
The Windup Girl
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Narrated by:
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Jonathan Davis
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By:
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Paolo Bacigalupi
About this listen
Earphones Award Winner (AudioFile Magazine)
Anderson Lake is a company man, AgriGen's Calorie Man in Thailand. Under cover as a factory manager, Anderson combs Bangkok's street markets in search of foodstuffs thought to be extinct, hoping to reap the bounty of history's lost calories.
There, he encounters Emiko...Emiko is the Windup Girl, a strange and beautiful creature. One of the New People, Emiko is not human; instead, she is an engineered being, creche-grown and programmed to satisfy the decadent whims of a Kyoto businessman, but now abandoned to the streets of Bangkok. Regarded as soulless beings by some, devils by others, New People are slaves, soldiers, and toys of the rich in a chilling near future in which calorie companies rule the world, the oil age has passed, and the side effects of bio-engineered plagues run rampant across the globe.
What happens when calories become currency? What happens when bio-terrorism becomes a tool for corporate profits, when said bio-terrorism's genetic drift forces mankind to the cusp of post-human evolution? In The Windup Girl, award-winning author Paolo Bacigalupi returns to the world of The Calorie Man (Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award-winner, Hugo Award nominee, 2006) and Yellow Card Man (Hugo Award nominee, 2007) in order to address these poignant questions.
BONUS AUDIO: In an exclusive introduction, author Paolo Bacigalupi explains how a horrible trip to Thailand led to the idea for The Windup Girl.
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Critic reviews
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- By: Neal Stephenson
- Narrated by: Jennifer Wiltsie
- Length: 18 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Neal Stephenson, "the hottest science fiction writer in America", takes science fiction to dazzling new levels. The Diamond Age is a stunning tale; set in 21st-century Shanghai, it is the story of what happens what a state-of-the-art interactive device falls into the hands of a street urchin named Nell. Her life, and the entire future of humanity, is about to be decoded and reprogrammed.
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The rock could use a bit more polishing
- By Tango on 05-19-13
By: Neal Stephenson
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The Speed of Dark
- By: Elizabeth Moon
- Narrated by: Jay Snyder
- Length: 14 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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In the near future, disease will be a condition of the past. Most genetic defects will be removed at birth; the remaining during infancy. Unfortunately, there will be a generation left behind. For members of that missed generation, small advances will be made. Through various programs, they will be taught to get along in the world despite their differences. They will be made active and contributing members of society. But they will never be normal.
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Unexpected Interest
- By Holly Helscher on 12-22-08
By: Elizabeth Moon
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Doomsday Book
- By: Connie Willis
- Narrated by: Jenny Sterlin
- Length: 26 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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For Oxford student Kivrin, traveling back to the 14th century is more than the culmination of her studies - it's the chance for a wonderful adventure. For Dunworthy, her mentor, it is cause for intense worry about the thousands of things that could go wrong.
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Timely, beautiful, terrible and haunting
- By mudcelt on 11-02-09
By: Connie Willis
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The Doubt Factory
- By: Paolo Bacigalupi
- Narrated by: Emma Galvin
- Length: 11 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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In this contemporary thriller, National Book Award Finalist and New York Times best-selling author Paolo Bacigalupi explores the timely issue of how public information is distorted for monetary gain, and how those who exploit it must be stopped.
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Engaging
- By Mark on 10-08-15
By: Paolo Bacigalupi
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The Calculating Stars
- A Lady Astronaut Novel
- By: Mary Robinette Kowal
- Narrated by: Mary Robinette Kowal
- Length: 11 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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On a cold spring night in 1952, a huge meteorite fell to earth and obliterated much of the East Coast of the US, including Washington, DC. The ensuing climate cataclysm will soon render the Earth inhospitable for humanity, as the last such meteorite did for the dinosaurs. This looming threat calls for a radically accelerated effort to colonize space and requires a much-larger share of humanity to take part in the process. Elma York’s drive to become the first lady astronaut is so strong that even the most dearly held conventions of society may not stand a chance against her.
