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Dark Intelligence
- Transformation, Book 1
- Narrated by: Peter Noble
- Series: Transformation, Book 1
- Length: 15 hrs and 44 mins
- Categories: Science Fiction & Fantasy, Science Fiction
Non-member price: $25.82
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I absolutely love this
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Ian Cormac was raised to adulthood during the end of the war between the human Polity and the vicious arthropoid race the Prador. In Neal Asher's Shadow of the Scorpion, Cormac is haunted by childhood memories of a sinister scorpion-shaped war drone and the burden of losses he doesn't remember. In the years following the war, he signs up with Earth Central Security and is sent out to help either restore or simply maintain order on worlds devastated by Prador bombardment.
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Asher excellence.
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Hilldiggers
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In Neal Asher's Hilldiggers, during a war between two planets in the same solar system - each occupied by adapted humans - what is thought to be a cosmic superstring is discovered. After being cut, this object collapses into four cylindrical pieces, each about the size of a tube train. Each is densely packed with either alien technology or some kind of life. They are placed for safety in three ozark cylinders of a massively secure space station.
Publisher's Summary
One man will transcend death to seek vengeance. One woman will transform herself to gain power. And no one will emerge unscathed....
Thorvald Spear wakes in hospital, where he finds he's been brought back from the dead. What's more, he died in a human vs. alien war which ended a whole century ago. But when he relives his traumatic final moments, he finds the spark to keep on living. That spark is vengeance. Trapped and desperate on a world surrounded by alien Prador forces, Spear had seen a rescue ship arriving. But instead of providing backup, Penny Royal, the AI within the destroyer, turned rogue. It annihilated friendly forces in a frenzy of destruction, and years later it's still free. Spear vows to track it across worlds and do whatever it takes to bring it down.
Isobel Satomi ran a successful crime syndicate. But after competitors attacked, she needed more power. Yet she got more than she bargained for when she negotiated with Penny Royal. She paid it to turn her part AI herself, but the upgrades hid a horrifying secret. The Dark AI had triggered a transformation in Isobel that would turn her into a monster, rapidly evolving into something far from human.
Spear hires Isobel to take him to the Penny Royal AI's last known whereabouts. But he cheats her in the process, and he becomes a target for her vengeance. And as she evolves further into a monstrous predator, rage soon wins over reason. Will Spear finish his hunt before he becomes the hunted?
This is the first volume in a no-holds-barred adventure set in Asher's popular Polity universe.
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What listeners say about Dark Intelligence
Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
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Performance
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- Sean
- 02-08-2018
Entertaining Science Fiction
Great story, enjoyable, interesting, and fantastic world building. If you like science fiction you should like this one.
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- J. D. Hopkins
- 14-07-2018
Excellent book
A very good read, complex character interactions and a good story line. I was pleasantly surprised given I have not read Asher’s books before. Also, refreshing to hear a British accent - thanks Peter.
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- Richard
- 16-11-2017
Great adventure
A really intriguing read, beautifully crafted. Looking forward to listening to the next one now.
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- Michael
- 03-11-2017
Excellent start to a promising series
Another great novel by Asher. A little less action than in his other novels and you don't really see how the multiple plotlines relate until the end of the novel, but one particular corner of Asher's universe is expanded as a result, which I'm sure will factor majorly in the Polity universe as a whole. Make sure you've read the other novels in the Polity before you read this one, or you'll be lost as to the significance of what brief background information is present in this novel, and the full implication of the events in this book on future series. For my money, this entire universe is the closest to Iain Bank's Culture novels that I've come across, so if you're missing that universe you won't regret the time invested here.
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- Amazon Customer
- 25-09-2017
very good reading.
loved it worth a listen kept me entertained for 3days at work lol a must read/ listen.
3 people found this helpful
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- APS
- 27-10-2018
All to alien and foreign to keep up with
Loved the first Neal Asher book I heard, but this was so far in the future with alien / AI minds in constant flux, it did my head-in. An amazing imagination, but I cannot visualise. However, cleaver use of words that gives you an idea of what he is talking about although never really explained.
2 people found this helpful
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- Amazon Customer
- 30-07-2018
Amazing
Great story Great narrator All in all an amazing experience with a good look out for the rest of the series.
2 people found this helpful
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- Petteri
- 28-06-2018
One of Ashers best
Splendid voice acting, with that a lesser story would also work. but the story is great! maybe AIs are bit too human-like and dark AI godlike, but its a minor thing.
2 people found this helpful
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- Amazon Customer
- 29-04-2018
great story
I enjoyed the story. It had a lot of twists and brought everything together at the end with more food for thought.
2 people found this helpful
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- HUGH SHARKEY
- 23-09-2017
Never fulfilled a promising start
A lot of the story is spent explaining events that have previously transpired. This became tedious quickly and I was eventually just getting through it. Not awful, which I know is hardly a recommendation but had the potential to be better.
5 people found this helpful
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- paul
- 02-10-2019
Great book and narrator
Loved this book. Character and story depth amazing. Had me hooked from start. The story stayed strong to the end
1 person found this helpful
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- Craig Thompson
- 29-09-2017
Just ok
The story over all was ok but jumped around a lot and felt fragmented as a result of this.
3 people found this helpful
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- Al
- 02-10-2019
was okay. near the end
not as enjoyable as the Ian Cormac novels. it may get better though. will see
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- Toadjuggler
- 19-06-2019
Boring, disjointed, medicre narration.
I have tried getting further than a third of the way through this twice now and have just had to abandon the enterprise yet again. It's terrible. The storyline is fragmentary and disjointed, the characters are all the same, the scenes don't mesh, the science is cobblers, and the narrator is disengaged and dull. I kept finding myself half-way through a chapter with no idea who was doing what to whom or where. Unfinishable and yet I see that there are two further volumes... I may try another Neal Asher with a different narrator at some point, just to see if it's the writer or the reading that is a fault (it could be either or both) but not today. Or this year.
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