowed to go outside.
-
-
THIS is a strong female character
- By Alex on 03-23-23
By: Hugh Howey
-
A Hole in the Sky
- Arkship Trilogy, Book 1
- By: Peter F. Hamilton
- Narrated by: Elizabeth Klett
- Length: 9 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sixteen-year old Hazel lives in the Daedalus, a starship that is flying in search of a new world. The ship has been traveling for 500 years, searching for a world to settle in after having to abandon its last world. Everyone on board Daedalus lives a very simple existence in farming villages. The age of machines supplying their needs was lost during a mutiny 500 years ago.
-
-
What happened?
- By Trip Williams on 03-24-21
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
World Engines
- A post climate change high concept science fiction odyssey
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Penelope Rawlins, Christopher Ragland
- Length: 17 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the middle of climate-change crises, there is no mood for space-exploration stunts - but Reid Malenfant, elderly, once a shuttle pilot and frustrated would-be asteroid miner, decides to go take a look anyway. Nothing more is heard of him. But his ex-wife, Emma Stoney, sets up a trust fund to search for him the next time the Kernel returns...By 2570 Earth is transformed. A mere billion people are supported by advanced technology on a world that is almost indistinguishable from the natural, with recovered forests, oceans, ice caps.
-
-
Kinda wraps up Manifold...
- By R. Carlson on 07-04-24
By: Stephen Baxter
-
Fortress Sol
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Frankie Porter
- Length: 13 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Rab was a baby, his mother made a decision which would change his life. She feared he would be sent to work in the hellish mines of Mercury, to eke out his life until he was worn out, all in the name of maintaining the defense of the Solar System. But when her desperate attempt to flee with her 2 year old failed, she took a desperate step to save him. She cut off his hand. Decades later, Rab has been spared the physical hardships he can no longer endure, and is now based on the Mask, the all-encompassing structure which hides the Solar System from alien eyes.
-
-
performer did well. story was weak
- By Zack on 03-21-25
By: Stephen Baxter
-
The Thousand Earths
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Caitlin Shannon, David Monteith
- Length: 17 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hackett, in his trusty ship the Perseus, is not just a space traveller—beginning his travels with an expedition to Neptune and back—but, thanks to the time-dilation effect, a time traveller as well. His new mission will take him to Andromeda, to get a close-up look at the constellation which will eventually crash into the Milky Way, and give humanity a heads-up about the challenges which are coming. A mission which will take him five million years to complete. Not only is Hackett exploring unknown space, but he will return to a vastly different time.
-
-
Another Epic Hard Sci-Fi Novel from Baxter
- By Jeff Koeppen on 11-09-22
By: Stephen Baxter
-
Proxima: Book 1
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Kyle McCarley
- Length: 17 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The very far future: The galaxy is a drifting wreck of black holes, neutron stars, and chill white dwarfs. The age of star formation is long past. Yet there is life here, feeding off the energies of the stellar remnants, and there is mind, a tremendous galaxy-spanning intelligence each of whose thoughts lasts a hundred thousand years. And this mind cradles memories of a long-gone age when a more compact universe was full of light... The 27th century: Proxima Centauri, an undistinguished red dwarf star, is the nearest star to our sun. How would it be to live on such a world?
-
-
No Sense of Conclusion
- By Lisa Davidson on 04-24-16
By: Stephen Baxter
-
Voyage
- The NASA Trilogy, Book 1
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Kevin Kenerly
- Length: 24 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An epic saga of America’s might-have-been, Voyage is a powerful, sweeping novel of how, if President Kennedy had lived, we could have sent a manned mission to Mars in the 1980s. Imaginatively created from the true lives and real events, Voyage returns to the geniuses of NASA and the excitement of the Saturn rocket and includes historical figures from Neil Armstrong to Ronald Reagan who are interwoven with unforgettable characters whose dreams mirror the promise of a young space program that held the world in thrall.
-
-
Borrrring
- By Robert on 09-11-21
By: Stephen Baxter
-
The Medusa Chronicles
- By: Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds
- Narrated by: Peter Kenny
- Length: 12 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Howard Falcon almost lost his life in an accident as the first human astronaut to explore the atmosphere of Jupiter - and a combination of human ingenuity and technical expertise brought him back. But he is no longer himself. Instead he has been changed into an augmented human: part man, part machine, and exceptionally capable.
