The Ophiuchi Hotline
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Narrated by:
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Gabra Zackman
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By:
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John Varley
About this listen
The remnants of humanity that survived relocated to the moon and other planets. But they are not alone in their struggle - someone or something, somewhere deep in space, is sending them advanced scientific data via the Ophiuchi Hotline. And by the 25th century, the technological gifts from the hotline - especially its biological and medical solutions - have created a world unlike any ever known or imagined.
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Roger Torraway watched in horror as the monster lurched, toppled over and died. Project Man Plus had gone suddenly and drastically wrong. The race to colonize Mars was too important, too costly, and America was already too committed, for plans to be scrapped. They would have to make a new Martian. And Roger Torraway was it, candidate for the endless surgery, operation after painful operation, that would enable him to survive on that faraway planet.
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More timely now than ever
- By Sandy R on 06-28-10
By: Frederik Pohl
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A World Out of Time
- By: Larry Niven
- Narrated by: Tom Weiner
- Length: 7 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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After more than two hundred years as a corpsicle, Jaybee Corbell awoke in someone else’s body and under threat of instant annihilation if he made a wrong move while they were training him for a one-way mission to the stars. But Corbell bided his time and made his own move. Once he was outbound, where the society that ruled Earth could not reach him, he headed his starship toward the galactic core.
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Do you know how people get old?
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 11-13-12
By: Larry Niven
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Diving into the Wreck
- Diving Series, Book 1
- By: Kristine Kathryn Rusch
- Narrated by: Jennifer Van Dyck
- Length: 9 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Boss loves to dive historical ships, derelict spacecraft found adrift in the blackness between the stars. Sometimes she salvages for money, but mostly she's an active historian. She wants to know about the past--to experience it firsthand. Once she's dived the ship, she'll either leave it for others to find or file a claim so that she can bring tourists to dive it as well. It's a good life for a tough loner, with more interest in artifacts than people.
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NOT Clive Cussler in Space
- By W. S. on 03-18-10
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Variable Star
- By: Robert A. Heinlein, Spider Robinson
- Narrated by: Spider Robinson
- Length: 11 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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At his death in 1988, Robert A. Heinlein left a legacy that almost single-handedly defined modern science fiction. But one of Heinlein's masterpieces was never finished. In 1955, he began work on Variable Star, a powerful and passionate tale of two young lovers driven apart by pride, power, and the vastness of interstellar time and space. Now, the Heinlein estate has authorized award-winning author Spider Robinson to expand his outline into a full-length novel. And the result is vintage Heinlein.
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Spider WHO
- By Randall on 04-25-09
By: Robert A. Heinlein, and others
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Invasion
- Alien Invasion, Book 1
- By: Sean Platt, Johnny B. Truant
- Narrated by: Ray Porter
- Length: 8 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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They are coming. The countdown has begun. First visible only as blips on a telescope image, the discovery of objects approaching from Jupiter's orbit immediately sets humanity on edge. NASA doesn't even bother to deny the alien ships' existence. The popular Astral space app (broadcasting from the far side of the moon and accessible by anyone with Internet) has already shown the populace what is coming.
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"terrible, absolutely terrible"
- By Andre M. Nel on 08-02-18
By: Sean Platt, and others
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Seveneves
- A Novel
- By: Neal Stephenson
- Narrated by: Mary Robinette Kowal, Will Damron
- Length: 31 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.
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Odd narrator choice
- By Josh Mitchell on 05-30-15
By: Neal Stephenson
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Building Harlequin's Moon
- By: Larry Niven, Brenda Cooper
- Narrated by: Tom Weiner
- Length: 15 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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The first interstellar ship, John Glenn, fled a solar system populated by rogue AIs and machine/human hybrids, threatened by too much nanotechnology, and rife with political dangers. The John Glenn’s crew intended to terraform the nearly pristine planet Ymir in hopes of creating a utopian society that will limit intelligent technology, but by some miscalculation they have landed in the wrong system.
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Excellent - but needed to be twice as long
- By DAVID on 10-11-12
By: Larry Niven, and others
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The Year's Top Short SF Novels 5
- By: Cory Doctorow, Ken Liu, John P Murphy, and others
- Narrated by: Tom Dheere, Nancy Linari
- Length: 15 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Short novels are movie-length narratives that may well be the perfect length for science fiction stories. This audio collection presents the best-of-the-best short science fiction novels published in 2014 by current and emerging masters of this vibrant form of storytelling.
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Narrator sounds like Tony Danza
- By Sean on 03-05-16
By: Cory Doctorow, and others
What listeners say about The Ophiuchi Hotline
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- Robert
- 11-01-09
really enjoyed this
There world of this novel is rich and plausible; I wish there were more stories set in this place. The mysteries of the hotline, the invaders, interesting exploration of culture, cloning (a wonderful twist on this theme), gender, biomechanics, ethics and more, made this a fun read. I'd definitely recommend this one.
