A new Stainless Steel Rat book—hurrah! Slippery Jim DiGriz, a con artist in the 35th century, just wants to retire in peace, but handout-seeking relatives arrive, and before he can say "bowb," he's off to preach racial equality. This is an odd deviation from the usual sci-fi adventures to be sure, but it’s so well told by Phil Gigante that the moralizing is barely noticeable. Sinking his vocal teeth into a performance as good as any one-man play, Gigante is perfectly matched to the material; even a minor medic is easily distinguished. Gigante could take this show on the road and sell out every night. Country hicks drawl, generals bark, bankers smarm, and Slippery Jim wanders through the insanity with a bemused calm, soothing the listener even as porcupine-pigs from space wreak havoc.
Pub Date: Aug. 3, 2010
Duration: 8 hrs
DD ISBN: 9781441881830
Publisher: Brilliance Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Eric Flint's series has been running for 12 years, and this is the book that started it all. A small mining town in West Virginia is teleported through time and space to Germany during the Thirty Years War, and its inhabitants must learn to survive in this brutal age. Narrator George Guidall brings a quiet gravitas to the often gory proceedings. He uses regional accents lightly, preferring to portray the characters through cadence and the solid pronunciation of difficult Germanic words and phrases. His best moments come in the many scenes of dialogue when the characters banter and shout. Guidall never lets the dialogue get ahead of him, reading deliberately to keep even the most emotional scenes on an even keel.
Pub Date: Jan. 22, 2012
Duration: 19 hrs, 30 mins
DD ISBN: 9781464018282
Publisher: Recorded Books Inc.
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Dick Hill is a talented narrator, beloved for his renditions of the classics and action novels by Lee Child and Michael Connelly. Hill has gravitas; the man knows how to impregnate a pause. Movies by Albert Brooks, such as LOST IN AMERICA and DEFENDING YOUR LIFE, show actors—himself prominent among them—in circumstances so humiliating that they’re hilarious. Having chosen a futuristic setting for his first-ever novel, Brooks has upped the ante. The future is where many of us—all those unsaved—expect the worst. The combination of Hill’s deep voice and Brooks’s dark comic vision pushes hard at the line between what’s funny and what’s only sad. But hang on, because there’s a happy ending, or happyish.
Pub Date: May 30, 2011
Duration: 14 hrs, 30 mins
Publisher: Tantor Media
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
