Cloud Atlas (20th Anniversary Edition) Audiobook By David Mitchell, Gabrielle Zevin - introduction cover art

Cloud Atlas (20th Anniversary Edition)

A Novel

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Cloud Atlas (20th Anniversary Edition)

By: David Mitchell, Gabrielle Zevin - introduction
Narrated by: Scott Brick, Cassandra Campbell, Kim Mai Guest, Kirby Heyborne, John Lee, Richard Matthews, David Mitchell, Gabrielle Zevin
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#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A timeless, structure-bending classic that explores how actions of individual lives impact the past, present and future—from a postmodern visionary and one of the leading voices in fiction

Featuring a new afterword by David Mitchell and a new introduction by Gabrielle Zevin, author of Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

One of the New York Times’s 100 Best Books of the 21st Century • Shortlisted for the International Booker Prize

Cloud Atlas begins in 1850 with Adam Ewing, an American notary voyaging from the Chatham Isles to his home in California. Ewing is befriended by a physician, Dr. Goose, who begins to treat him for a rare species of brain parasite. The novel careens, with dazzling virtuosity, to Belgium in 1931, to the West Coast in the 1970s, to an inglorious present-day England, to a Korean superstate of the near future where neocapitalism has run amok, and, finally, to a postapocalyptic Iron Age Hawaii in the last days of history.

But the story doesn’t end even there. The novel boomerangs back through centuries and space, returning by the same route, in reverse, to its starting point. Along the way, David Mitchell reveals how his disparate characters connect, how their fates intertwine, and how their souls drift across time like clouds across the sky.

As wild as a video game, as mysterious as a Zen koan, Cloud Atlas is an unforgettable tour de force that, like its incomparable author, has transcended its cult classic status to become a worldwide phenomenon.


List of Readers:
The Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing, read by Scott Brick
Letters From Zedelghem, read by Richard Matthews
Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery, read by Cassandra Campbell
The Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish, read by John Lee
An Orison of Sonmi~451, read by Kim Mai Guest
Sloosha’s Crossin’ an’ Ev’rythin’ After, read by Kirby Heyborne©2004 David Mitchell; (P)2004 Random House Audio Literary Fiction Genre Fiction Fiction Historical Fiction Funny Fantasy Epic Epic Fantasy Scary

Critic reviews

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER #1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER
FINALIST FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE
LONGLISTED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL IMPAC DUBLIN LITERARY AWARD
A Times (UK) Best Book of the Decade
A New York Times Notable Book
A Globe and Mail 100 Best Book
Longlisted for the IMPAC Award

“[David] Mitchell is, clearly, a genius. He writes as though at the helm of some perpetual dream machine, can evidently do anything, and his ambition is written in magma across this novel’s every page.”—The New York Times Book Review

“One of those how-the-holy-hell-did-he-do-it? modern classics that no doubt is—and should be—read by any student of contemporary literature.”—Dave Eggers

“Wildly entertaining . . . a head rush, both action-packed and chillingly ruminative.”—People

“The novel as series of nested dolls or Chinese boxes, a puzzle-book, and yet—not just dazzling, amusing, or clever but heartbreaking and passionate, too. I’ve never read anything quite like it, and I’m grateful to have lived, for a while, in all its many worlds.”—Michael Chabon

“Cloud Atlas ought to make [Mitchell] famous on both sides of the Atlantic as a writer whose fearlessness is matched by his talent.”—The Washington Post Book World

“Thrilling . . . One of the biggest joys in Cloud Atlas is watching Mitchell sashay from genre to genre without a hitch in his dance step.”—Boston Sunday Globe

“Grand and elaborate . . . [Mitchell] creates a world and language at once foreign and strange, yet strikingly familiar and intimate.”—Los Angeles Times

Featured Article: Happy Cicada Season! Welcome Brood X with These Buzzy Throwback Best Sellers


Every 17 years, the periodical cicadas known as "Brood X" emerge from the ground in regions across the Eastern US. Whether you find its distinctive racket—a mechanical din of whirrs and clicks—nostalgic or maddening, the dulcet sounds of our favorite audiobooks are a timely complement (or antidote) to the sonic swarm. To make them feel at home, we present our favorite listens from past cycles—and some new recommendations to bring them up to date.

Featured Article Happy Cicada Season Welcome Brood X with These Buzzy Throwback Best Sellers
Innovative Structure • Interconnected Narratives • Diverse Literary Styles • Thematic Depth • Rewarding Complexity

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This is an extremely clever book filled with nuances and devices that would, I think, be better appreciated in the written form; to state the obvious, it's much easier to flip back in a book than it is to scan back on a listening device. But you (who am I kidding, I mean me; it's all about me) feel pretty darned smart while listening to the second half of the book when you find that not only do you really get it, but that you are also able to make "aha" connections between parts early on in the book that made almost no sense at the time. This isn't a mystery (although one of the stories within the book does take the form of a mystery, of sorts) but I often felt as if I would have been better able to keep up with the story if I had been taking notes; then again, that probably would have interfered with my ability to sleep on the subway while listening to some of this book. On an almost entirely positive note, some of the narration is excellent and the fact that the book is split up into six different stories with different narrators makes it very easy on the ear, if a little taxing on the brain.

Easy listening it ain't

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I enjoyed a couple of the stories. Did not enjoy a couple of them too. The old guy trapped in a retirement home had me laughing out loud. I kept waiting for the author to tie all the stories together, and I was rather shocked when it ended. Felt kind of lazy to me. Like maybe the author had a few short stories lying about, so he slapped a birthmark on the protagonist and called it reincarnation.

Some good storytelling but not cohesive

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What made the experience of listening to Cloud Atlas the most enjoyable?

Excellent narration! I watched the movie afterwards and it stunk. The audio book easily ties all the story lines together and the different voices and accents make it difficult to put down.

What other book might you compare Cloud Atlas to and why?

Unique. I've never read (Listened to) anything like it.

Which scene was your favorite?

The guy in the old folks home was hilarious from the start. I replayed parts from this section over and over and kept laughing.

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

It was an experience. You have to listen to this audio to get the whole deal. Better than ANY movie I've seen in the past year.

Any additional comments?

SKIP THE MOVIE AND THE BOOK........this one was MADE for audio!

skip the movie, skip the book - do audio!

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on 1st story and the reader reads so fast I cannot keep up with what is going on. I will keep listening

I am confused

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This novel is comprised of five very distinct stories all incorporating the theme, as Dr. Goose put it, "the weak are meat and the strong eat." The stories are wedding cake tiered upon each other meaning 4 of the stories are split into 2 parts with only the 5th, top tier, being told from beginning to end. Readers beware that the first story ends in the middle of a sentence so that you'll think something is wrong with the recording. None of the other stories do that.

Two of the stories are voiced with English accents, which I found a liitle disconcerting for the first several minutes, but I soon became accustomed. Actually, I was compelled to pay attention to the conversation (mostly first person narrative) due shearly to the fact that David Mitchell is so witty, humorous, and cleaver, I didn't want to miss anything.

I've never heard anything like the top tier story told from a Pacific Islander point of view. The Pidgen English of this narrative was also a little disconcerting at first, but after awhile I found myself marveling at the amazing vocabulary the author put together to pull this off. It must have taken an enormous amount of time and research.

I picked this book due to the good reviews and I'll pass it forward, though not for anyone looking for a light read.

5 stars for 5

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