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Never achieves lift off
- By Richard Bruno on 10-01-18
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Stations of the Tide
- By: Michael Swanwick
- Narrated by: Oliver Wyman
- Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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The Jubilee Tides will drown the continents of the planet Miranda beneath the weight of her own oceans. But as the once-in-two-centuries cataclysm approaches, an even greater catastrophe threatens this dark and dangerous planet of tale-spinners, conjurers, and shapechangers. From author Michael Swanwick—one of the most brilliantly assured and darkly inventive writers of contemporary fiction—comes a masterwork of radically altered realities and world-shattering seductions.
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Hard to categorize, hard to put down
- By Robert L. on 03-25-12
By: Michael Swanwick
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Perdido Street Station
- By: China Mieville
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 24 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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The metropolis of New Crobuzon sprawls at the center of the world. Humans and mutants and arcane races brood in the gloom beneath its chimneys, where the river is sluggish with unnatural effluent and foundries pound into the night. For a thousand years, the Parliament and its brutal militias have ruled over a vast economy of workers and artists, spies and soldiers, magicians, crooks, and junkies. Now a stranger has arrived, with a pocketful of gold and an impossible demand. And something unthinkable is released.
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Brilliant, wonderful book -- horrible recording
- By James on 08-19-09
By: China Mieville
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Hominids
- The Neanderthal Parallax, Book 1
- By: Robert J. Sawyer
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis, Robert J. Sawyer
- Length: 11 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Neanderthals have developed a radically different civilization on a parallel Earth. A Neanderthal physicist, Ponter Boddit, accidentally passes from his universe into a Canadian underground research facility. Fortunately, a team of human scientists, including expert paleo-anthropologist Mary Vaughan, promptly identifies and warmly receives Ponter. Solving the language problem and much else is a mini-computer, called a Companion, implanted in the brain of every Neanderthal. But it can't help his fellow scientist back in his world, Adikor Huld, when the authorities charge Adikor with his murder.
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Scicen Fiction Can Be Literature
- By Scott on 08-10-09
By: Robert J. Sawyer
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Roadside Picnic
- By: Arkady Strugatsky, Boris Strugatsky, Olena Bormashenko - translator
- Narrated by: Robert Forster
- Length: 7 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Red Schuhart is a stalker, one of those young rebels who are compelled, in spite of extreme danger, to venture illegally into the Zone to collect the mysterious artifacts that the alien visitors left scattered around. His life is dominated by the place and the thriving black market in the alien products. But when he and his friend Kirill go into the Zone together to pick up a "full empty", something goes wrong.
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Gritty, resonant sci-fi classic
- By Ryan on 02-14-13
By: Arkady Strugatsky, and others
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All the Birds in the Sky
- By: Charlie Jane Anders
- Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan
- Length: 12 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Childhood friends Patricia Delfine and Laurence Armstead didn't expect to see each other again after parting ways under mysterious circumstances during high school. After all, the development of magical powers and the invention of a two-second time machine could hardly fail to alarm one's peers and families. But now they're both adults, living in the hipster mecca San Francisco, and the planet is falling apart around them.
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Too twee for me.
- By Amy on 03-13-17
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Ancillary Justice
- By: Ann Leckie
- Narrated by: Adjoa Andoh
- Length: 12 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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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.
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Has some redeeming value, but is deeply flawed
- By Matthew J. Mimnaugh on 08-07-19
By: Ann Leckie
A fascinating view of the potential that our children's children may face if we don't make changes now, this novel was in dire need of a good editor before it first was issued in book form.
After a couple of slow first hours, I listened at one and a half speed and lost little I'm sure as the author spent chapters on, for example, a "Noe" fruit which I learned far too much about only to have it make no real difference in the plot.