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- Ruth Ann Orlansky
- 10-21-10
What a romp of a story!
I have read this book over and over for about the last 20 years, and have enjoyed it each and every time. So imagine my delight when I discovered that Audible had it in an unabridged version. And what a version! I found the narrator's version of the story as delightful as my own silent reading of it. As to the story itself, I loved the believability of the characters and the descriptions of the various planetary environments. I felt myself living in each of these environments as the story about it was told. I really hated to have the story end. This book is for those who don't mind reading a novel in which all sorts of "improbable" things such as memory recordings, living on airless asteroids, searching for small black holes to sell, etc. seem quite achievable and believable. In other words, for those who are not literal-minded and want to stretch their minds and imaginations by reading something that is just plain FUN.
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- Selena
- 10-04-17
An odd one.
I have a really hard time explaining this book without giving things away. Let's just say it's a wild, crazy, and often confusing ride into the future, with accidental time travel. Also, whales are smarter than us.
But not in the satirical, Douglas Adams' dolphins' thanks-for-all-the-fish kind of way, but in a "I decided to do LCD, peote, bath salts, and a bottle of moonshine" kind of way.
It's just. Odd. Hence, I'm giving it a middle-ground rating. It had really good parts, and really makes one think about certain aspects of life and futility of society, but also...really really weird. Sort of in an Asminov, Bladerunner kind of way...except...not as approachable? I dunno. Like I said, this ones hard to pin down without spoiling a lot.
Also, lots of sex scenes. But involving people who have...experimented with their own anatomies. Not mutants though. Or at least, not mutants the way we usually think of them?
All I can say is if you don't have any other books you're excited over or pressing matters to attend to, this could be an interesting experimental listening. Otherwise, save it for when the mood for something completely unexpected but NOT the Spanish Inquisition strikes you.
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- Marshall I. Cohen
- 10-14-11
I loved it
This was as good as the Titian series. It continues with the post invasion world line.
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- Ocean State Prime
- 03-31-19
still pretty good after all these years
I remember liking this book when I read it as a new paperback. Forty years later it doesn't seem dated. However, I remembered the ending, which maybe took something away from it this time around. I felt the ending was deus ex invader and therefore a letdown. I could have done without the sex scenes too, which maybe in 1977 were edgy, but now were something I wanted to skip. Zackman did a fine job as the narrator.
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- E. Woodford
- 05-03-16
Not one for the kids
Interesting story, but seems rushed at the end. Characters developed nicely, then it just ends.
Lots of sex in the story. So not one for listening to in the car with younger kids.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Michael G Kurilla
- 09-04-21
Humanity as refugees within the solar system
John Varley's The Ophiuchi Hotline offers a novel perspective on humanity being forced off Earth. Invaders from gas giants have arrived and determined that humans are far down the scale of intelligence such that whales and dolphins can exist on Earth, while humans can eek out survival on the other worlds (except for Jupiter). Their survival is assisted by messages broadcast from the direction of the Ophiuchi constellation. This has led to biological modifications with cloning and memory transfer, but DNA modification remains strictly taboo. A convicted genetic engineer is saved from execution by the leader of a group dedicated to overthrowing the invaders and taking back Earth. She has multiple adventures through multiple clones, eventually learning the secret of the hotline and orchestrates the overthrow of the slave-like conditions of the insurgency.
Varley offers a unique perspective on alien lifeforms as well as the distinct views on what constitutes intelligence. Humanity has seemingly adjusted to its 3rd class status in their own solar system, but with lingering resentment. At the same time, there are hints at a larger universe of intelligences with galactic conflict that humanity is barely able to discern. Oddly, while humanity seems to have accepted cloning (including sex change) and memory transfer easily, the taboo against DNA modification seems arbitrary.
The narration is solidly performed with excellent character distinction. Pacing is brisk.
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- HeadInTheSand
- 01-10-24
marginal
You woul think the narrator woukd at least have learned how to pronounce ophiuchi, right?
the usual Varley imaginative material, though.
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- jason
- 12-22-24
Weird sex
I know most of the writers were ahead of their times and tried to be forward thinking about society and what the future may hold. That being said this author has a plethora of ideas and situations about sex that are completely unrelated to the story most times and it feels like he has to force them in. I love his stories but not a fan of the sex dropped in at almost every turn.
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- Kelli
- 08-25-10
Very good Sci-Fi
This book flowed really well and was easy to follow for something with such a complex plot that follows a single character in multiple settings and times. It isn't about the invasion of Earth by aliens, but what happens long after that invasion from the perspective of a woman who has several possible roles in the salvation of various parts of humanity. Most of the book takes place on various planets in our solar system and outer space, and it is very imaginatively described without too much detail or invention of unneeded new words that some authors have a tendency towards in this genre. It was fun to listen to, though the narrator is not my favorite. She often speaks statements with an inflection that makes them sound like questions and tries too hard on male voices, but I got used to it after a while and was glad I'd chosen to listen.
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3 people found this helpful