The Urth of the New Sun cover art

The Urth of the New Sun

The sequel to 'The Book of the New Sun'

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The Urth of the New Sun

By: Gene Wolfe
Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
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The long awaited audiobook sequel to Gene Wolfe's four-volume classic, The Book of the New Sun.

Listeners return to the world of Severian, now the Autarch of Urth, as he leaves the planet on one of the huge spaceships of the alien Hierodules to travel across time and space to face his greatest test, to become the legendary New Sun or die. The strange, rich, original spaceship scenes give way to travels in time, wherein Severian revisits times and places which fill in parts of the background of the four-volume work, that will thrill and intrigue particularly listeners who enjoyed the earlier books. But The Urth of the New Sun is an independent structure all of a piece, an integral masterpiece to shelve beside the classics, one itself.

 Action & Adventure Adventure Fantasy Fiction Science Fiction Classics
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Critic reviews

“The Urth of the New Sun is a fine coda to what is arguable the finest piece of literature American science fiction has yet produced, the four-volume Book of the New Sun.” —Chicago Sun-Times

“Gene Wolfe's new book soars, falls free, runs like the river that runs through it from universe to universe, between life and death and life again. The groundnote of it all is human pain, so that this fantasy has the weight of vision.” —Ursula K. Le Guin

“Gene Wolfe's four-volume magnum opus, The Book of the New Sun, is one of the modern masterpieces of imaginative literature--an evocation of a world so far in the future that magic and technology, poetry and science, are indistinguishable,a world heavy with time but yet bereft of hope, a world brought to life by Mr. Wolfe's unique blend of slightly archaic diction and ever-surprising vocabulary. Readers familiar with these volumes will find much to enjoy in The Urth of the new Sun.” —The New York Times
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Like all enjoyable tales there lies a skeleton under the characters. And directing the skeleton is a teleology. And within that a theory of metaphysics. Encompassing them all is the ontology. Every character has a place there and a destiny. Severian the Torturer like every exalted individual ie autarchs demi-gods etc had a torturous route to his place. But there was a reason to it. The book explains how and why. It's torturous and inter-dimensional but deep. It's actually very good. GW educates his readers.

Metaphysics of a New Sun

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First the books are amazing. This one not so much. Overdosed on punk steam and christianity.

Not at the same level as the previous three

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Disappointing after reading earlier books in the series. Narrator switch was much worse than the excellent predecessor

Disappointing after reading earlier books in the series

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The narrators voice is old and old fashioned and I really really struggled to enjoy the book.

Great book but I really don't this narrator.

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