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METAtropolis
- Narrated by: Michael Hogan, Scott Brick, Kandyse McClure, Alessandro Juliani, Stefan Rudnicki, John Scalzi
- Length: 9 hrs and 7 mins
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Publisher's summary
Welcome to a world where big cities are dying, dead - or transformed into technological megastructures. Where once-thriving suburbs are now treacherous Wilds. Where those who live for technology battle those who would die rather than embrace it. It is a world of zero-footprint cities, virtual nations, and armed camps of eco-survivalists.
Welcome to the dawn of uncivilization.
METAtropolis is an intelligent and stunning creation of five of today's cutting-edge science-fiction writers: 2008 Hugo Award winners John Scalzi and Elizabeth Bear; Campbell Award winner Jay Lake; plus fan favorites Tobias Buckell and Karl Schroeder. Together they set the ground rules and developed the parameters of this "shared universe", then wrote five original novellas - all linked, but each a separate tale.
Bringing this audiobook to life is a dream team of performers: Battlestar Galactica's Michael Hogan ("Saul Tigh"); Alessandro Juliani ("Felix Gaeta"); and Kandyse McClure ("Anastasia 'Dee' Dualla"); plus legendary audiobook narrators Scott Brick (Dune) and Stefan Rudnicki (Ender's Game).
John Scalzi, who served as Project Editor, introduces each story, offering insight into how the METAtropolis team created this unique project exclusively for digital audio.
Critic reviews
- 2009 Hugo Award nominee, Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form
- 2009 Audie Award nominee, Original Work
“Each story shines on its own; as a group they reinforce one another, building a multifaceted view of a realistic and hopeful urban future.” (Publishers Weekly)
“Scalzi and his contributors/collaborators have created a fascinating shared urban future that each of them evokes with his or her particular strengths.... This stellar collection is a fascinating example of shared world-building.” (Booklist)
"This impressive group of writers imagines what happens when the world moves beyond cities as a locus of human civilization. The range of narrators...brings a unique narrative style to the production. Of the five narrators, all well chosen for the stories, Allessandro Juliani proves to be the best with his rendering of Scalzi's piece." (AudioFile)
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Humans beware. As the robotic revolution continues to creep into our lives, it brings with it an impending sense of doom. What horrifying scenarios might unfold if our technology were to go awry? From self-aware robotic toys to intelligent machines violently malfunctioning, this anthology brings to life the half-formed questions and fears we all have about the increasing presence of robots in our lives.
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Has some bright spots
- By ChrisM. on 10-22-15
By: Daniel H. Wilson, and others
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A Hymn Before Battle
- Legacy of the Aldenata
- By: John Ringo
- Narrated by: Marc Vietor
- Length: 14 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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With Earth in the path of the rapacious Posleen, the Galactic Federation offers help to the backward humans - for a price. You can protect yourself from your enemies, but God save you from your allies!
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Another heads up!
- By Dr. Daniel Chapman on 06-12-14
By: John Ringo
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Singularity Sky
- By: Charles Stross
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 13 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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In the 21st century, the perfection of faster-than-light travel and the rise of a prodigious artificial intelligence known as the Eschaton altered the course of humankind. New civilizations were founded across the vastness of space. Now, the technology-eschewing world known as the New Republic is besieged by an alien information plague. Earth quickly sends a battle fleet - but is it coming to the rescue, or is a sinister plot in motion?
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Gonzo giggleworthy geekitude
- By Noah Smith on 11-11-10
By: Charles Stross
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Lightning Fall
- A Novel of Disaster
- By: Bill Quick
- Narrated by: Johnny Heller
- Length: 18 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Three terrorist attacks are launched from freighters against the United States. Only one fully succeeds, but in the blink of an eye all of the country west of the Rocky Mountains is transformed into the technological equivalent of the 18th century - no electricity, no computers, no electronics of anykind, or any of the amenities of modern life that depend on them. This is the story of ordinary and extraordinary people, high and low, who struggle to survive in a mortally wounded nation, as America's enemies within and without circle for the kill.
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An Equal Opportunity Political Disaster
- By Jan on 07-01-14
By: Bill Quick
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Soon I Will Be Invincible
- A Novel
- By: Austin Grossman
- Narrated by: Coleen Marlo, Paul Boehmer
- Length: 10 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Doctor Impossible, evil genius and diabolical scientist, has tried to take over the world in every way imaginable, but this time is going to be different. He'll have to contend with Fatale, however, a rookie superhero on her first day with the Champions, the world's most famous superteam. She's a patchwork woman of skin and chrome, a gleaming technological marvel built for the next generation of warfare.
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Now that I have you at my mercy. . .