-
-
Almost stopped listening. Glad I didn't.
- By cek on 08-21-16
By: Stephen Baxter, and others
-
World Engines
- A post climate change high concept science fiction odyssey
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Penelope Rawlins, Christopher Ragland
- Length: 17 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the middle of climate-change crises, there is no mood for space-exploration stunts - but Reid Malenfant, elderly, once a shuttle pilot and frustrated would-be asteroid miner, decides to go take a look anyway. Nothing more is heard of him. But his ex-wife, Emma Stoney, sets up a trust fund to search for him the next time the Kernel returns...By 2570 Earth is transformed. A mere billion people are supported by advanced technology on a world that is almost indistinguishable from the natural, with recovered forests, oceans, ice caps.
-
-
Kinda wraps up Manifold...
- By R. Carlson on 07-04-24
By: Stephen Baxter
-
Fortress Sol
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Frankie Porter
- Length: 13 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Rab was a baby, his mother made a decision which would change his life. She feared he would be sent to work in the hellish mines of Mercury, to eke out his life until he was worn out, all in the name of maintaining the defense of the Solar System. But when her desperate attempt to flee with her 2 year old failed, she took a desperate step to save him. She cut off his hand. Decades later, Rab has been spared the physical hardships he can no longer endure, and is now based on the Mask, the all-encompassing structure which hides the Solar System from alien eyes.
-
-
performer did well. story was weak
- By Zack on 03-21-25
By: Stephen Baxter
-
The Thousand Earths
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Caitlin Shannon, David Monteith
- Length: 17 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hackett, in his trusty ship the Perseus, is not just a space traveller—beginning his travels with an expedition to Neptune and back—but, thanks to the time-dilation effect, a time traveller as well. His new mission will take him to Andromeda, to get a close-up look at the constellation which will eventually crash into the Milky Way, and give humanity a heads-up about the challenges which are coming. A mission which will take him five million years to complete. Not only is Hackett exploring unknown space, but he will return to a vastly different time.
-
-
Another Epic Hard Sci-Fi Novel from Baxter
- By Jeff Koeppen on 11-09-22
By: Stephen Baxter
-
Proxima: Book 1
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Kyle McCarley
- Length: 17 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The very far future: The galaxy is a drifting wreck of black holes, neutron stars, and chill white dwarfs. The age of star formation is long past. Yet there is life here, feeding off the energies of the stellar remnants, and there is mind, a tremendous galaxy-spanning intelligence each of whose thoughts lasts a hundred thousand years. And this mind cradles memories of a long-gone age when a more compact universe was full of light... The 27th century: Proxima Centauri, an undistinguished red dwarf star, is the nearest star to our sun. How would it be to live on such a world?
-
-
No Sense of Conclusion
- By Lisa Davidson on 04-24-16
By: Stephen Baxter
-
Voyage
- The NASA Trilogy, Book 1
- By: Stephen Baxter
- Narrated by: Kevin Kenerly
- Length: 24 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An epic saga of America’s might-have-been, Voyage is a powerful, sweeping novel of how, if President Kennedy had lived, we could have sent a manned mission to Mars in the 1980s. Imaginatively created from the true lives and real events, Voyage returns to the geniuses of NASA and the excitement of the Saturn rocket and includes historical figures from Neil Armstrong to Ronald Reagan who are interwoven with unforgettable characters whose dreams mirror the promise of a young space program that held the world in thrall.
-
-
Borrrring
- By Robert on 09-11-21
By: Stephen Baxter
-
The Medusa Chronicles
- By: Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds
- Narrated by: Peter Kenny
- Length: 12 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Howard Falcon almost lost his life in an accident as the first human astronaut to explore the atmosphere of Jupiter - and a combination of human ingenuity and technical expertise brought him back. But he is no longer himself. Instead he has been changed into an augmented human: part man, part machine, and exceptionally capable.
-
-
Almost stopped listening. Glad I didn't.
- By cek on 08-21-16
By: Stephen Baxter, and others
What listeners say about World Engines
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- R. Carlson
- 07-04-24
Closure (Kinda) for the Manifold Series..
(applies to "Creator" and "Destroyer")
This will likely be my last Baxter book. Xeelee Vengeance and Redemption were bad enough, I was hoping for a return to better days, but it was not to be. So many issues!
