Far Futures, Greg Bear
Far Futures, Greg Bear
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Far Futures

Author: Greg Bear, Donald Kingsbury, Poul Anderson, Joe Haldeman, Charles Sheffield, Gregory Benford

Narrator: various narrators, Vikas Adam, Paul Boehmer, Susan Hanfield, Alex Hyde-White, Stefan Rudnicki

Unabridged: 16 hr 53 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Skyboat Media

Published: 06/17/2014


Synopsis

Five novellas of hard science fiction by five modern masters of the formFrom Nebula Award winner Gregory Benford comes this ambitious hard SF anthology that collects five original novellas. Each one takes the very long view—all are set at least ten thousand years in the future. The authors take a rigorously scientific view of such grand panoramas, confronting the largest issues of cosmology, astronomy, evolution, and biology.The last moments of a universe beseiged occupy Greg Bear's Judgment Engine. Can something human matter at the very end of creation, as contorted matter ceases to have meaning and time itself stutters to an eerie halt?Genesis by Poul Anderson is set a billion years ahead, when humanity has become extinct. Earth is threatened by the slowly warming sun, and vast machine intelligences decide to recreate humans.Donald Kingsbury contributes Historical Crisis, a starting work on the prediction of the human future that challenges the foundations of psychohistory, as developed in Isaac Asimov's famous Foundation Trilogy.Joe Haldeman's For White Hill confronts humanity with hostile aliens who remorselessly grind down every defense against them. A lone artist struggles to find a place in this distant, wondrous future when humanity seems doomed.In At the Eschaton by Charles Sheffield, a man tries to rescue his dying wife from oblivion by hurling himself forward, in both space and time, to the very end of the universe itself.

About Greg Bear

Greg Bear has won two Hugo Awards and three Nebula Awards and is a past president to the Science Fiction Writers of America. He lives in Seattle, Washington.

About Donald Kingsbury

Donald MacDonald Kingsbury is an American–Canadian science fiction author. He taught mathematics at McGill University in Montreal from 1956 to 1986.

About Poul Anderson

Poul Anderson (1926–2001) was one of the most prolific and popular writers in science fiction. He won the Hugo Award seven times and the Nebula Award three times, as well as many other awards, including the Grand Master Award of the Science Fiction Writers of America for a lifetime of distinguished achievement. With a degree in physics and a wide knowledge of other fields of science, he was noted for building stories on a solid foundation of real science, as well as for being one of the most skilled creators of fast-paced adventure stories. He was author of over one hundred novels and story collections, several hundred short stories, and several mysteries and nonfiction books.

About Joe Haldeman

Joe Haldeman is an American author of award-winning science fiction and nonfiction works and a part-time professor at MIT. He earned a BS in physics and astronomy, as well as an MFA in writing. Drafted into the military, he served in Vietnam as a combat engineer in 1968 and 1969, was severely wounded, and earned a Purple Heart. His experience in war and in returning to civilian life are themes he uses in much of his writing. He is the author of numerous novels and several series, including the Forever War series. His science fiction has earned many awards, including five Hugo Awards, five Nebula Awards, a John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel, a Locus Award, three Rhysling Awards, a World Fantasy Award, and a James Tiptree Jr. Award. Haldeman was named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America in 2009, received the Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award for lifetime achievement in 2010, and was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2012.

About Charles Sheffield

Charles Sheffield (1935–2002) was a mathematician, physicist, and author of both nonfiction and science fiction. For his novel Brother to Dragons, he won the 1992 John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel. He won the Nebula Award in 1993 and the Hugo Award in 1994 for his novelette Georgia on My Mind. He was a president of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America and of the American Astronautical Society. He served as chief scientist of Earth Satellite Corporation, a company that processed remote sensing satellite data. He was a distinguished lecturer of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics and a board member of the National Space Society. Born and educated in England, he held bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mathematics and a doctorate in theoretical physics.

About Gregory Benford

Gregory Benford is a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of California, Irvine. A Woodrow Wilson Fellow and a member of Phi Beta Kappa, he received the Lord Prize for contributions to science in 1995 and the Asimov Memorial Award for popularizing science in 2007. He has written numerous works of science fiction, receiving a Nebula Award and a John W. Campbell Memorial Award for his novel Timescape.

About Claire Bloom

Claire Bloom gained international fame in 1951 with her screen debut in Charles Chaplin???s motion picture Limelight. Among her many memorable films are Richard III, The Haunting, Look Back in Anger, and A Doll???s House.

About Vikas Adam

Vikas Adam is a classically trained actor who has performed on stage, film, and television. He has also recorded over one hundred audiobooks, for which he has garnered numerous awards and nominations, including Earphones, various Best of the Year lists, and the Audie Award. When not recording, acting, or directing, he can be found lecturing in the Theater Department at UCLA.