- By Brad W. on 07-02-07
By: Austin Grossman
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Up Against It
- By: M. J. Locke
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 16 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Geoff and his friends live in Phocaea, a distant asteroid colony on the Solar System's frontier. They're your basic high-spirited young adults, enjoying such pastimes as hacking matter compilers to produce dancing skeletons that prance through the low-gee communal areas, using their rocket-bikes to salvage methane ice shrapnel that flies away when the colony brings in a big (and vital) rock of the stuff, and figuring out how to avoid the ubiquitous surveillance motes.
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Very old school SF, in ways good and bad
- By A reader on 06-19-12
By: M. J. Locke
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The Hunted
- By: Rachel Lee
- Narrated by: Therese Plummer
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Journalist Erin McKenna is not only investigating a major defense contractor suspected of complicity in the international sex-slave trade but testifying against them in court. Her world collapses when that same firm buys her newspaper and she's fired without explanation. Her home is ransacked, her computer stolen and she is attacked. FBI agent Jerod Westlake is haunted by the disappearance of his sister long ago, and has dedicated his life to ending the international sex-slave trade. When he discovers Erin wounded on the floor of her apartment, he swings into action to protect her as a witness - and as a woman.
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Should NEVER be billed as "Romantic" Suspense!!!!!
- By M. Davis on 08-16-12
By: Rachel Lee
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Lockstep
- By: Karl Schroeder
- Narrated by: Jonathan Todd Ross
- Length: 13 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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When 17-year-old Toby McGonigal finds himself lost in space, separated from his family, he expects his next drift into cold sleep to be his last. After all, the planet he' s orbiting is frozen and sunless, and the cities are dead. But when Toby wakes again, he' s surprised to discover a thriving planet, a strange and prosperous galaxy, and something stranger still - that he' s been asleep for 14,000 years. Welcome to the Lockstep Empire, where civilization is kept alive by careful hibernation. Here cold sleeps can last decades and waking moments mere weeks.
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A Great Idea, Poorly Served
- By D. M. ROBISON on 04-01-14
By: Karl Schroeder
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Cold City
- Repairman Jack: Early Years Trilogy, Book 1
- By: F. Paul Wilson
- Narrated by: Alexander Cendese
- Length: 11 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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If you've never read a Repairman Jack novel, this is the place to begin. It's 1990. A twenty-one-year-old named Jack has dropped out of college, leaving his old life behind to build a new one in New York City. Manhattan's rough edges are jagged enough to shred any unwary newcomer, but perhaps not one who is determined to stay off the grid, at any cost, in the busiest metropolis on earth. And to do so, he'll have to take jobs of a less than legal nature.
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Fun, as long you don't think too much
- By Andrew Pollack on 01-17-14
By: F. Paul Wilson
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The Lives of Tao
- By: Wesley Chu
- Narrated by: Mikael Naramore
- Length: 12 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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When out-of-shape IT technician Roen wakes up and starts hearing voices in his head, he naturally assumes he’s losing it. He isn’t. As of last night, he has a passenger in his brain - an ancient alien life-form called Tao, whose race crash-landed on Earth before the first fish crawled out of the oceans. Over the millennia his people have trained human heroes to be great leaders, to advance our species at a rate far beyond what it would have achieved on its own. Split into two opposing factions - the peace-loving, but under-represented Prophus, and the savage, powerful Genjix - the aliens have been in a state of civil war for centuries.
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Not funny, just a lot of fighting
- By Julie W. Capell on 09-19-15
By: Wesley Chu
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Darknet
- By: Matthew Mather
- Narrated by: Tom Taylorson
- Length: 10 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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One minute Jake O'Connell is on top of the world, with a beautiful family and bright future as a stock broker in New York; the next it's all ripped away when he's embroiled in a fraud investigation, his childhood friend is murdered, and he finds himself on the run. Dodging the FBI and targeted by the Mob, Jake is thrown into a Wall Street underworld of crypto currencies and autonomous corporations, where he discovers a dark secret setting the world on a path to destruction.
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Good Outline, bad book
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 08-25-16
By: Matthew Mather
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Hunter
- A Thriller
- By: Robert Bidinotto
- Narrated by: Conor Hall
- Length: 11 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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From its first moments, Hunter takes you on a nonstop thrill ride: from the top floor of the CIA, to the marbled corridors of Capitol Hill...from the posh hotels of downtown Washington, to the city's mean, violent streets. It introduces a colorful new hero for our time - and a dazzling heroine every bit his equal. A spy mystery...a crime thriller...a passionate romance: Hunter is a genre-bending novel unlike any you've read. Deviously plotted, filled with vivid characters, and propelled at a breakneck pace.
