Tell Me a Story Audiobook By Arthur C. Clarke, William Gibson, Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick, Robert Sheckley, Terry Bisson, Avram Davidson cover art

Tell Me a Story

Science Fiction One

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Tell Me a Story

By: Arthur C. Clarke, William Gibson, Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick, Robert Sheckley, Terry Bisson, Avram Davidson
Narrated by: uncredited
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Ready for a story? Author and editor Paul Williams has selected some of the finest science fiction short stories of recent years, including: Arthur C. Clarke's "The Nine Billion Names of Gods," Isaac Asimov's "Insert Knob A in Hole B," William Gibson's "Cyber-Claus," Robert Sheckley's "The Perfect Woman" and "Beside Still Waters," Terry Bisson's "They're Made Out of Meat," Avram Davidson's "The Golem" and Philip K. Dick's "Expendable."Recording (P)1997 by Audio Literature Anthologies Anthologies & Short Stories Fiction Literary History & Criticism Science Fiction Short Story
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Many of these were familiar but were read a long time ago. Others were new to me. The reader seemed to have more of a love for and familiarity with some stories while others were read as if for the first time, with stilted delivery. In the whole, though, a nice sampler of the genre

Good mix of short stories

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Wow. The narration is painful on this one. The stories are great but it sounds like the narrator is reading this book for the first time. Choppy sentences, mispronounced words. No voice inflection or anything to discern different characters or moods. I had to stop listening after 2 stories because it was just too painful.

Has the Narrator ever read anything out loud before

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If the narrator were a robot from the 1950s, I would rate the performance 5 stars, but I’m pretty sure he’s a sentient being, so 2 stars is generous.

As for the stories, they were probably great, given who wrote them, but I really couldn’t get past the narration. Four stars anyway.

I hate to pile onto this poor guy, but this was bad.

Just get the print version

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Good content, enjoyed the stories. When I could get past the halting monotone of the reader.

Poor reader

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What did you like best about Tell Me a Story? What did you like least?

These are classic syfy stories, very enjoyable in themselves, however the reader does an unusually poor job. I found if I adjusted the playback speed to 1.5 most of the awkward gaps in the speech cadence were eliminated.

Playback speed adjustment improves the listen

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What did you like best about Tell Me a Story? What did you like least?

I enjoyed most of the stories in this book but I really wish I knew who narrated this book so I could avoid ever getting another by him.
By no means the best of what these authors. Many of the endings were a bit predictable and trite but I still enjoyed them. Just the constant hesitations and extremely odd breaks by the narrator detracted and made the book hard to listen too.

Would you be willing to try another one of the narrator’s performances?

Not by choice but I can't find his name.

Good stories, bad narration

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Any additional comments?

My only complaint about this audio book is that it was a little too short (only 1.5 hours). The content within that short time is nearly all pure gold. There are one or two stories that had me wondering WHY they were added to the collection, but overall it's a great compilation of some of my favorite authors. The fact that the book contains Sheckley, Asimov, Dick, AND Clarke should be enough reason alone to check this one out.

8.3 / 10

Great Collection of Authors

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Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

no. The reader is awful

What did you like best about this story?

classic SciFi

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of the narrator?

Anybody human.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Yes

Any additional comments?

Its like trying to listen to HAL read a book, but HAL would have sounded more natural.

Reader sounds like a robot

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Narrator: Cartman

Where have I heard that voice...

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Wonderful choice of classic short stories. Enjoyable for more than one listen. Good like for sci fi lovers' library.

Solid Sci Fi

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