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The Gripping Hand cover art

The Gripping Hand

By: Jerry Pournelle, Larry Niven
Narrated by: L. J. Ganser
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Summary

Robert Heinlein called it "possibly the finest science fiction novel I have ever read". The San Francisco Chronicle declared that "as science fiction, The Mote in God's Eye is one of the most important novels ever published". Now Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, award-winning authors of such best sellers as Footfall and The Legacy of Heorot, return us to the Mote, and to the universe of Kevin Renner and Horace Bury, of Rod Blaine and Sally Fowler.

There, 25 years have passed since humanity quarantined the mysterious aliens known as Moties within the confines of their own solar system. They have spent a quarter century analyzing and agonizing over the deadly threat posed by the only aliens mankind has ever encountered - a race divided into distinct biological forms, each serving a different function: Master, Mediator, Engineer, Warrior. Each supremely adapted to its task, yet doomed by millions of years of evolution to an inescapable fate. For the Moties must breed - or die. And now the fragile wall separating them and the galaxy beyond is beginning to crumble.

©1993 Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

What listeners say about The Gripping Hand

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Waited for more

In short - I was somehow disappointed in the book.

I had a unique situation, as I already had read the book once in paper format but as the first one (I read the first part of the series after this second part only - somehow started the other way around). So - the first time I loved the book - a lot! Then came a big pause (several years) until I got to read the first book of the series, liked it quite well and decided I had forgotten all about what happens in the second part, so let's read it again!

Well, somehow now it seemed that the first part was much more interesting and the main reason is that the story there moved much quicker. In this book - the Gripping Hand - half of the book or more you are waiting and waiting for some action to start at last, you are bored to death with descriptions of all the Imperial laws and casts and royals and lords and who knows what. Who cares, really??? Give me the aliens already! And when you get them and you already had read the first book, you don't have much of any surprises there left for them, and there seems to be much less interesting interactions with humans there as it was in the first book. So, maybe reading the first book, spoiled the second one... but it shouldn't be like that... so the only conclusion is that the author went wrong somewhere.

So - maybe, if you choose to read it as the only book of the series, it will still be a good choice. But I guess, you should better pick the first one.

I can't rate it bad though, as I loved it the first time I read it. And I liked the narrator, too.

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2 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars
  • B.
  • 26-06-22

Long-winded and without the revelations of part 1

I liked part one very much because there were some exciting new concepts in it. This second book is very long winded and really just involves ships going back and forth, shooting at each other, and not much else. The revelations of the relationships within the Moti families did little to help the story.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Better than the first one

Except some really cringe expression involving lizards this book is great. Much better than the first one.
It has some incredible predictions but it was published in 1993 almost 20 years after the first one. Discussions about private/public encryption keys and more useful persona assistants than Alexa or Google.
Great relationship between the trader Barry and his friend.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Great science-fiction story

This is a very good science fiction story but is somewhat dated in its characterisation.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Far too little story related to the Moties

As with the previous book it is set in a empire filled mostly royal Scottish people who are either Christian or Muslim - why this is i have no idea. What it lacks however is Moties. The story takes many hours going into irrelevant directions which don't give us anymore info on Moties. A wasted opportunity basically to build on a interesting first book.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

sadly, a dull sequel to a classic

Dull and overlong- disappointing.
Much talking by characters whose presence in the narrative only appears to to discuss what’s happening for the benefit of the reader.
The whole first section could easily have been dropped

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

An absolute classic storyline

I read the book years ago whilst still a teenager. I love audiobooks and this one is well produced. I'm not a big fan of the narrator but you get used to his style quite quickly. Also, his delivery is quite in keeping with the actual book itself.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Fantastic stuff for N&P universe fans

You can't go wrong with these two. Only criticism is it ends too early but was that because I was enjoying the motie space battles. Someone needs to do a figurine of a motie warrior 😉

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Ruined by OTT narrator

Essentially the same review that I posted for the first book, as I unfortunately bought them both at the same time. This is a great story, being ruined by a narrator who seems to have trained entirely on a diet of action movie trailer voice-overs.

There's unnecessary and hugely distracting amounts of emphasis on almost every word in some sentences. Within minutes of starting to listen, I'm not hearing a story any more, just some sort of freestyle vocal gymnastics - constant pitch and volume changes that combine to somehow leech all meaning from the words.

As with the first book, I hope this one gets re-read by another narrator at some point; I'd love to be able to hear the story, instead of the person reading it.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

more great to listen to and imagination great

more of the same pls characters were a revelation in the story real interesting

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