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Lucifer's Hammer cover art

Lucifer's Hammer

By: Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle
Narrated by: Marc Vietor
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Publisher's Summary

The gigantic comet had slammed into Earth, forging earthquakes a thousand times too powerful to measure on the Richter scale, tidal waves thousands of feet high. Cities were turned into oceans; oceans turned into steam. It was the beginning of a new Ice Age and the end of civilization.

But for the terrified men and women chance had saved, it was also the dawn of a new struggle for survival - a struggle more dangerous and challenging than any they had ever known....

©1985 Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle (P)2009 Audible, Inc.

Critic Reviews

"Take your earthquakes, waterlogged condominiums, swarms of bugs, colliding airplanes, and flaming what-nots, wrap them up and they wouldn't match one page of Lucifer's Hammer for sweaty-palmed suspense." ( Chicago Daily News)
"Massively entertaining." ( Cleveland Plain-Dealer)

What listeners say about Lucifer's Hammer

Average Customer Ratings
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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Epic tale of disaster and survival

Read this book in the late 70’s. Was a pleasure to revisit it in audio.

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

fantastic

if the earth ever bites a comet, well I know how to make do. excellent story.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
  • Sam
  • 20-03-2023

One of the best End of the World stories ever

The amount of research and accuracy on this novel is fantastic. One of the best!

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

Lucifers Hammer

The best SCFI book that I ever read is transformed into a brilliant audiobook, a great read and a better listen. 5 stars

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

A Classic for a reason

Any additional comments?

This book is getting a tad long in the tooth, being first published in 1977. But age has not removed the shine from this classic apocalyptic novel. If anything I feel that the age of the book adds to the story and in places makes for some hilarious reading.

All this aside Lucifer's Hammer delivers a story of a world that is in the path of a comet. Mankind knows it is coming close, just not how close. The start of the book is used well in informing the reader about comets and the science of predicting their paths. Our main characters are well grounded and we get a good feel for them.

Then the world comes to an end and Armageddon is let loose upon the earth. We watch the survivors struggle to come to terms with their new reality. It is fascinating to see how they change. Some rise to the challenge and some lapse into depravity. The plot is not a new one nor does it comes as surprise. But what makes it a truly great read is how well the author tells his tale. Also the thought is always in the back of your mind that what you are reading may one day be your reality, which in itself is truly scary stuff.

This book did leave with one question. Why the hell was it no called hammer fall.

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2 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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A pretty good end of the world story

The narration is really good and this old time classic follows all the principles of a bloody good story with structure, interesting characters, a plot, descriptive settings, the conflict and the resolution.

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

Looooong.

Long. Sad. Language outdated. Worth rewriting by a modern writer. Could be an Epic both literary and Hollywood.

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

Terrible - The only book I have ever not finished

I am a calm person.

This book made me angry, I actually swore out a loud though shear frustration at the painful progression and boring characters. I found myself wishing the comet would come sooner just to wipe them out...it would be a kindness....at least to the listener.

I only gave it one star because I don't know how to give it zero.

Not only is this book not worth the money but I would pay aliens to delete the bits I have not been able to erase from my memory with beer.

Now I am stuck with it in my library and to this day I still get an eye twitch when I see the title....oh it can be that bad right? Wrong....it can, it takes talent to be this bad.

Mike.

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

Boring, boring, boring

Slow as buggery, piss weak storyline, too many players who all do nothing. A total waste of time, how do I get my money back?

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