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Vicarious

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Vicarious

By: Rhett C. Bruno
Narrated by: Wil Wheaton, Katherine McNamara
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About this listen

Award-winning performers Wil Wheaton (Star Trek: The Next Generation, The Big Bang Theory, and Ready Player One audiobook) and Katherine McNamara (Shadowhunters, The Stand, CW’s Arrow) bring this mind-bending, deeply imagined sci-fi tale to life.

The real world is only where you breathe....

In High Earth, digital entertainment is everything. Shows. Virtual worlds. Simulations - there’s something for everybody in a city where working for a living has been rendered obsolete by technological advancements. Even a short walk outside to visit with others is no longer necessary. Just load into the network and you can be with anyone, anywhere.

For Asher Reinhart, nothing compares to Ignis; a live reality show that pushes human beings to their very extremes. As a volunteer director, Asher closely monitors the lives of those living on an interstellar ark, believing they're the last of humanity.

But when it's determined that the life of the show’s brightest star, Mission, must be put in danger to boost declining ratings, Asher is forced to choose: the show he loves or the woman whose existence has been the focus of his attention since the day he was born.

From number-one Audible best-selling author and Nebula Award nominee Rhett C. Bruno comes a story about the power of human connection. The Truman Show meets Ready Player One in a novel perfect for fans of Hugh Howey, Kim Stanley Robinson, and Michael Crichton.

©2021 Rhett C. Bruno (P)2021 Podium Audio Adventure Cyberpunk Dystopian Fantasy Fiction Hard Science Fiction Science Fiction Technothrillers Thriller & Suspense Technology Thriller

Critic Reviews

"This perceptive take on the reality-TV-in-the-future premise deserves boffo ratings" (Kirkus Reviews)

"A truly unique sci-fi experience...Mission's story is both heartbreaking and triumphant, and the growth Asher shows from start to finish blew me away." (Nicholas Sansbury Smith, NYT best-selling author of Hell Divers)

“Vicarious is 2001: A Space Odyssey meets The Truman Show. A riveting take on man’s inhumanity to man". (Scott Sigler, number one New York Times best-selling Author of Earthcore)
All stars
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still not a fan of the changing between narrator . especially when a voice for a character has been set buy one voice and then the narrator changes and the same character is now another voice . other then that. I did enjoy both voices on there own . and the story was enjoyable.

story was great

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i struggled to get into it to start but somewhere about a third of the way through I really started to enjoy the story. I hope there will be another book in this series.

next part please

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I loved this book, it's everything I wanted in a fun sci-fi VR adventure.

Fantastic!

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I've seen both Katherine and Wil on screen, but I wasn't sure if they could pull of an audiobook. I listen to this while I work and I find their performances to be juxtaposing each other. Wil packed a firm, controlled performance while Kat brought a more human element to Mission. Would love to see these two collab again.

Performances are pheromonal

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I wasn’t sure what to expect, but the premise sounded like something I have enjoyed before. It could have been too young adult but thankfully reached above that for me.

It was quickly engaging with the two worlds of Asher and Mission, characters were well developed and presented by the narrators. The Igneous world reminded me of the Silo series by Hugh Howey which I loved, and there’s a familiar voyeur structured society where one is entertainment for another. The haves and the have nots built around virtual reality, all of which is very effective sci fi with heart, I found it creative and a very enjoyable listen that moved at a good pace and kept me wanting to delve deeper.

I think Mr Bruno should write more like this and “The Circuit” and use similar narrators, Will Wheaton and Katherine McNamara were perfect in this and Jefferson Mays in The Circuit made the experience so real, personal and engaging. He is so under utilised and one of the very best for space opera and sci fi in my opinion.

Thoroughly enjoyable!

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I have to hand it to the author, the ending was anything but predictable. I wish there had been more resolution to the story though. Felt a bit ripped off there. Also, one other annoyance was that the math seemed to be off in the timeliness, unless I missed something. Mission is the 14,000th or so person on board the Ignus, which has a population cap set at 1,000 people, yet they're celebrating the 50th anniversary, but it also feels like a well established society. Couldn't make sense of it.

Not perfect, but definitely enjoyable!

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This is a cracker of a book. Perfect for fans of sci-fi, VR, dystopian fiction. It took a little while to get in to but when then an event 1/3 way through lights the fuse, and the tension builds to the point where the last third of the book is un-put-down-able. Hold on tight.

A Bottle Rocket!!

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This is a great story of a dystopia disguised as a utopia. Rhett does a great job of transforming the reader’s relationship to characters as they learn and evolve through the story. The relationship between the two main characters is an intriguing one and is portrayed well by the two voice actors.

Brilliantly done

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Thank God It's Finished! This was a real struggle to get through. Maybe I'm the wrong demographic but I just didn't find the concept of future Big Brother very interesting at all. I really enjoyed the narration though.

TGIF

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