Do you like audio books? Do you like podcasts? If so then you really should check the world of podcast fiction. It’s a great way to get new books without spending much money at all. That is until you find some that you like and decide to support the author, which I highly recommend so they can keep putting out the stuff you like.
Below is the list of podcast books that I have enjoyed, along with a minor review/synopsis of each sorted by author. Authors are listed in alphabetical order only because I have listened to enough of them that I can’t remember the exact order I listened to them. The majority of the links below go to Podiobooks.com because it is the easiest way to subscribe to a new podcast novel as well as to discover new ones.
J.C. Hutchins
7th Son: Book 1- Descent
My Synopsis: This is the first book in an amazing trilogy. It starts with the murder of the president by a four-year-old. Next thing you know there are 7 clones standing around a table in a more secret than top-secret underground base. The clones didn’t know they were clones and had never met before. All of them are very different from each other. They are tasked with finding the man they were cloned from, John Alpha. Apparently he is the brains behind the assassination of the president.
My Review: If you like conspiracy, and very realistic fiction, this series is definitely for you. The author does an amazing job of keeping the “Code Phantom” technology well within the realm of possibility. The twists and turns that this story takes you through are truly amazing.
7th Son: Book 2- Deceit
My Synopsis: Book 2 starts two days after the clones meet for the first time. They were successful in tracking down John Alpha, but at a great loss. Now the clones begin to see that John Alpha’s plot is much deeper than they could have imagined. The clones now must travel all over the country to track down clues as to John Alpha’s true location and to figure out what his grand scheme really is. They must also unearth many of the secrets behind the government program that birthed them.
My Review: It took me a bit to get into the first book because I am a much bigger fan of science fiction and fantasy type stuff, but after the fourth episode or so I was hooked and I really wanted to find out what was going to happen to the clones and what John Alpha’s plot really was. Some of the things that happened in this book and some of the technologies in it are truly awesome.
7th Son: Book 3- Destruction
My Synopsis: The fourth day of the story, John Alpha’s plans are nearing completion. This isn’t good for the clones or the rest of the world. Thanks to “psijack” Alpha now has access to anything and everything he needs to throw the world into complete chaos. The only way for the clones to be successful in their endeavors to stop Alpha is to start tracking him on their terms. They can just follow the bread crumbs left by Alpha and they can’t be restricted by their creators anymore. The clones must use every resource at their disposal to even have a chance of stopping John Alpha.
My Review: The way this book pulls everything together in one big finale is really amazing. J.C. has done a great acting job for each of the characters in the story. The battles that the clones must face are almost epic. Not because of the scale of the battles, but because of the results of each one. The twists and turns make for a wild ride and my jaw literally dropped when I found out who the true mastermind was behind everything.
Mur Lafferty
Heaven- Season 1
My Synopsis: Imagine if Heaven wasn’t as great as it was supposed to. As if you weren’t satisfied with it because it was too perfect. Because you feel this way you are granted the ability to travel to other Heavens via a celestial passport. Now imagine that during your travels you find out that you were actually prophesied to visit each of these Heavens. Kate and Daniel are the people this happens to.
My Review: If you are a big fan of mythology like I am, you will love this series of novellas by Mur Lafferty. The imagery created by her in each of the Heavens is really cool. And who would have known that two average kids could herald such big changes.
Heaven- Season 2: Hell
My Synopsis: Kate and Daniel are separated at the end of season one and luckily they are reunited at the beginning of season two. They find out that there are souls missing from various Heavens and suffering unjustly in Hell. The only way to save these souls is to travel to Hell and free them. Daniel now has part of the soul of a very old god within him and carries the sword of a death goddess. As Kate and Daniel search for the missing souls, they have to find out if their friendship, not to mention the universe, can handle everything that has happened.
My Review: It’s very cool to see Kate and Daniel travel from Heaven, through Purgatory to Hell. Then the entrance to Hell is pretty spiffy too. It’s crazy how powerful Daniel is becoming in this book, as well as how certain parts of Hell connect to certain parts of Heaven. Oh and you might want to listen to 7th Son before getting into this one due to some of the character references. Not required, but the inside jokes are amazing.