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Best Vigilante Story since Without Remorse
- By Victor @ theAudiobookBlog dot com on 04-16-16
By: Robert Bidinotto
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I love Scalzi's writing but not this book
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IT'S HARD TO GET MYSTICAL ABOUT YOUR JOB
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Slow Time Between the Stars
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New York Times best-selling and Hugo Award-winning author John Scalzi gift-wraps 15 short takes on the holiday season - interviews with holiday notables, "informational" articles about TV specials and Christmas carols, short stories and poems, and even a couple of nods to Thanksgiving and New Year’s - and puts them all into a stocking stuffer-sized package that makes the perfect gift for friends, family, or yourself.
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Very Scalzian indeed!
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Shoggoths in Traffic and Other Stories
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Traffic is piling up, and strange things are headed your way in this new story collection by World Fantasy Award-winning author Tobias S. Buckell. In these twenty-four stories you’ll find inhabitants of a small town who won’t vaccinate against a zombie plague, a lone sentry keeping motorists from stumbling into something ancient and evil, a man who puts stranded ghosts to rest, an ex-soldier traveling the seas who trades his new life of hardship for a return to swords and blood, and many more tales of speculative fiction.
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What a ride.
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The space-faring Yherajk have come to Earth to meet us and to begin humanity's first interstellar friendship. There's just one problem: They're hideously ugly and they smell like rotting fish. So getting humanity's trust is a challenge. The Yherajk need someone who can help them close the deal. Enter Thomas Stein, who knows something about closing deals. He's one of Hollywood's hottest young agents.
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excellent
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The Android's Dream
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A human diplomat creates an interstellar incident when he kills an alien diplomat in a most unusual way. To avoid war, Earth's government must find an equally unusual object: A type of sheep ("The Android's Dream"), used in the alien race's coronation ceremony. To find the sheep, the government turns to Harry Creek, ex-cop, war hero and hacker extraordinaire.
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Covertly flatulent Scifi at it's best!
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Just One Damned Thing After Another
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Time travel meets history in this Audible Original drama. When Max, a recent ancient history graduate, is offered a mysterious job at St Mary's Historical Research Institute, she quickly comes to realise this isn't any old stuffy research library. At St Mary's the historians don't just study the past - they revisit it. What begins as an academic exploration of events, such as the Peterloo Massacre, takes a dark and dangerous turn, and the historians of St Mary's soon learn that it's not just history they're fighting....
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Might be tough for longtime series fans
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No Kindness Too Soon
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A mysterious radio signal is picked up from a neighboring star system. A group of experts is brought to the floor of the Grand Canyon to investigate its origin and its meaning as the planet suffers one natural disaster after another. Cut off from the rest of the world, they must question everything, including each other, if they hope to solve the mystery.
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The very kindness I needed...
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The B-Team
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Colonial Union Ambassador Ode Abumwe and her team are used to life on the lower end of the diplomatic ladder. But when a high-profile diplomat goes missing, Abumwe and her team are last minute replacements on a mission critical to the Colonial Union’s future. As the team works to pull off their task, CDF Lieutenant Harry Wilson discovers there’s more to the story of the missing diplomats than anyone expected... a secret that could spell war for humanity.
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Obumwe said, Eagan said, Wilson said, Rickney said
- By A Fitts on 01-18-13
By: John Scalzi
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The White Plague
- By: Frank Herbert
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- Unabridged
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A warm day in Dublin, a crowded street corner. Suddenly, a car-bomb explodes, killing and injuring scores of innocent people.From the second-floor window of a building across the street, a visiting American watches, helpless, as his beloved wife and children are sacrificed in the heat and fire of someone else's cause.
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Great book and not a rip off
- By Randall on 11-09-17
By: Frank Herbert
What listeners say about METAtropolis
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Overall
- james
- 10-27-08
Not a wasted credit
(rewritten to exclude apostrophes or quotation marks, which Audible processes incorrectly.)
I like the concept of a shared world and overall this is an entertaining audiobook, but like any anthology some stories are better than others.
In the Forests of the Night by Jake Lake was an extended pseudospiritual/political rant that never answers the most obvious question, i.e. who is Tygre?
I liked Stochasti-city by Tobias Buckell at least in part because it is read by Scott Brick but also because it is entertaining and interesting although the ideas of ex-military street mercs and repurposing abandoned urban real estate were done (better) decades ago by William Gibson.
The Elizabeth Bear story elicited an enthusiastic meh. The characters just were not that compelling and there was not much of a plot to resolve.
John Scalzi is a good writer with a good sense of humor and a lighter tone was needed by this point. His story was funny, but at times it comes across like a 1980s comedy film: slacker hero saves the world through pranking. Not a spoiler, because you see it coming a mile away.
