Daegan Smith

I Just Got Sucked In...

Revisado: 03-01-18

It was definitely a fun listen. What I remember most was that I basically listened to it from beginning to end. Start to finish, within a couple days and that’s rare. For me, it was a good story. The main character was just interesting/nerdy enough, the story kept you curious and guessing just enough to hook you from start to finish. It hit all the right science fiction buttons for a fun ride.

That said, if I asked myself “Will I remember this book or year from now?” or “Is it one of those that you just have to tell your friends about as soon as it’s over?”

Sadly, I have to answer no.

Definitely worth the listen but don’t expect to have your mind blown like the first time you saw The Matrix.

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Maybe Only Audiobook I Immediately Hit Repeat...

Revisado: 01-19-18

Would you listen to Dune again? Why?

1,000% certain I'll listen to this far more than one more time. Definitely better than the movie, but more than that this isn't an audiobook. It's a complete saga, full cast of characters, movie like experience. The only comparison that comes immediately too mind is this is like watching the three good batman movies (Batman Begins to Dark Night Rises) only it's audio. For me, one of the best so far and I have invest in a LOT of audible audiobooks.

What other book might you compare Dune to and why?

Definitely up there in the top 10 in my library of thousands and thousands of audiobooks, but what sets it apart is that it's literally an audio movie. There are other audiobooks in my library that I love but they don't have the production value and then others that are more audio sagas like this that I have and enjoy, but not as much as this so I don't want to compared it to others. It stands alone so far.

Which scene was your favorite?

Hmmm... If I have to choose a part maybe when Paul experiences seeing not the future for the first time. I like to imagine into "what would it be like if I could..." and I've found that my ability to unlock that door into that new perspective/viewpoint is always the quality of the metaphor(s) the author offers to me as the "key" - the only key to stepping into the authors shoes.

The metaphors they use to unlock the door to see into the future as Paul does were so vivid and accessible that is almost natural to get a sense for what it would like to have that experience. That stuff excites me. It's like not only did I get to follow along on the sag, but forever, until I die I can say with some certainty right, I've got this new "sense" or filter to view the world thru.

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

Yes. I think audible needs to create a new category, maybe it's even a new word, for audio experiences like this. They're not audiobooks, they are much much much more.

From the outside you can't tell; looks like any other title, but it ain't.

If I could have more experiences like Dune and I had a simple way to find them without listening to 50 samples to find one that is good and represents accurately what you're in for - best believe I'm buying.

Any additional comments?

Here, get a head start (I think this is how it starts...) then buy it.

"A beginning is a very delicate time. Know then, that it is the year 10191. The known universe is ruled by the Padisha Emperor Shaddam IV, my father. In this time, the most precious substance in the Universe is the spice melange. The spice extends life. The spice expands consciousness. The spice is vital to space travel. The Spacing Guild and its navigators, who the spice has mutated over four-thousand years, use the orange spice gas, which gives them the ability to fold space. That is, travel to any part of the Universe without moving. Oh yes, I forget to tell you. The spice exists on only one planet in the entire Universe. A desolate, dry planet with vast deserts. Hidden away within the rocks of these deserts are a people known as the Fremen, who have long held a prophecy, that a man would come, a messiah, who would lead them to true freedom. The planet is Arrakis. Also known as Dune..."

As far as audiobooks go it's about the most value I've gotten here.

Important: If you're new and you're thinking about getting this as your first audiobook - DO NOT. It will set your expectations far past the fair mark for whatever would come next for you...

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Not Bad - A Good Passive Background Listen

Revisado: 01-19-18

What did you like best about Paradox Bound? What did you like least?

That's a hard one for me as I sit back and think on it. I didn't dislike anything, but I also didn't love anything. Six months from now I'll remember it as "the one about the guy and girl who drive through American history to find the 'DREAM'..." and will feel it was ok.

How would you have changed the story to make it more enjoyable?

With a title like "Paradox Bound" I would have really focused the story on the concept of paradoxes and the real world / philosophical implications of what happens when those situations are created and the different types of paradox situations one might encounter more vividly - as real situations with stakes within the story that must be resolved.

Instead this story was kinda a gentle ride through American history where you know how it should end, but your interest stays somewhat peaked by the core concept - paradoxes.

You know, you're listening thinking "I wonder what the huge twist is going to be, because it must be coming."

