Empire Builders

And excellent book and hard to stop listen to

This is the second book about Dan Randolph even if it was writte well before Powersat.

The earth is heading towards a greenhouse cliff, a sudden climate change that will destroy much of the planet in ten years if something isn't done soon. The ice caps will melt. Cities will be flooded. Millions will die. When Randolph tries to let people know what's going on and try to help orchestrate a plan to avoid this catastrophe, government officials from the Global Economic Council (the GEC) confiscate his company, imprison him, and silence his scientific team.

The story continues and as usual it quite good and i find the book hard to put down, or stop listen to if you, like me listen to the audio book.

Stefan Rudnicki does an very excellent job adjusting his voice to each of the characters so you get a god idea of who speach. Speech tags become redundant. He captures a variety of accents well, and the voices match the personalities. He tries hard to get the Japanese right, but it doesn't roll off his tongue well.

Its even a bit scary to think that this book was written back in 1993 and quite well talks about some of the problems we have been facing today. The tsunamis in Indonesia and the flooding of New Orleans.

9 people found this helpful

Another keeper from Ben Bova

Would you listen to Empire Builders again? Why?

Yes, I would listens again, I enjoyed this book

What other book might you compare Empire Builders to and why?

I think I could compare this title to the Orion series, there is a lot of space travel and exploration in both

What about Stefan Rudnicki’s performance did you like?

I like Stefan Rudnicki, he is a very good narrator for truck drivers because he keeps his voice at a fairly constant volume, which is nice because I don't have to keep fooling with the volume control while I'm driving

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

No, I'm generally not an emotional person

4 people found this helpful

Excellent

Stephan Rudnicki is one of my favorite narrators, and he did his usual excellent narration here. Easy to listen to, easy to distinguish different characters, just the right amount of tension. The story itself drags a bit at times; too many meetings! I did enjoy how Dan managed to get out if situations that did not seem to be survivable so many times! An interesting story, with a definite environmental theme.

2 people found this helpful

I loved it!

I just got so wound up in Dan's situations I couldn't stop listening. Stefan Rudnicki did his usual job of using different voices with each character.....outstanding!

2 people found this helpful

Ben Bova (Chicken Little)

THis "enviromentality" really shows in this one. A little naïve and over steps the climate change logic here. But it does set the stage for his grand tour. Listen only for background information after listening to Powersat and continue on with the Grand Tour books. Stefan Rudnicki preforms this and does it very well.

3 people found this helpful

Fun listen, But the story is too much Ayn Rand

Ayn Rand in spaaaaaace. Better written than any book by Rand but basically business good capitalism fantastic people lazy government bad.

A good jumping-off point for the wider Grand Tour

This is (I think) the last of the Grand Tour books to feature Dan Randolph as a main character, and it's good one to end his run on. Empire Builders does a good job setting the stage the the scientific and geopolitical situations of the later books. Like PowerSat it suffers from heavy-handed political messaging. Ironically, it isn't the climate science, but the anti-government, pro-business rhetoric that beats you over the head while you read (or listen), sometimes to an absurd degree. I don't know if this is representative of Dr. Bova's actual political beliefs, or was just put in to better flesh-out the Dan Randolph character, but it could have been handled with a splash more subtlety. Other than that, it is a well crafted story based in sound science, with characters that are believeable enough to care about, but with enough action and intrigue to keep the reader entertained.

Global Climate Change

For a one time read this is a good book, but I was a little bored in the beginning. There isn't a ton of action, and some of the topics surrounding economy and management were not very interesting to me. However, I did like the main character and I really like how conclusion wrapped everything up. This book should be praised for its attempt to explore climate change, and the effects of organized crime and a global government in a futuristic Earth where civilization has expanded to the moon. The story also takes a look at government cover ups and the effectiveness of private run corporations verses government. If you are strongly politically motivated you may love or hate this story.

A bit about the story. Ben Bova creates a futuristic society where Earth has expanded to the moon and now mines space. The main character, Dan Randolph, is a wealthy business man who is one of top seven privately owned companies that run trade. His business is regulated by the Global Economic Council (GEC) who are not big fans of Dan Randolph. Some of the GEC leadership is looking to consolidate the world under one power and eliminate private run corporations that operate in space. This leads to some financial and legal trouble for Dan and a quick downward spiral when the GEC goes after him. As a protagonist Dan Randolph is easy to follow because he wants to do the right thing and seems to care more about others more than money despite being one of the wealthiest businessmen in the world.

I have been critical of some Stephen Rudnicki's performances in the past, but in this book he was a good fit. So, I definitely got my money out of this one (5 dollar bin). This is my second Ben Bova read. I am currently enjoying his Orion series. Ben Bova is a well established writer so it is hard to go wrong trying this one out.

1 person found this helpful

Technology has badly aged

Is there anything you would change about this book?

I think what I can say is that Bova sees to lack some imagination. This was already evident in Powersat (a book he wrote more than a decade later). The idea of a watch sized wrist computer is very.... 1980s?

If you’ve listened to books by Ben Bova before, how does this one compare?

This was my second book (see Powersat) and I pretty much have the same complaint, that at the end of the day Bova doesn't seem to be very imaginative. A lot of the technology in the books comes across as horribly antiquated.

What about Stefan Rudnicki’s performance did you like?

I think he captured the personalities of the characters well, it definitely helped me create the images in my mind.

Could you see Empire Builders being made into a movie or a TV series? Who should the stars be?

I could see it as a SyFy movie of the week.

Any additional comments?

Yeah, I had planned to read / listen to all of the "Grand Tour", the concept sounded interesting. After two books though I have decided not to continue, the lack of technological "dreaming" is just way too distracting for me.

1 person found this helpful

Sci-Fi?

A good listen that, were it not for a lunar thing, would be just good fiction. A hegemonic, Russian Communist style dominatation and is bested by the corporate good guys in white hats. Enter love interests, sister hating and other human foibles and this could just as easily been the 11th century. Good, fun read, but don't expect much sci-fi.