Polostan cover art

Polostan

Bomb Light, Book 1

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Polostan

By: Neal Stephenson
Narrated by: January LaVoy
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About this listen

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of TERMINATION SHOCK, the first installment in a monumental trilogy: an expansive historical epic of intrigue and international espionage, presaging the dawn of the Atomic Age.

The first installment in Neal Stephenson’s Bomb Light cycle, Polostan follows the early life of the enigmatic Dawn Rae Bjornberg. Born in the American West to a clan of cowboy anarchists, Dawn is raised in Leningrad after the Russian Revolution by her Russian father, a party line Leninist who re-christens her Aurora. She spends her early years in Russia but then grows up as a teenager in Montana, before being drawn into gun running and revolution in the streets of Washington, D.C. during the depths of the Great Depression. When a surprising revelation about her past puts her in the crosshairs of U.S. authorities, Dawn returns to Russia, where she is groomed as a spy by the organization that later becomes the KGB.

Set against the turbulent decades of the early 20th century, Polostan is an inventive, richly detailed, and deeply entertaining historical epic, and the start of a captivating new series from Neal Stephenson.

©2024 Neal Stephenson (P)2024 HarperCollins Publishers Science Fiction Espionage Russia
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This is a fantastic book. I have read a lot of Neal Stephenson. I enjoy his style and the nerdy exposition. I love that he finds interesting corners of culture in his books to explore, whether it's treasure diving, currency, cryptography or in this case Polo and Nuclear Bombs. I also admire that he writes female lead characters and makes them interesting.

This book has a really good balance of exposition and story. The characters are interesting. The historical events are real and written in believably. He does love his WW2 generals to be in the fray.

Really looking forward to the next book.

A great start to an interesting angle on history

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Can’t wait for book 2, fascinating time period, peopled with a cast of wonderful colourful characters. Excellent narration.

Great Read

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I loved all the characters and time period and places that this story is set in

Driven by interesting characters and circumstance. I loved it

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