The Girl and the Stars

The Book of the Ice, Book 1

De: Mark Lawrence

Narrado por: Helen Duff

A stunning new epic fantasy series following a young outcast who must fight with everything she has to survive, set in the same world as Red Sister.

In the ice, east of the Black Rock, there is a hole into which broken children are thrown. Yaz's people call it the Pit of the Missing, and now it is drawing her in as she has always known it would.

To resist the cold, to endure the months of night when even the air itself begins to freeze, requires a special breed. Variation is dangerous, difference is fatal. And Yaz is not the same.

Yaz's difference tears her from the only life she's ever known, away from her family, from the boy she thought she would spend her days with, and has to carve out a new path for herself in a world whose existence she never suspected. A world full of difference and mystery and danger.

Yaz learns that Abeth is older and stranger than she had ever imagined. She learns that her weaknesses are another kind of strength and that the cruel arithmetic of survival that has always governed her people can be challenged.

©2020 Mark Lawrence (P)2020 Penguin Audio

Can be long at times, but enjoyable story.

I found this book to be a bit of a struggle, says between listen. But I enjoy the world Abeth. It a good story, and it was enjoyable.

Amazing Narrator

This book was awesome and the narrator did a great job with all the voices. I hope she does the next book.

Read the physical books

Coming here after the Book of the Ancestor trilogy it's great fun to explore the world and lore from a completely different angle.

The narration makes it very hard to follow, however. The words are low and hard to hear now and then, but the killer blow is how difficult it is to tell the characters apart from each other, from the non-dialogue text, and sometimes, from themselves. The main character changes accent and intonation several times, and once even within the same chapter. It really scrambles the character up. At one point a male character, who speaks with male voice acting, drops the gender acting part half way through the conversation, and for a while the story carries on as if the protagonist is speaking the lines, confusingly, until I figure out from context again it isn't who I think it is that's speaking. This just goes to show how difficult it really is to voice audiobooks with many characters, while keeping them separate enough via only voice, for us listeners to follow the story with ease and immersion .

Read the physical books. The cover art is nice, and there may even be pretty maps on the inside.

Loved it

The story is wonderful and the narrator is beyond wonderful. I am also very happy with the author as his writing is amazing.

Read the Grey Sisters First

I enjoyed the book but I think it's because I was already familiar with the author's other series which takes place in the same world. The narrator was decent. There were some inconsistency over time with the various characters but overall I enjoyed the reading. If you aren't familiar with the Grey Sisters series then you probably won't enjoy this book. If you have read/heard the other series and liked them give this one a chance.

Great story with perfectly suited narrator

This book kept my attention first sentence to last. The writing is beautiful with certain phrases turned perfectly- for example, “Some hurts are too large for our hearts to span-they have to enter by degrees- like a knife into its wound.” The narrator brought this work alive so much that it felt-real. I am starting the second book now with high hopes!

good but not great

The book seems like a great start to a series but had some parts that dragged. I had trouble with the keeping track of the characters for at least half the book, I think there were too many with odd names introduced too quickly. When reading a book it is easier to deal with this but in an audio book I find it very hard. Overall good story that lays foundation for more books.

Mark Lawrence Does It Again

I listen to a lot of books and seemingly always have several ready to go, on pre-order, or in my wishlist. There are probably 4 or 5 authors that when they release a book, it goes straight to the top of my listening list. Mark Lawrence is one of those, though I have to admit I couldn’t make it through One Word Kill or the Impossible Times series. More to do with my not liking the narrator than the story. The Girl and the Stars once again proved my faith in Mr. Lawrence.

I found the underworld of this book fascinating, and the main character Yaz made you feel for her plight. Having been thrown into a hole in the ground, she must quickly adapt to her surroundings before becoming victim to monsters both human and machine. The story of her and her friends survival, and discovering the underground lost city keeps the book rolling.

Overall, I enjoyed the book all the way through. The narration from Helen Duff was solid.

A good beginning

Mark Lawrence tells beautiful stories. His frozen planet is lovingly constructed, and each paragraph carefully, artfully breathed into life. After reading The Book of the Ancestor trilogy, I should have known what to expect, but the storytelling mastery still came as a worst welcome surprise.

Helen Duff is no less brilliant as she delivers the tale in a soothing, measured cadence. Ironically, this calmness seems to make the intense fighting sequences even more impactful. Huh.

Definitely looking forward to reading and hearing book two.

He's done it again

Much like he did with The Red Queen's War trilogy, Lawrence has expanded the world of a previous trilogy and delivered something totally different but highly engaging. I think this trilogy may be shaping up to be my favorite of his so far, and I've read all his books. Give it a try, you don't have to read any of his other books to jump right into this trilogy.