It’s a classic for a reason. This was a great reading of a book every Sci-Fi fan should read. Certainly not the first incarnation of rogue AI, but definitely one of the most important early on. I heard somewhere that HAL was so named by taking IBM and shifting each letter one to the left in the alphabet. Hmmmm…
I think book three is my favorite of the series. They pay-off is well worth it as you travel down the river through all the worlds, bouncing from story to story and discovering how they’re all intertwined.
Book two of the series starts to dial in the main plot line, while still expanding the universe and taking you on a great ride. The first book is good, but this book is great.
I consider Ender’s Game to be the single greatest leadership book ever written. Yet it’s sci-fi. And about children. WTF?
Once upon a time I aspired to be a leader like Ender. After experimenting with different leadership styles, I realized that style works best in a hierarchical structure and even then is a bit dated as far as management theory goes. Regardless, I love the book and still think the both the character of Ender and the whole novel are top-notch. It’s on my must-read list.
All of these reviews are for the Stephen Fry recording, not the Jim Dale version on Audible. That version on Audible is complete shit.
I downloaded the Fry version years ago—around 2007—and recently purchased the Dale version of book 1 in 2018. Jim Dale’s reading was so awful I couldn’t tell the difference between Dumbledore and Hermione. Yes, it was so bad, a 10-year-old girl and a 109-year-old man sounded nearly identical. And yes Albus Dumbledore is 109 in book one.
With that out of the way, let’s talk Potter.
I believe the reason this series is such a part of the modern culture is because it does two things that very few other authors ever do: 1) the plot lines and the main characters grow up and become more serious in each book and 2) no plot lines are recycled from book to book. All the rest of the elements have been done before, yet even these are done well (or at least not overdone).
If you have never read Harry Potter—or haven’t read it in a while—I highly recommend jumping into the series with the Stephen Fry version, and opening the door to the wizarding world.