Cities of the Red Night cover art

Cities of the Red Night

The Red Night Trilogy, Book 1

 Preview
Try Premium Plus free
Thousands of incredible audiobooks and podcasts to take wherever you go.
Immerse yourself in a world of storytelling with the Plus Catalogue - unlimited listening to thousands of select audiobooks, podcasts and Audible Originals.
£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Cities of the Red Night

By: William S. Burroughs
Narrated by: Ray Porter
Try Premium Plus free

£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

Confirm Purchase
Pay using card ending in
Switch payment method
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.
Cancel

About this listen

From one of the founders of the beat generation and the 1960s counterculture comes this opening novel of a series available now in audio for the first time. An opium addict is lost in the jungle; young men wage war against an empire of mutants; a handsome young pirate faces his execution; and the world's population is infected with a radioactive epidemic. These stories are woven together in a single tale of mayhem and chaos. In the first novel of the trilogy continued in The Place of Dead Roads and The Western Lands, William Burroughs sharply satirizes modern society in a poetic and shocking story of sex, drugs, disease, and adventure.

©2013 William S. Burroughs (P)2016 Blackstone Audio, Inc. Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Science Fiction

Listeners also enjoyed...

 The Soft Machine: The Restored Text cover art
The Yage Letters cover art
The Glass Bead Game cover art
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas cover art
Heart of Darkness: A Signature Performance by Kenneth Branagh cover art
Monolithic Undertow cover art
The Keep cover art
Against the Day cover art
The Mermaid Latitudes cover art
New Spring cover art
Ascendant cover art
Night Soldiers cover art
Hero Forged cover art
The Paths Between Worlds cover art
William S. Burroughs and the Cult of Rock 'n' Roll cover art
Vigor Mortis: Volume 1 cover art
All stars
Most relevant  
This was my first foray into Burroughs's literary universe, and it's a harsh landing. It starts out strangely, but quickly finds it's footing in a serious of storylines that I really enjoyed. But around two-thirds through it takes a hard turn into completely unhinged territory, which I sort of gave up following.
I really enjoy Burroughs's writing style, and his setting feels very unique. The reading was also great, but in the long run I really struggled with the plot. It's just so confusing, and it's really hard to tell if there even is a 'red thread' to follow through the various jumps and skips.
I'm not sure I would recommend it - At this point I'm enticed to try the two companion books in this trilogy, but it's a hard sell unless you're really into freaky fiction with lots of opiates and freewheeling homosexuality.

Hard to follow

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Ray Porter renders the opening of the red night trilogy with precisely the sort of irreverent panache befitting a narration of Burroughs' trademark brand of storytelling. Alongside the masterful evocation of numerous fantastic and absurd characters, it is ridiculous in the most wonderful way.

The first third of his magnum opus.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
First read the paper version in the early 80's. Ray Porter's narration takes it to a whole other level. Superb.

Mind-bending novel, beautifully narrated.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Back to back Burroughs, after finishing soft machine I couldn't resist starting cities of red night and what could be more intresing than a detective story running parallel to a pirate tale?
The usual ever present ass #ucking and ejaculation remain a Burroughs theme, I was all in and so far so good then book 2 somewhere halfway through and the cut out novel reaper appeared and plunged me into a river of nonsense, pity I was getting along so well too.

And it all started so well

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
If you like gay sex, you'll like this book. Mucho intense and not for the light of heart.

A lot of penises and smells described

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Of course there's no one better to read Burroughs than Burroughs himself. But if you can't get hold of Bill's drawn out reading of his own work then this is certainly the next best thing. Excellently read by Ray Porter, who brings it all to life, and highly recommended by me.
P.s. Though it's book 1 of a trilogy, it does stand up superbly, just by it's self.

Of course...

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I found it to be an unusual and imaginative story, and was read really well. However I found that I didn’t really get into it, so didn’t get a lot from it.

Didn’t get into it

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Ray Porter is absolutely brilliant (again) in one of Burroughs's most readable narratives. Razor sharp and street smart commentary that's still relevant, as well as his usual tropes of sex, drugs and weirdness. Top marks.

great version of a fun

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Ive never heard it read and love the revised book series and especially been reading cities only my 80s copy since maybe cities is my favorite id trying to be objective, realistically concept, shades from all the cut ups, Yager letters,naked lunch nooses and tge hanging all wrp into the investigation narrative chef's kiss. And going 2 be coming back propably soon.

23b bustin

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
An utter nonsense about sex, cocks, anuses and bodily secretions. Verbal diarrhea. Load of gibberish without conclusion or sense. Only listened through partly because of great narration (completely wasted here) and I was looking for something that will tie this nonsense together. But that didn't happen. Guess this happens in the other two parts of the trilogy. But I will never find out as I will try to stay away from it as far as possible.

God only knows what this is about

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews