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Noumenon

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Noumenon

By: Marina J. Lostetter, Madeleine Rose
Narrated by: Christopher Ragland, Laurence Bouvard, Madeleine Rose
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About this listen

With nods to Arthur C. Clarke's Rama series, the real science of Neal Stephenson's Seveneves and a touch of Hugh Howey's Wool, this is a powerful tale of space travel, adventure, discovery and humanity.

In 2088 humankind is at last ready to explore beyond Earth's solar system, and astrophysicist Reggie Straifer knows where we should go. He's discovered a distant anomalous star that appears to defy the laws of physics. It could be a weird natural phenomenon, or it could be alien.

Convoy 7's mission to discern the nature of the star's strange qualities will use vast resources and take centuries, so in order to maintain the genetic talent of the first crew, clones will be used for the expedition. But a clone is not a perfect copy, and each generation has its own quirks, desires, and neuroses.

As the centuries pass, their society changes and evolves, but their mission remains the same: to reach Reggie's mysterious star and explore its origins - and implications.

A mosaic of discovery, Noumenon successfully examines aspects of the human condition with a touch that is both thrilling and poignant.

©2017 Little Lost Stories (P)2017 HarperCollins Publishers Fiction Genre Fiction Hard Science Fiction Military Psychological Science Fiction Space Exploration Space Opera Technothrillers Thriller & Suspense Time Travel Interstellar Thriller Technology Exciting

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Critic reviews

‘NOUMENON is a grand interstellar quest that marries intimate detail with the sweep of social change and discovery across generations. I was enthralled’
Yoon Ha Lee, author of Ninefox Gambit

‘A striking adventure story that could hold a galaxy in its scope’
KIRKUS REVIEWS

‘An ambitious and stunning debut’
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
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Loved it! Wished it would never end as I fell in love with all the characters, especially ICC. Hope there is a sequel.

Fantastic read!

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So many ideas about social structures and how that will resolve at the interpersonal level. So that is great to read and think about, but they are tarnished by by view that they are not really possible or realistic. Still it has the big picture about learning and expansion and what that means to people. The way to solve the long time scales is one of those clever but unrealistic ideas. So it is forgiven due to it being required to make the plot work at all. Not great, but good enough to get me to buy the next book and still be looking forward to it.

Interesting ideas but perhaps not realistic.

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This was enjoyable though there's a slight tweeness at times. I think it would be tighter with less obvious spelling out of some situations. But then it also deals really well with a long term societal change and how slight tweaks in a culture can have drastic results.

One of the nicest AIs you'll meet, but the humans

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Follows a central them, but really a collection of short stories along the theme. They vary - some better than others. Never really came together and when you do connect with a character... it’s the end of that short section

Patchy - more short stories than novel

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Short version: there is a sequel and I'm not bothered in the slightest.

Long version: This was a good listen but a weak execution of some interesting ideas.

I won't fault the audio experience at all, delivery was good and clear (though I was annoyed that cloned generations had the same accents as their originals, done to help clarity but narratively unlikely).

The premise was great but the execution was weak. There was a lot of telling and less showing. We saw crises unfold but the reasons behind the crises were listed off rather than beong experienced in the story. And ideas of nature vs nurture were under explored.

Really liked the mid point and finale plots but by the last quarter of the book I just wasn't engaged.

Overall just a bit bland - may be better reading it.

Good performance of some untapped potential

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Following the different generations of a convoy of human clones tasked with travelling to a star and back, Noumenon is the story of a society changing for better and for worse. It's also the story of ICC, the Inter Convoy Computer changing from an expert system with a personality overlay, to a sentient AI whose primary goal is the success of the mission.

In one sense the novel lacks coherence and getting to know characters is impeded by them dying off, but the constant of ICC pulls that together and gives us someone to root for.

I enjoyed it and will read the succeeding novels in the trilogy.

A superbly entertaining story

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if you love millennia spanning space operas, you can't miss this, feels like losing a friend when it's over

space opera

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This is a very unusual story with each chapter being of a different time period. Conceptually strong with a big dose of socio-political content - really quite a commentary on the challenges of our societies today. It took a while to get going but I liked it a lot, and will read the inevitable sequel. The narration was excellent.

Thought provoking story, epic in scale, well narrated

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I really liked this story, some very goodnand new ideas (to me anyway)
looking forward to next installment

great multi generational space story

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I love that each chapter was essentially a mini story within the main plot. Lots of great concepts through out the book.

Great story, not too long not too short.

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