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The Martian Chronicles
- Narrated by: Mark Boyett
- Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins
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The Martian Chronicles
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Summary
Man, was a a distant shore, and the men spread upon it in wave.... Each wave different, and each wave stronger.
Ray Bradbury is a storyteller without peer, a poet of the possible, and, indisputably, one of America's most beloved authors. In a much-celebrated literary career that has spanned six decades, he has produced an astonishing body of work: unforgettable novels, including Fahrenheit 451 and Something Wicked This Way Comes; essays, theatrical works, screenplays and teleplays; The Illustrated Mein, Dandelion Wine, The October Country, and numerous other superb short story collections. But of all the dazzling stars in the vast Bradbury universe, none shines more luminous than these masterful chronicles of Earth's settlement of the fourth world from the sun.
Bradbury's Mars is a place of hope, dreams, and metaphor - of crystal pillars and fossil seas - where a fine dust settles on the great, empty cities of a silently destroyed civilization. It is here the invaders have come to despoil and commercialize, to grow and to learn - first a trickle, then a torrent, rushing from a world with no future toward a promise of tomorrow. The Earthman conquers Mars...and then is conquered by it, lulled by dangerous lies of comfort and familiarity, and enchanted by the lingering glamour of an ancient, mysterious native race.
Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles is a classic work of 20th-century literature whose extraordinary power and imagination remain undimmed by time's passage. In connected, chronological stories, a true grandmaster once again enthralls, delights, and challenges us with his vision and his heart - starkly and stunningly exposing in brilliant spacelight our strength, our weakness, our folly, and our poignant humanity on a strange and breathtaking world where humanity does not belong.
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What listeners say about The Martian Chronicles
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- NICK
- 23-02-21
Prescient
A wonderful set of cameo stories, taking us from the first exploratory missions, through the settlement of Mars to a post-apocalyptic withdrawal. I love the complete freedom of imagination which the Mars setting allows to Ray Bradbury. His is always a light touch, even though several of the stories are tragic or sad. Yes, on occasion I felt that stories were variations on a theme, yet this is not a novel, and the author avails himself of the chance to roam and return. First published in the 1940’s, this book foreshadows themes which today are at the forefront of our concerns: colonisation, the treatment of minorities, the ugliness of ignorance, the desecration of environments, and our perennial violence. Particularly important are the musings on art in the face of bureaucratic philistinism, in one rather disturbing story.The reading, by Mark Boyett, is very fine.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance2 out of 5 stars
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Story1 out of 5 stars
- Reverend Mike
- 04-01-22
ok
it was ok I didn't really like it at all. I wouldn't bother getting it if I was you.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Tony
- 28-02-22
Great in places, dated and some dodgy chapters
Having enjoyed the TV mini series many moons ago I thought I'd revisit this. Some faithful reproduction of this book exists in the TV show but large chunks left out quite rightly as they didn't add anything or were too racist. There's some language in one chapter about the diaspora of the global black population to Mars that I found deeply uncomfortable to listen to.
I keep forgetting the book is positively ancient around 70 years and R Bradbury was highlighting, I believe, the racist attitudes of the time.
Narrations is excellent
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Kindle Customer
- 11-11-22
Perfection
This is my number one audiobook out of 400. The stories are superb and the narration is sublime. I must have listened at least 20 times. You won’t be disappointed with this.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Gillian
- 19-06-24
Martian chronicals
Really great, as good as remember reading reading it years ago. A well thought out and presented book.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- Stephen George
- 28-08-24
Disappointed
I don’t read a lot of fiction, 2 or 3 books a year, as I prefer non-fiction but I was disappointed with this. I didn’t realise it was a “fix-up” novel made up of short stories edited together, so to me it was very disjointed and I couldn’t really get caught up in it.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Uneken Dan
- 14-09-16
Relevant today as it was 70 years ago.
Such a beautiful and sad book, wonderfully read by Mark Boyett. More than ever its message is relevant: humanity on course for destroying whatever it encounters, including itself.
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15 people found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Yibrán Arumir
- 02-12-20
An excellent science-fiction fix-up novel
It's the first Ray Bradbury book I read/listen and it was amazing. The way it describes the way of life of the martians and how humans from Earth come searching for a better life it's both heartwarming and sad at the same time. A great book.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Kindle Customer
- 01-12-20
Unexpectedly fascinating and entertaining
Do not judge a book by its cover (or publication date).
Fascinating. Beautifully narrated.
Bonus: listen to it with a good headset when going to sleep. I promise you'll find it very meditative.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- Amazon Customer
- 02-02-23
Odd..
Struggled with this book, it's well written and the narration is great, but the story itself is odd and and as there are no main characters, it's hard to form a bond.. more like a collection of short stories.
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