Playground Audiobook By Richard Powers cover art

Playground

A Novel

Preview
LIMITED TIME OFFER

3 months free
Try for $0.00
Offer ends July 31, 2025 at 11:59PM PT.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for $14.95/mo after 3 months. Cancel anytime.

Playground

By: Richard Powers
Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini, Robin Siegerman, Eunice Wong, Pun Bandhu, Krys Janae, Kevin R Free
Try for $0.00

$0.00/mo. after 3 months. Offer ends July 31, 2025 at 11:59PM PT. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $17.49

Buy for $17.49

Confirm purchase
Pay using card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use, License, and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Taxes where applicable.
Cancel

A magisterial new novel from the Pulitzer Prize-winning and New York Times best-selling author of The Overstory and Bewilderment.

Four lives are drawn together in a sweeping, panoramic new novel from Richard Powers, showcasing the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Overstory at the height of his skills. Twelve-year-old Evie Beaulieu sinks to the bottom of a swimming pool in Montreal strapped to one of the world’s first aqualungs. Ina Aroita grows up in naval bases across the Pacific with art as her only home. Two polar opposites at an elite Chicago high school bond over a three-thousand-year-old board game; Rafi Young will get lost in literature, while Todd Keane’s work will lead to a startling AI breakthrough.

They meet on the history-scarred island of Makatea in French Polynesia, whose deposits of phosphorus once helped feed the world. Now the tiny atoll has been chosen for humanity’s next adventure: a plan to send floating, autonomous cities out onto the open sea. But first, the island’s residents must vote to greenlight the project or turn the seasteaders away.

Set in the world’s largest ocean, this awe-filled book explores that last wild place we have yet to colonize in a still-unfolding oceanic game, and interweaves beautiful writing, rich characterization, profound themes of technology and the environment, and a deep exploration of our shared humanity in a way only Richard Powers can.

©2024 Richard Powers (P)2024 Spotify Audiobooks
Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Political Inspiring Heartfelt Thought-Provoking Suspenseful
Beautifully Crafted Storylines • Thought-provoking Themes • Multiple Talented Narrators • Vivid Ocean Descriptions
Highly rated for:
All stars
Most relevant  
I loved the book itself. As a diver and a marine conservationist, there was no question that I needed to read it. The book is fantastic. The story amazing. The writing makes me feel like I am under the ocean.

I didn’t care for the readers of the book. For some, the inflections seemed off and almost comical. I found that very distracting. In the beginning, it almost made me stop reading the book. I persevered simply because of the topic, and I’m so glad that I did.

What a tremendous story

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

This novel intertwines human friendships, hopes, and hurts with wonderful explanations of the ocean, racial tensions, artificial intelligence, and future challenges. I listened to it twice, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

An outstanding ending

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

This is a new favorite. Great story, well researched and thoughtful with endearing characters and incredibly relevant plot.

Loved

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

This is my fourth book by Richard Powers, likely my favorite. His well researched literacy in so many different arenas is beautifully interwoven in narratives from widely disparate and thoughtful perspectives. The narrators are (mostly) wonderfully well suited to the material. Highly recommend!!!

A masterful tapestry!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

Fascinating book about the implications of “progress” that blew my mind in the end. Wildly different boys meet in high school and forge a friendship based on their great intellects, different perspectives, and love of competing with each other. As they grow up, their friendship is initially strained by a new relationship with a woman, but really divergent definitions of success and visions for the future.

Apart, they each achieve success in their respective fields, but it’s clear their former friendship and its dissolution haunts Todd, whose POV leads the story…sort of. Todd is a tech billionaire and leader in AI who struggles to build and maintain human connections after a sad and emotionally stunted childhood. As he faces a terminal prognosis, Todd tells his life story. Rafi was his friend in high school and college, struggling to build his own identity against the high expectations of a mother who doesn’t understand him and a father who sees his son as a means to right racial wrongs. Ina is the young woman who enters their lives as a love interest for Rafi and friend/competitor/potential love for Todd. Meanwhile, in another place and time, Evie the French Canadian diver, author and ocean scientist builds a life that will influence millions to think about the ocean and all of its fascinating inhabitants.

And here is where the story gets more complicated. Three timelines unfold, and it can be challenging to see how all the storylines will eventually link together. You start to wonder if all of these stories are real. You start to wonder how Todd’s research in deep generative AI may be influencing this story. It bends your brain a little. More questions abound — can anything be owned — AI, the ocean, people’s loyalty? What is the distinction between art and science? How can smart people make choices that alienate them while they yearn for connection? What is real, and what is the story we are telling ourselves? How do we accept the vulnerability that is needed to really be known by others? Why do we compete with the ones we love? Who determines our fate?

Playground opens with a creation story. Playground ends with a burial at sea, among a land of living and ghosts. The beginning and the end. While so much of the ending twists and — who’s dead, who’s alive, are we even in French Polynesia, is the 3rd timeline real, etc. — are still a little unresolved to me, I loved this book. And while it feels like a warning about AI and climate change, what I really loved about this novel were the deeply held and very human relationships at the core of the stories. Evie and Bart, but especially Rafi and Todd. This story kept me thinking and questioning and going online to get perspectives about what really (or didn’t really) happen.

Note on audio vs physical book: I listened to the audio book and while I loved the narrators, I do think reading the book to see what was italicized and what was not would have helped me see the upcoming plot twist about POV and the creation of the story earlier perhaps.

Such an interesting and thought-provoking story

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

This is absolute brilliant storytelling that will make you think. I loved both the story and the characters. Especially relevant for our times.

Brilliant

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

Eduardo Ballerini is one of the best audio book narrators around. If only he had read the whole thing. Instead, there were additional narrators and one of them was SO BAD that I’d switch to the Kindle for her chapters. It’s a great story from a wonderful author but this was not a good listen.

Better to Read Than Listen

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

Beautiful remarkable story spoiled by horrible recording production. Someone should be embarrassed by the shoddy way they put this gorgeous work into the world.

Brilliant Novel- Horrible Production

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

Many relevant topics woven into a thought provoking story across recent history and rapidly ascending future. Especially touching to those who have more than 10 years of scuba diving experience and those who wonder about a future with AI.

Put your thinking cap on!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

Loved every chapter as it moved me want more every day. Thank you for my inspiration to see the poetry of the world.

Just stunning and thought provoking

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

See more reviews