But, it was fascinating to listen to the misery that people were living in, struggling to eat, living in dismal slums. The (former) US, which is now agro-corporations, hires these wretched people at minimal wage ( of course), enslaves genetically modified elephants for labor and is essentially the Ugly American.
The 3rd part, however, is much more exciting, and much of the plot is knitted together.
Jonathan Davis is an excellent narrator but he lacked the ability to keep his accents and names straight..one time a person might have an Asian accent, the next sentence he wouldn't. With all the Asian names, it can get a bit confusing for someone unused to the words.
Would I recommend it? Depends. It can be horrific to listen to, depressing and confusing but it IS a dark future novel, not one of peace and joy and life like Star Trek promised us on TV.
You'll have to decide for yourself if you want to spend a credit on an essentially depressing view of our future. I'm glad I did.
300 years from now..A nightmare Future
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Wonderful surprise
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Overall this was an interesting sci-fi book and has won two of the biggest awards:
The Hugo Award and The Nebula Award.
Award Winning
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The events of the story occur in a future version of Thailand. In Gibson-esque fashion, Bacigalupi introduces a motley cast of characters with intertwining stories, a hustling North American "calorie man" desperately looking to make a quick fortune from the discovery of lost foodstuffs, a duty-driven officer of a militarized environmental protection force struggling to hold pestilence out of the Thai kingdom, a genetically engineered sex slave who's despised by a xenophobic population but possesses a strange power, and a once-wealthy Chinese refugee who now must make deals to stay alive.
I enjoyed the calm intensity that Bacigalupi brings to his story, the vivid sense of a declined world in motion, where people are nonetheless surviving and living their daily lives as best they are able. I appreciated that the author didn't try to lead readers by the hand, but left us to soak up his reality and a set of intrigues already underway. The Windup Girl's setting, texture, and level of literacy feel quite different from a lot of other science fiction books, but its images and scenes stuck with me more than most. Perhaps this one will be remembered for painting a stunning vision of the-future-in-the-hazy-distance for 2009, in the same way Neuromancer did for 1984.
Criticisms? Well, some readers have complained that the plot is slow-moving and the characters aren't very involving. The former charge -- arguably true in this case -- rarely bothers me in a good novel, but the latter is hard to deny. The characters, cogs in a complex plot, never quite become sympathetic (we hardly learn anything about the backstory of the American), and the only one I found truly interesting, the vile but mesmerizing Dr. Gibbons, doesn't get much stage time. Still, the book swept me up as its plot strands converged towards a blazing finale, and I would certainly consider Bacigalupi a writer to keep an eye on.
The audiobook reader deserves a lot of praise, with subtle but distinct differences in accent for the various characters.
Original, troubling world creation
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Absolutely terrific
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Don't listen to the detractors, this book ROCKS!
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Great ideas, but doesn't quite deliver
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Not super-impressed so far. Hoping the pace will pick up and the characters will become more interesting.
Good narration - almost disappears into the background, and the reader gets through the rape scene without over-acting. It's hard to pitch that kind of thing just right. Amused by the choice of stock (but subtly rendered) character voices.
We'll see how the rest of it goes.
I'm sure it's unfair to review based on a few chapters, but I'm not sure I'll have the patience to get much further along. Figured some forewarning is warranted.
early impression: well-executed tripe
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Solid but not spectacular
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Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?
The detail to the world and characters almost lost me and yet that made it very difficult to stop listening. The world had gone so wrong all because of mankind.Who was your favorite character and why?
Emiko the windup girl was so real in the story, I had felt sorry for her and her life. Another innocent placed in unacceptable conditions out of her control.Which character – as performed by Jonathan Davis – was your favorite?
Emiko and Anderson tied for first place.Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
The treatment of Emiko was very disturbing her programming of reactions sad. No control in her own life.Any additional comments?
One of the hardest audio books I've listened to. The depth and detail made everything so real at times I wanted to jump ahead. It was a grind sometimes difficult other times I hated to stop. So glad I listened all the way through well worth my time.Amazing detail amazing world
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