When you get there you're like "Hmmm... Ok. I didn't see that coming, but definitely not the magnitude of a surprise to how to resolve all this that I was hoping for, but all-in-all worth the journey."

Which scene was your favorite?

When they describe how the blank faced men could "see" by certainty instead of using eyes, ears... That was fun to imagine into and definitely a novel concept I hadn't encountered anywhere else.

Do you think Paradox Bound needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

No. I don't think I'd get it if there was one. Fun enough to follow through to the end of this, but honestly I left the story without really caring about the future of the main characters or why type of shenanigans could be stumbled into next in this fictional landscape.

Any additional comments?

Good as a passive listen - If you're washing clothes, doing dishes, working out, etc. In other words, you're not centrally focus on the story alone. It's something to listen to as you're doing something else more primary, but can be made more enjoyable with a little background distraction.

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F?;*ing Gangster! Only "Darth Plagus" Challenges This One...

Revisado: 01-22-17

I don't know why they don't make movies like this. To me, Star Wars and the new Star Wars don't even compare slightly to this and the other epics told from the perspective of the Darkside.

I'll keep it short. Buy this. Press play, and... Get ready to be seduced by the Darkside…

PS. If you've experienced "Darth Plague" you'll love this bad boy (and vice versa)...

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The Martian - review

Revisado: 12-28-15

I watched the movie before listening to the audiobook. This was also my first time listening to an audiobook without actually reading the book for myself first, so I wasn't quite sure how well I would pay attention.

Since I'd already seen the movie, listening to the book actually made the movie better and vice versa. I'm not a sciency person so I forgot, or failed to pay attention to, the definitions for some of the terms. But I had the movie memories to fall back on. And the book goes more in depth than the movie.

The reader did a great job! He acted out the scenes wonderfully and has a powerful voice.

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I listen to it straight through...

Revisado: 08-26-15

What made the experience of listening to Shada the most enjoyable?

Didn't expect to put this in at 8pm and then not sleep and find reasons to exercise in the middle of the night just so I could keep listening for 11 hours, but once I started it seemed to be the only plausible option so I saw it through.

What was one of the most memorable moments of Shada?

I just like the way that Douglas Adams writes. He's a freaking beast. If a words could be crack then he's got the market is best way to put it. Once you get a taste you can't stop...

Which character – as performed by Lalla Ward – was your favorite?

That ship. Haha... Yeah. That ship with the female voice was by far the best character in my humble opinion.

Any additional comments?

I'd just say that if you like the Hitchhiker series and or you like Dr. Who you are more than hooked up here. You're in for a darn good time.

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Felt Chills At Ending...

Revisado: 08-26-15

Just listen. If you like Q. Trust this might not only be the best Q story, but maybe even the whole Star Trek franchise.

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The Exact Opposite Of Epic....

Revisado: 05-24-15

What would have made Epic Content Marketing better?

Something worth listening to. Imagine if you could turn celery into a book and then made it 8 hours worth of audiobook. That's just about what I experienced.

This was like listening to almost nothing for 8 hours. I lied. I couldn't do it. I couldn't listen the whole thing. I tried though...

The narration was fine. It was just that in every chapter except one, by the time I got about a third of way through it I realized I had wasted my time and then, I just couldn't go any further. Too frustrated, and times to the point of anger.

Even just typing that I feel surprised and strange. That's not me and not an experience I've had before. I'm an optimist. At the beginning of every single chapter I kept hoping things would change, but they never did.

I don't even know how you can write a book this long and say so little of transferrable value. If anything, I'm FAR impressed by what that than anything.

It was wholly superficial.

There were openings where there could have been value, but... nope. Just another quote stating the extremely obvious yet again.

I don't what was in this book, but epic it was not. I expectation of it being good I excited to get into. I even invested in the kindle book anticipating that I'd want to have a text reference.

Now I just feel ashamed and embarrassed for making that decision.

Would you ever listen to anything by Joe Pulizzi again?

Very much doubt it. Right now, honestly I feel like wasted a part of my life trying to find value in this book. Nothing against you Joe, but you called the book "Epic Content Marketing" and it was literally the exact the opposite.

What didn’t you like about Joe Pulizzi’s performance?

His performance vocally was just fine, but there no substance anywhere. I couldn't believe it, but there were literally times where I felt myself growing viscerally irate.