Heaven- Season 3: Earth
My Synopsis: It turns out that Kate and Daniel went through everything because they were set on a path to become gods. Now Kate is in charge of Heaven and Daniel is in charge of Hell. First problem, figuring out how to properly use their godly powers. Second, get everything back in order after it was all thrown into chaos because of Kate and Daniel’s rise to power. They also have to remake the Earth. There are a couple things standing in the way though, a bunch of previous deities that aren’t happy with the change in power structure.
My Review: I will warn you straight out. The end of this book is a major cliffhanger. If I would have had to wait for season four to begin, I probably would have gone on a shooting spree or something. The more I listen to this series, the more hooked I get. Some of the other places Kate and Daniel go in this book while they try to fix everything are very fascinating and I know I never could have thought of them.
Heaven- Season 4: Wasteland
My Synopsis: Kate is dead and Daniel is exiled into the wastelands of the afterlife. This place is neither a Heaven or a Hell. Parts of it seem rather odd though because a large part of the wastelands doesn’t seem like a wasteland anymore, it appears to be a new world.
My Review: I was worried when this book first started because one of the main characters was dead. Being that it was the afterlife, I didn’t expect her to stay dead, but I was wondering how long it would take her to come back. Luckily she comes back right away and the adventure they go on is very cool. I love how they worked some steampunk type stuff into this story along with some new deities that were created just for this strange new world. The end isn’t really a cliffhanger, but I am very excited for when Season 5 comes out.
Playing for Keeps
My Synopsis: Keepsie Branson is a bar owner in Seventh City. A city that apparently is full of super powered heroes and villains. Many of the average people have powers too, but they “aren’t powerful enough” to get accepted into the Hero Academy. The Heroes are extremely full of themselves and the Villains are very manipulative. Keepsie, her friends, and her bar fall into the middle of a huge battle between the Heroes and Villains and it quickly becomes very hard to tell who are the bad guys and who are the good guys.
My Review: I am a huge comic book fan. I love the TV show Heroes. So this was actually my first taste of Mur Lafferty’s writing. It turned out to be a very refreshing take on super powers and how even “crappy” powers can be very useful. If you like traditional comic character roles turned on their head, then you will really enjoy this story.
Chris Lester
Metamor City
My Synopsis: Metamor City is a place where magic has evolved alongside technology. At the beginning of the podcast it is a series of short stories that introduces many characters and seems to have an over arching story. Starting with the Ninth episode the story “Making the Cut” begins. It is a story of people with various psychic powers in a Collective. Daniel and his friends work great together in sports and school, the only problem is, Daniel’s psi powers are very weak and he isn’t sure what he will do with his life, while his friends are hired by the psi collective to do special ops. Because of Daniel’s weak psi abilities, the collective almost looks down on him despite being a hard worker and dedicated to improving the collective. Here is a quote from the author. “The story is really about the conflict between choice and duty. When our own desires conflict with what’s expected of us, how much will we sacrifice to belong? And, on the other side, how much are we willing to defy our own society for the sake of happiness, for ourselves and the people we care about?”
My Review: I’ve always enjoyed stories that combine magic and technology. Shadowrun(the RPG, not the Xbox 360 game) is a very cool setting and Metamor City greatly reminds me of it. Seeing the humans interact with were-creatures, vampires, demons, and psionics is very cool.
Patrick McLean
Succeed in Evil: Volume 1
My Synopsis: Edwin Windsor is an evil efficiency consultant. Evil “geniuses” and super villains hire him to help them maximize their profits from their evil plans. He does the best job he can, but being that most of his clients are psychotic they don’t normally take his advice. After seeing villain after villain waste so much, Edwin decides to go into the evil business for himself.
My Review: I’ve always thought the comic book type evil villains have been pretty cool, but they could do so much better if they just thought stuff through. I guess Edwin thinks the same way, except he actually gets work advising those villains. The story is a great satire on comic book villains and corporate culture.
Tee Morris
Morevi
My Synopsis: Askana Moldarin is the queen of the landlocked country Morevi. She has the title “The Black Widow” because of her bloody rise to power. Her new regime is unstable due to traitors and Askana needs help weeding them out. Rafe Rafton is a privateer and is more than willing to help with this, for the right price of course.
My Review: This is a very good story that combines historical elements with fantasy. The sword fights and action are very exciting as well as the political intrigue. The voice acting of the cast is top notch and the writing is superb.
Steve Saylor
Black Shadow
My Synopsis: Super villains are an ever present problem in the world. If that isn’t bad enough, they get possessed by demons to turn the Earth into a real living Hell. There is one man that can stand in their way though. His name is Black Shadow. He is the only person that has the abilities to beat down the demons all the way back to where they came from.
My Review: This is sort of like Batman against the devil. It has a very comic book atmosphere but the added supernatural makes for a very interesting story. I like all of the gadgets that Black Shadow has. The way the angels and demons are portrayed is very interesting as well.
Scott Sigler
Earthcore
My Synopsis: A huge platinum deposit is found and of course the greedy mining corporation wants to get at it. A couple of problems though, it is deeper than they have ever mined before. Not to mention that in the depths of that mountain are creatures not of this world, and they don’t like it when people enter their mountain.
My Review: This was my first foray into the world of podcast fiction. After just a couple of episodes you could officially label me a “Junkie.” Sigler definitely has a talent for describing gore in a way that you can almost feel the blood splatter across your face.
Ancestor
My Synopsis: Scientists are striving to create an animal that can have it’s organs transplanted into humans. The way the scientists at Genada have decided to go about doing this is to recreate the ancestor of all mammals. They finally recreate it, but it is not the docile primitive animal that they envisioned. It is a very fast growing, vicious carnivore and it is hungry.
My Review: I really like the hard science that Sigler puts in his writing. Some of this stuff seems very possible. I was at the edge of my seat for most of the story. Those are some scary creatures.
The Rookie
My Synopsis: I can’t think of a better synopsis than Scott Sigler’s own synopsis of this book. “Imagine a story that combines the intense football action of “Any Given Sunday” with the space opera style of “Star Wars” and the criminal underworld of “The Godfather.”‘
“The Rookie” is set amongst a lethal pro football league 700 years in the future. Aliens play positions based on physiology, creating receivers that jump 25 feet into the air, linemen that bench-press 1,200 pounds, and linebackers that — literally — want to eat you. Organized crime runs every franchise, games are fixed and rival players are assasinated.
Follow the story of Quentin Barnes, a 19-year-old quarterback prodigy that has been raised all his life to hate, and kill, those aliens. Quentin must deal with his racism and learn to lead, or hell wind up just another stat in the column marked “killed on the field.”
My Review: I have never really enjoyed American football. But if I ever saw football played like this, I would be a raving mad fan. The races that Sigler created in this story are very cool. The way they fit into each position on the field is almost too perfect, but at the same time I can see how football had to be modified a bit to accommodate the new races as well. The way Quentin pulls the team together and deals with the organized crime is pretty cool.
Infected
My Synopsis: All over America people are turning into paranoid psychotic killers because of some weird skin disease. CIA agent Dew Phillips is tasked with tracking these people down and catching a live victim. Margaret Montoya from the CDC must analyze what causes the disease, but all she has to work with are rapidly decomposing corpses.
Meanwhile, Perry Dawsey, former football star turned desk jockey, wakes up one morning to 7 strange marks on his body that itch like mad. Soon he start to hear voices as the marks grow into a triangular shape. Perry must battle with the emotions and thoughts that these creatures growing inside him are causing. Humanity could depend on the outcome of that battle.
My Review: This has to be one of the most gore filled disgusting books I have ever read/listened to. I seriously almost got sick during a couple of the parts, but it was an amazing story. The level of realism made it great. I also liked how it became more and more sci-fi towards the end. A very intense book and I would highly recommend going out and buying INFECTED.
Nocturnal
My Synopsis: Something lives under the streets of San Francisco. They have lived there for hundreds of years. They feed on the dregs of society, the “won’t bes.” The Nocturnals aren’t quite human and they live in hiding, away from “Savior.” Savior has hunted the Nocturnals for many years, but stories of a leader named “The King” are starting to abound that will lead them out from the under city and to the surface where they rightfully belong. And where they can hunt the humans in the open.
My Review: The way this story is written is pretty cool. It combines a lot of horror elements with a detective story for a unique mix. The Nocturnals are some really twisted creatures that only Sigler could come up with. The police involvement with everything is pretty interesting too.
