Roadside Picnic

I found this audiobook version of 'Roadside Picnic' to be an fairly interesting listen. It was well-narrated and came with some genuinely interesting 'additional information' notes from the authors, at the end. In truth, though, I also found 'Roadside Picnic' to be a rather unevenly paced novel, one which left me genuinely puzzled about the huge amounts of plaudits and critical praise that are routinely showered on it by reviewers, serious SF critics, SF podcasters, and others. Overall, then, certainly a very decent book, but not really one that has sent me rushing off to either listen to or read anything further by the brothers (Arkady and Boris), at least for the time being.

take a rubber film of science fiction, and stretch it razor thin over endless descriptions of smoking or wanting to smoke. sprinkle in laughable writing of female "characters" (ie sex objects), two black extras whose blackness the author assumes immediately conveys to the reader that they are thugs, and a giant spoonful of anger at....the man or something. if you are reading this because someone told you it is a classic, maybe it is, but for me it was an absolute chore to get through. I found the narration particularly unbearable

This was an incredible experience, Robert Forster is an amazing narrator and I felt like I was watching a movie in my head until the very end. His tone and way of phrasing things gave me chills at all the right points. I'll forever have his voice stuck in my head as Redrick Schuhart. To hell with your zone! The book of course is a classic and the Strugatsky brothers will always be known as legends. If you're gonna listen to one science fiction audiobook let it be this one. Well worth the price. The doomed city is also awesome.