What character would you cut from Epic Content Marketing?

Wasn't about at all.

Any additional comments?

Only that I pray anyone who reads this does not make the same mistake I did.

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Mind Boggling...

Revisado: 04-07-15

What made the experience of listening to Decoding Reality the most enjoyable?

Getting to the last chapter.

Pondering THAT last chapter after the deep exploration of how information plays into every aspect of everything in every way you never knew then adding this whole quantum mechanics thing to it. It's crazy.

It's like science telling you that you literally create the world when you observe it and then it creates meaning for you by giving you more unique information to observe and vice versa.

Then as all these ideas start to gel in your mind you start realize that, life, language, conscious thought and meaning, economies, and potentially any psychosis you may or may not have all, from an informational standpoint are all different version of the same thing.

Then you start thinking about the relationship between entropy (randomness in the universe) and information (the order that life creates through it's observation) which is, as our conscious understanding of the universe grows, becomes more stable and complexity so does randomness within the physical universe. Thats nuts.

It means that as we learn the universe literally gives us more to learn, and it's not that nature will confirm what we know. It will predominately, just like a mutation to a strand of DNA - one mistake in million most of the time kills the developing fetus, provide more random observable events that will disprove what we thought we knew.

You can see where this leads right? We're, as humans, machines built to create meaning from new information at higher and higher levels of complexity. We never question our quest for knowledge, but it always for that "thing" that will make everything make sense, and well that's the one thing that can never happen.

It's also ironic that we, as humans, tend to search for the confirmation of what we think might be true all day and everyday, but the universe primarily provides possibilities for us to observe things that will tell us what it isn't. It has to because there has to the potential for infinite possibilities for it and us to exist.

If you only know what something isn't then, sure, that creates distinctions but you can never know what you don't know so there's always an infinity of possibilities within that range. It's like the buffer for everything to exist.

Anyways, I'm still going through all the possibilities mentally right now as you probably see. The book has created a shift in perspective completely, in that one distinction alone. Life wants order so it wants to confirm it's right so it's safe. That's why we act as we do, but then we also observe random negative things happen in the physical world like earthquakes and assign negative meanings to them as if they confirm something. Maybe... I don't know.

I'd just say that understanding of meaning has shifted dramatically because of this relationship between life and physical world.

Ohh! One last new distinction, if life is necessary, or some observer needs to be present for anything that isn't life to exist then it means that we're (things that live and store complex information) integrally important. The sun needs us just as much as we need it (but we're the only one's that it. haha...)

The conclusion is one of those I'll listen to at least 20 more times. To come to a point where a person can explain to you how something comes from nothing and how it happens all the time and then shares exactly how it's happening right now and it's us, as we observe it that creates that it.

To truly understand how nothing exists until we observe it is mind boggling.

Any additional comments?

The ONLY negative thing here in this book was that the author did on several occasions bring up concepts like god and free will and would then argue against them as if you as the reader necessarily take that stance. It was strange and felt out of place to me.

Here in this highly scientific context devoting a few large segments to concepts we create because we need meaning when there isn't any so we we create it. It didn't feel scientific. It felt very forced and kinda manipulative in that the arguments he'd set up for the imaginary "free will" believer didn't make sense and was unfounded so it was easy to poke holes in and then demolish.

All in all though, way worth it for the quantum shift in my own perspectives and the ability to explore them.

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Profound & Life Changing...

Revisado: 04-06-15

Where does What Is Life? rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

This is one of the best audiobooks I've invested in on audible. As a college graduate with a BS in Biology concentrated in neuropharmacology and a minor in chemistry who's favorite course were molecular evolution and organic chemistry this was like going home.

I'd say this as a warning, if you're not familiar with terms like chirality or the process in which genes are expressed this might be a stretch from a comprehension standpoint, but if you are up for the challenge this book is absolutely worth it.

It's worth it anyway. It absolutely makes good on the title in far more comprehensive way than I expected.

For me, if I leave with with far more clarity than I started with on a subject I love, new questions about it that further my personal exploration of the subject, AND profound insights on things in realms far removed from the topic itself, that's what learning is about and that's exactly what this is.

What is life? Well, you'll find the most clear, lucid, quantifiable, and deductively valid answer to that question and a LOT more right here.

The value of the experience and permanent change to my world view FAR outweighs the cost.

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