First let's start with the good stuff: It's "high concept", its multiverse, mysterious world destroying engineers, it's Malenfant from the Manifold. In fact, this wraps up the Manifold Trilogy (Time/Space/Origin), making it a …”Pentalogy”! (but see below) It offers some closure to those of us who scratched our heads over Manifold/ORIGIN and the Red Moon, which seemed to have actually been part of a larger storyline – sooooooo Yay?
What's not to like?
Unfortunately, quite a bit
Let's start with the narration. It’s a trainwreck. In the first book there’s two narrators, in the second there's four, but they trade off some parts, like one of the main characters, Malenfant. At least in World Engines Destroyer, there were just two of them. Also, they don't necessarily split the narration according to character. You can figure it out, but it's disconcerting when Malenfant's voice just changes for no reason, depending on who he's talking to. Also, Penelope Rawlins' Malenfant is abominable - cringy and hard to listen to. There’s also only so many hours you can listen to a sardonic robot as a main character (he's no "Bender"). Also, no one in the US pronounces it “mee-thane”. It’s “meth-ane”… or Gee-sers…it's Guy-sers!
Next, there's the characters -- there's way too many of them. Emma seems to have almost no point and no relationship until almost the very end. They seem to kill off some characters, like the Brits, or forget about them, like the Denisovans (Neanderthals?). Also, there's little linkage back to the Manifold books (which you might have read 25 years ago). Sure, they mention a fact or two from them, but these guys all come from a different universe, so...
Then, there's the exposition. Book 1 (Destroyer) spends 3/4 of the book describing post-climate change economics in a world where Armstrong dies on the moon and Nixon invents guaranteed basic income. Sure, at the very end we discover the Multiverse, try to move a planet (not very successfully), and jaunt off to find the engineers. In Book 2 (Creator) we spend the first half in a "Robinson Caruso on Mars" scenario as everyone tries to understand what is pretty much evident from the start - Persephonie is a zoo. Throw in some very evident “mysteries” (the mistreatment of the sub-humans) and a LOT of rocket engineering and you’re now about 3/4 ‘s of the way through.
Answers come in the last 45 minutes or so. Through exposition, of course….
--------------------------- Danger: Spoilers Ahead -------------------
OK, time to wrap up the prior Manifold Trilogy (sorry, Tetralogy… I guess Phase Space, a short story, is sometimes included(?) so now a Hexology!). Spoilers -- it’s the Downstreamers – (remember them from Manifold TIME -- 1999? 25 years ago?) basically, humans from the end of time, back when there was no multiverse. They’re bored. Reruns of “Happy Days” are just not doing it for them. They simply ran out of time and resources, so they sent a message back in time to a generation of children and had them build a device to create the vacuum catastrophe. In doing so, they created a series of universes, a multiverse, a MANIFOLD. At least some of the kids (including “Michael”) jumped into portals before the catastrophe and became immortal beings whose job is to tinker with the construction of various versions of the solar system, like a big billiards game. Oh yeah, and they spread Earth Life (because it’s basically the only game in town). Oh YEAH – remember the red moon from Manifold ORIGIN (from the Manifold Trilogy)? Finally explained, tied up – it was Michael cross breeding hominids across the universes! (And that's why there's duplicates of most of the characters in some of the multiverse worlds....huh?)
Eventually, the blue children will report to Downstreamer central….(wherever that’s supposed to be -- if the vacuum disaster wiped out the original timeline, then Where TF is “Michael” supposed to report to in the end? Nevermind... )
Why?
Who knows…I can hear Baxter screaming “Well just reread the damn books!!!” (the Manifold Series, which were already pretty incoherent 25 years ago...).
Malenfant and Emma decide to stay in “reality IV” and build a life together on a Mars that’s only a little more habitable than ours. Dierdre decides to join the AI/Blue Child “Michael” and travel downstream to the end. Col. Lighthill decides he needs to establish a Titanic to service the Multiverse (and seems not to see the irony in this… Ahhh.. the British Empire in Space!).
Like I said, this is my last Baxter.
If you LOVE Baxter and absolutely NEED to have "Manifold" wrapped up a bit more AND you can tolerate exquisitely bad narration, then have a go. Otherwise, look for better product.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Darryl Wagoner
- 09-18-20
Kind of a bore
I liked the Long Earth series, but this had a lot of detail that poorly related to the theme of the book. The plot was really hard to follow.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful