THE ORIGINAL (audiobook) by Brandon Sanderson and Mary Robinette Kowal

 




Published in September of 2020 by Recorded Books.

Read by Julia Whelan.
Duration: 3 hours, 30 minutes.
Unabridged.

Brandon Sanderson is one of the go-to names in science fiction and fantasy in the 21st Century. He has been nominated for or has won just about all of the major awards. Mary Robinette Kowal has similar credentials. Together, they created this audiobook-exclusive novella.

This audiobook clocks in at 3 hours and 30 minutes, but it is an action-packed 3 hours and 30 minutes that takes the listener into an all-too-plausible (mostly) and creepy world.

Mary Robinette Kowal
The Original begins with Holly Winseed waking up in a hospital. She has no idea why she is there and gets very confusing answers from the staff. Soon, she realizes that she is a cloned copy of herself.

Winseed lives in a future filled with nano-technology, including in the human bloodstream. The tiny robots keep people healthy and young. 

It also allows the government to access your mind. Then, they can clone the body and, if things go well, unite the new body with the old mind. This is rarely done, though. The government reserves the right to do this when the original person has committed a heinous crime and needs to be tracked down. The idea is simple - who knows how you think better than you? 

The plot is interesting, but for me the setting was even better. This imagined world takes CGI to another level - enabled by the nano-technology in their bloodstreams. It is well worth your time to listen to this audiobook just for that - the story within their created universe is a bonus.

I rate this audiobook 5 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: THE ORIGINAL (audiobook) by Brandon Sanderson and Mary Robinette Kowal.


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