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Jack Four
- Narrated by: Nathaniel Priestley
- Length: 14 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged Audiobook
- Categories: Science Fiction & Fantasy, Science Fiction
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Summary
Created to die - determined to live.
Jack Four - one of 20 human clones - has been created to be sold. His purchasers are the alien prador, and they only want him for their experimentation program. But there is something different about Jack. No clone should possess the knowledge that’s been loaded into his mind. And no normal citizen of humanity’s Polity worlds would have this information.
The prador’s king has been mutated by the Spatterjay virus into a creature even more monstrous than the prador themselves. And his children, the King’s Guard, have undergone similar changes. They were infected by the virus during the last humans-versus-prador war, now lapsed into an uneasy truce. But the prador are always looking for new weapons - and their experimentation program might give them the edge they seek.
Suzeal trades human slaves out of the Stratogaster Space Station, re-engineering them to serve the prador. She thinks the rewards are worth the risks, but all that is about to change. The station was once a zoo, containing monsters from across known space. All the monsters now dwell on the planet below, but they aren’t as contained as they seem. And a vengeful clone may be the worst danger of all.
Critic reviews
"Neal Asher’s books are like an adrenaline shot targeted directly for the brain." (John Scalzi, author of the Old Man’s War series)
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What listeners say about Jack Four
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Stu
- 08-07-21
Preder Preder Preder
Neal, I know you look at these things, For my perspective, i'd just started playing a game called "Empyrion" You wake up as a clone in hostile territory with a hunger... and I seem to eat every 5 mins in that game or i'm in real danger of dying of hunger - good to see Jack feels the same way..or was it me ? Bravo for the uncanny timing of this coming out. FOR THE LOVE OF BROCKLE never ever use this Narrator again, ever. For every one of your other books, the wonderful narrators say the word "Prador" and pronounce the "o" The genius narrator of this book has decided to pronounce it " Prader" with fekcin E instead of an O. It really really hurts to listen to the name diminished, it's just wrong.
6 people found this helpful
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- Wayne Fitzgerald
- 27-08-21
Nasty Book
The synopsis for this was quite interesting, there the interest ended. Pity you can’t give a review negative stars! I listened for a couple of hours, you have to give things a chance, It started with violence and rape and quickly went down hill (if that is possible). A nasty piece of work from a mind which seems to me to be very warped. Perhaps the “Author” has spent too much time playing zombie/alien shoot it ups on his chosen console
4 people found this helpful
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- Paul J.
- 31-08-21
Mediocre at best
Maybe this genre isn't for me, but I don't get the 4.5 current rating. Good imagination and the story rounds off well, but how many times can someone be stupid enough to get captured time and time again? Get tortured? Get eviscerated? Rescued? And start all over again. the 3 stars is because there are some smart ideas in the story, but by the end, I couldn't wait for it to finish, then didn't realised it had until I realised I was listening to the glossary. Do I recommend this one, it's a marmite book obviously. Not for me.
3 people found this helpful
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- ChrisH
- 03-08-21
Has the feel of a spaghetti western .
Annoying mispronunciation of Prador throughout which grated during a fast paced action adventure which just happened to be based in the Polity.
2 people found this helpful
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- Peter Comninos
- 18-07-21
One of my favourite SF writers.
Good hard SF book with plenty of action in his familiar universe. Excellent narration.
1 person found this helpful
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- BrianP
- 15-05-22
Sorry, Neal, juvenile drivel
I did eventually listen to this all the way through, but it was hard work. Apart from the unnecessary gore-fest, the flaw with this book is that over and over again, the protagonist would be put into a dire situation and then at the last moment, "With one bound, Jack was free". Over and over again, bullets and missiles would just miss him, whereas he killed hundreds of opponents. Over and over again, his armour would stop him from being killed, whereas opponents' armour wouldn't protect them at all. Over and over again, he would be brought back to full health by magic so-called "autodocs", conveniently being given enough time between engagements to fully heal. I hate to criticise someone's creative effort, but this is just juvenile tosh. The narrator does a good job, but like many SF stories set lightyears from Earth, the protagonists seem to have a variety of UK regional accents - necessary I suppose to allow you to distinguish the characters, but bizarre all the same
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- Anonymous User
- 30-10-21
Narrator was passionless and flat
I thought the narration was very poor, monotonous and really flat - I’ll have to read this one as after 14 hours of listening, I really couldn’t tell you very much about the plot or characters etc - found the presentation so dull, my thoughts would wander else where. Disappointed as I’m a Neal Asher fan
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- Amazon Customer
- 05-08-21
So good
It is hard to believe that someone can conjure such a detailed storyverse
One of the best Neal Asher books
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- SF
- 26-06-21
Not up to Asher’s usual standard
Being a longtime fan of Neil Asher and the rich and terrifying universe he has created I couldn’t help at being disappointed with this one. Perhaps it was the first person perspective. Rather than creating a sense of intimacy or urgency it played out like a rather long winded first person shooter. Even the hooders, usually a terrifying menace in prior stories, felt like props that popped up at the end of a level and then went on their merry way. Overall entirely missable.