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Anathem cover art

Anathem

Written by: Neal Stephenson
Narrated by: Oliver Wyman, Tavia Gilbert, William Dufris, Neal Stephenson
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Publisher's Summary

Fraa Erasmus is a young avout living in the Concent of Saunt Edhar, a sanctuary for mathematicians, scientists, and philosophers, protected from the corrupting influences of the "Saecular" world by ancient stone, honored traditions, and complex rituals.

Over the centuries, cities, and governments have risen and fallen beyond the concent's walls. Three times during history's darkest epochs, bloody violence born of superstition and ignorance has invaded and devastated the cloistered mathic community. Yet always the avout have managed to adapt in the wake of catastrophe, becoming out of necessity more austere and less dependent on technology and material things. Erasmus, however, has no fear of the outside - the Extramuros - for the last of the terrible times was long, long ago.

Now, in celebration of the week-long, once-in-a-decade rite of Apert, the fras and suurs prepare to venture outside the concent's gates - opening them wide at the same time to welcome the curious "extras" in.

During his first Apert as a fra, Erasmus eagerly anticipates reconnecting with the landmarks and family he hasn't seen since he was "collected". But before the week is out, both the existence he abandoned and the one he embraced will stand poised on the perilous brink of cataclysmic change.

Powerful unforeseen forces threaten the peaceful stability of mathic life and the established ennui of the Extramuros - a threat that only an unsteady alliance of Saecular and avout can oppose - as, one by one, Raz's colleagues, teachers, and friends are all called forth from the safety of the concent in hopes of warding off global disaster.

Suddenly burdened with a worlds-shattering responsibility, Erasmus finds himself a major player in a drama that will determine the future of everything - as he sets out on an extraordinary odyssey that will carry him to the most dangerous, inhospitable corners of an unfamiliar planet...and far beyond.

©2008 Neal Stephenson (P)2008 Macmillan Audio

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What listeners say about Anathem

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Only for elite hard sci fi lovers

I had to re-listen to the start of this novel ten times to get into the narrative. It's about a 6,000 year old academic/clerical community that has been kept isolated from the surrounding world the whole time. Naturally, such a community will develop philosophical, scientific and critical Ideas in their conversation. This is where the value of this Novel of Ideas lies, in the philosophical, scientific and critical Ideas that drop from time to time out of the narrative. It's 32 hours of challenging hard listening, if you're into hard listening. 32 hours is pretty good value for the money.

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9 people found this helpful

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    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Interesting ideas...

What if we put all the scientists and mathematicians into monasteries, and only took them out, dusted them off, and used their brains when crises hit? "They have an alien spaceship and nukes - we have a protractor." "OK, I'll go get a ruler and a piece of string." The quantum mechanics is a bit dodgy, but the story is a lot of fun!

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3 people found this helpful

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    1 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
  • Eli
  • 2018-03-21

Drivel

Usually I'm a huge fan of Stephenson, but this is just complete garbage. Lots of words strung together, going on and on without any purpose or meaning. Like finding a teenage diary or a stream of consciousness blog of a monk

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3 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Occasionally interesting dialogue... I guess...

The author has built worlds, and with them, quite a few new terms/words, which can initially be a bit tough to navigate, and, although you come to incorporate them into your vocabulary, many of them never reveal themselves to have been necessary (or even useful) for anything more than world building.

Anathem finds its characters in near constant philosophical dialogue, which can occasionally be interesting... Or present glimmers of hope that there would be some memorable twists. But no.. overall, the story is fairly boring, and the protagonist's actions inconsequential. Leaves me unsatisfied.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

slow burn, searing mark

The work of a master at full stride, this story is a water powered clockwork of time-space dialating imagination.

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1 person found this helpful

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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Hmmm…

Very…very… very…dry. Very…very…very…slow. Storyline had so much potential but didn’t deliver.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Another insightful epic

Neal Stephenson crafts another thought provoking and witty epic. It constantly amazes me how his insights often become prophetic. 5 stars for story!
William Dufris and company excellently narrate this tale. I bought this novel when it first came out in paperback and loved it so much that the audiobook was purchased so I could enjoy it during chore time 😀. All the narrators we excellent, but Dufris stood out, for me, as an excellent voice for Stephenson's style. 5 stars for the performance.
The one thing that would be an improvement would be a PDF of the diagrams and supplementary material for the math geeks like me. 4 stars, overall, since I was not able to reference their diagrams and appendixes (appendices?) without digging out my old paperback from a box in my attic.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Amazing depth

Don’t sleep on this book. It’s slow, but conveys ideas that we’ve though about for our entire existence.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

not sure why this book is so popular

the overall story is good but all of the talking through theoretical topics and sometimes meaningless chatter of the characters gets pretty annoying.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
  • J
  • 2023-04-06

Best Audiobook I've heard in a Long Time

Story as amazing as the first time I read this book, and the narration is top notch. For such a complex title, it really came accross as approachable and exciting. I'm a huge Stephenson nerd and was super happy with this production. Highly recommended.

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