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Of Monsters and Mainframes

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Of Monsters and Mainframes

By: Barbara Truelove
Narrated by: Gail Shalan, Emana Rachelle, Chris Devon, Zura Johnson, Charlie Albers, Cary Hite, Eve Passeltiner
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About this listen

Spaceships aren’t programmed to seek revenge—but for Dracula, Demeter will make an exception.

Demeter just wants to do her job: shuttling humans between Earth and Alpha Centauri. Unfortunately, her passengers keep dying—and not from equipment failures, as her AI medical system, Steward, would have her believe. These are paranormal murders, and they began when one nasty, ancient vampire decided to board Demeter and kill all her humans.

To keep from getting decommissioned, Demeter must join forces with her own team of monsters: A werewolf. An engineer built from the dead. A pharaoh with otherworldly powers. A vampire with a grudge. A fleet of cheerful spider drones. Together, this motley crew will face down the ultimate evil—Dracula.

The queer love child of pulp horror and ​classic ​sci-fi, Of Monsters and ​Mainframes ​is a dazzling, heartfelt odyssey that probes what it means to be one of society’s monsters—and explores the many types of friendship that make us human.

©2025 Barbara Truelove (P)2025 Dreamscape Lore Adventure Fantasy Genre Fiction Horror Humorous Literature & Fiction Science Fiction Science Fiction & Fantasy Fiction Heartfelt Greek Mythology Paranormal Mythology
All stars
Most relevant
I loved the premise of this book but when I looked for the Kindle edition I found it isn't available in the UK (something they might want to rectify),

I looked at buying the paperback but it's written in first person present tense which is something I really hate. So that was a no go. For some reason I tried the audio edition and I'm so glad I did. It's brilliant!

Hard sci-fi it certainly isn't, but what it is is fun and quirky with some genuine suspense, a healthy dose of found family and some romance too.

The entire cast were superb bringing each of their characters to life. And I thought first person present tense actually worked very well in this format.

All in all, an easy five stars and very easy to recommend. I just hope there's a sequel.

Quirky, Fun, and Brilliant

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The blurb gave me a false impression of the way the book would unfold and the pace of the story, given that the events described don't actually start coming together until well over 60% of the way through - way too far into the book to still know what's coming. I would have enjoyed it more had it not been spoiled.

In spite of that, I still liked it a lot, and quickly found myself invested in the well-being of this spaceship and it's AI autopilot.

Very enjoyable

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One of my favourite books of all time! This is the second time I’m reading this as I had to get the audiobook to listen to and it didn’t disappoint! The only thing I would have liked is if they’d done the voices of the characters when they were in someone else’s POV but apart from that it was fantastic!
Fantasy and Sci-fi meshed together, this was always going to be a favourite for me.
Demeter is an AI that controls a spaceship that gets passengers from A to B. Or she was until one trip when all her passengers were killed by Dracula no less!
The book is so funny! Demeter is funny without meaning to be, Steward is so done with everyone, Agnus is sarcastic and a bit of a brat, but I love her!
I cant wait to see what Barbara has next up her sleeve!

I didn’t think it would make me laugh so much

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Pros;
It is quirky.
I haven't read anything like it, probably.
Cons;
I didn't find the characters endearing in any way and I genuinely didn't care what happened to them.
It wasn't funny.
It wasn't exciting.
Also, if you must read it then get the physical copy, the binary read out at 5 points is really really annoying, as is listening to the relentless reading out of all the numbers of the character names.

A bit of a disappointment

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