About Paul Boehmer

Paul Boehmer attended his first Shakespearean play while in high school; he knew then that he was destined to become the classically trained actor he is today. Graduating with a master's degree, Paul was cast as Hamlet by the very stage actor who inspired his career path. A nod from the Universe he'd chosen aright! Paul has worked on Broadway and extensively in regional theater. Coinciding with another of his passions, sci-fi, Paul has been cast in various roles in many episodes of Star Trek. Paul's love of literature and learning led him by nature to his work as a narrator for audiobooks, his latest endeavour. Paul is married to the love of his life, Offir, and they live in Los Angeles with their two midnight-rambling tomcats, Dread and David.

About Susan Hanfield

Susan Hanfield is a three-time Audie award finalist and a 2016 Voice Arts award nominee. Classically trained, she has recorded over seventy titles in multiple genres, including young adult, historical fiction, faith-based inspirational, fantasy, paranormal romance, science fiction, classics, and nonfiction. In addition to recording audiobooks, she can be seen in film, on stage, and in commercials. For more information, visit her blog at susanhanfield.com/latest-from-susan.

About Alex Hyde-White

Alex Hyde-White is an actor and a producer of two films and hundreds of audiobooks thru his label Punch Audio.

About Stefan Rudnicki

Stefan Rudnicki is an award winning audiobook narrator, director and producer. He was born in Poland and now resides in Studio City, California. He has narrated more than three hundred audiobooks and has participated in over a thousand as a writer, producer, or director. He is a recipient of multiple Audie Awards and AudioFile Earphones Awards as well as a Grammy Award, a Bram Stoker Award, and a Ray Bradbury Award. He received AudioFile’s award for 2008 Best Voice in Science Fiction and Fantasy. Along with a cast of other narrators, Rudnicki has read a number of Orson Scott Card's best-selling science fiction novels. He worked extensively with many other science fiction authors, including David Weber and Ben Bova. In reviewing the twentieth anniversary edition audiobook of Card’s Ender's Game, Publishers Weekly stated, "Rudnicki, with his lulling, sonorous voice, does a fine job articulating Ender's inner struggle between the kind, peaceful boy he wants to be and the savage, violent actions he is frequently forced to take." Rudnicki is also a stage actor and director.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Kogiopsis on November 01, 2015

There's something profoundly alienating about being a woman in 2015 and reading science fiction 20 years old. Especially hard sci-fi. This is the thing about this subgenre, for me: the ideas may be weird and wondrous, the technology artfully extrapolated, the projections of human futures fascinating.......more

Goodreads review by Carl on March 13, 2025

I have a soft spot for deep time SF (and Fantasy), so I had high hopes for this collection of three long short stories and two novellas... thankfully, they were realised. Gregory Benford's introduction sets things up well, giving a brief but interesting history of this fairly unsubscribed sub-genre,......more

Goodreads review by Don on November 17, 2022

I'm a sucker for the ideas presented and wouldn't mind if some were explored further. However, as some have mentioned the stories are mostly a series of ideas held together by the thinnest of characters. The viewpoints, specifically the way the women are written, is also especially old fashioned.......more

Goodreads review by Clint on December 03, 2022

I read this a long time ago and remember being blown away by each of the stories. Some were better than others, but I seem to recall the Greg Bear story being the highlight.......more

Goodreads review by Michael on January 02, 2023

Nothing especially memorable, but all good.......more


Quotes

Far Futures is the kind of science fiction that got me reading SF in the first place. These stories have all the dazzling sweep of Golden Age SF, combined with the sensitive characterizations and complex moralities of a genre finally grown up. Not to be missed.” Nancy Kress, Nebula Award–winning author

“Most notable about all of these oft-apocalyptic novellas—excluding their common acceptance that organic life is destined to be superseded—is their essential vivacity. This volume presents five glorious adventures bound to delight anyone with an abiding curiosity about the distant future.” Publishers Weekly

“Five novellas by veteran authors of hard SF focus on imaginary far futures and explore the death of the universe, the end of time, and the evolution of human consciousness….These selections challenge the boundaries of the imagination. A strong addition for most libraries’ SF collections.” Library Journal

“Fictional scenarios of the remotely distant future, such as Stapledon’s classic Last and First Men, are rare in sf, perhaps because humans, at least in their current form, aren’t expected to last that long. To fill this void, editor Benford offers five novellas by leading hard-sf veterans that safeguard the human perspective while reaching ten thousand years and more into the future…A superb collection that stretches sf to its imaginative limits.” Booklist

“Excellent…A must for any fan of hard SF or good storytelling of any genre.” Starlog