They saved the best for last. To Hie from Far Cilenia by Karl Schroeder is the most thought-provoking of the set. It was a quirky combination of The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson and Spook Country by William Gibson with a heavy dose of Stephensonian fascination with currency. Being a huge fan of both Stephenson and Gibson, it worked for me. The fact that Stefan Ruknicki is a brilliant reader helps too.
The whole collection owes a lot to Gibson, even the various green movements (anybody remember the Sandbenders?), but Gibson was less heavy-handed than these stories. It does put a nice big flashing date stamp on the era at least. Half the science fiction books in the 80s were about nuclear Armageddon, half today are about environmental Armageddon.
Anyway, it serves as a good screenshot of contemporary writing and is worth a listen.
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Overall
- B Daigle
- 12-03-08
Great narration, stories hard to get into
Not much else to say but as this review is titled. The narration was great, but most of the stories were difficult to really get into.
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- Paul
- 10-21-11
A lesson to John Scalzi...
This was introduced as a new idea of tied in short stories set in a world where the United States is on the verge of economic collapse caused by Republican/Conservative political policies and environmental collapse as the earth is ravaged by global warming (once again due to Republican policies).
The idea of a themed set of short stories has been done in Sci Fi before. Such sci-fi classics like Assimov's "I Robot" and Bradbury's "Martian Chronicles", which are now monumental classics in the sci fi world and are often required reading in many schools.
Though these books are now dated an the timelines when these stories were to come to reality have long passed, they are still classics and are still treasured by sci fi enthusiasts. What Scalzi needs to learn from these two classic writers is a lesson of arrogance.
Bradbury and Assimov were not so arrogant as to suggest that their vision was how it was actually going to be, as Scalzi does in his interstory narratives.
Scalzi's world is a utopian vision based on Joseph Baratz model of Kibbutz aggrarian communes, hippy communes, collectivism and outright Marxism disguised as anarchism, with tiny cameras and satellites watching your every move - and we're supposed to think this is an intelligent answer to a new and more ideal world.
You have government counselors assigning you to a pig tending job from a goverment accepted job bank of job openings based on your aptitude... and if you don't accept your social duty and agree to your pig tending job, there was always life outside the walls of your community. Sound familiar? The Soviet Union had such walls - and they assigned their citizens to jobs and one room apartments.
In this book, the Soviet Union is like a capitalist wet dream as in some of the communes in this book, you can't even own personal property! In this world, you can't drive an electric car without people tearing up your car and calling you a "footprinter"... It is such a screwed up place that people are wearing reality augmenting glasses. You have walk or ride a bicycle everywhere. And we're supposed to think "Wow... This is cool!"
Saying that. Based on the setup, the stories were well done. Ignoring the politics, I loved the stories. They were performed by the best narrators and the plots were great. The same stories could have been told with a little less political finger pointing and a little less environazi arrogance. All the same, I look forward to the next book.
So the stories get 3 stars for sheer arrogance and political fingerpointing. Everything else about the stories was 5 star.
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4 people found this helpful
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- CJ
- 08-30-12
Sad, Depressing
Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?
Definitely not! The authors apparently imagine a future filled with violence; where there is not enough anything to go around. That is such a "I bought into the nonsense" point of view! There is enough in this world to go around for thousands of years to come!
What could the authors have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?
Make it more up-beat; more optimistic.
Did METAtropolis inspire you to do anything?
It just made me angry.
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4 people found this helpful
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- Meena
- 04-30-10
A good book
This was the best audiobook I've listened to! Mr Susskind assumes very little physics knowledge but still manages to not talk down to the listener and clearly explain complex concepts. In addition, he has many fascinating, illuminating stories about many of the great luminaries of the physics world, from drinking a beer with Feynman in a small bar in NYC in the 1960s to touring San Francisco's steep hills with Stephen Hawking. This was a great audiobook!
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3 people found this helpful
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- Amazon Customer
- 02-26-13
Great extrapolative science fiction
Great stories set in a common universe, not far from our own in time. You recognize a lot of the metatrends in our society, and it is cleverly thought out 20 years into the future.
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- Kenneth Patterson
- 12-20-20
Fantastic sci-fi!
Some of the best sci-fi I have ever read and is very much award-worthy. I highly recommend it.
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- Dr. Mc.
- 12-10-20
Bravo!
This is engaging, thoughtful, well written science fiction at its best. I can’t gush enough about this book.
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- deborah
- 10-24-20
half great
i really liked 2 of the 4 stories and would like them as full books
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- Josh
- 11-12-19
Thought provoking and hopeful futurism
I found METAtropilis to push the conceptual limit of science fiction; at least according to my experience. The future it depicts is extremely plausible, while also not being anything I’ve considered before. The performance was compelling and enjoyable.
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