I didn't realize the Mountain View Library still has books on cassette tapes. Neat!

So glad I'm not the only one who feels that way about The Difference Engine. (And I don't generally dislike Sterling...this book just didn't work for me.)

There seems to be a playlist on YouTube with slightly better quality: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLYn090EvNBcinpVcrKNmY...

*EDIT:* There's also the CD version somewhere out there. Here's a Reddit post where someone ripped it (but didn't make it available): https://www.reddit.com/r/Neuromancer/comments/1gr7k4n/audiob...

I listened to Neuromancer on a long drive one time, and I will say that it's a wonderful book but not one that's particularly suited to the audiobook medium. It's hard to follow at times because it avoids a lot of big picture narrative and instead focuses on very small scale scenes of events happening within a broader story. It means that it can be confusing at times, as you are often as in the dark as the characters are.

This is an abridged version, so maybe it streamlines some aspects of the narrative, so take that into account.

This is probably something worth submitting to the Internet Archive if you’re worried about it disappearing!

Previously:

William Gibson reads Neuromancer, from tape to mp3 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14021369 - April 2017 (3 comments)

Re. the date:

- The original book was published in 1984

- This abridged audio reading seems to have been published in 1994

- This article was published in 2004

Years ago I was blown away to learn about this "Gibson reads Neuromancer" audio book only when I heard it sampled in a song[0] by Haujobb (the band, not the demoscene group). I recognized the words as being from Neuromancer, one of my top favorite books, but I wasn't aware of where it was from. Had to do some searching online to discover the audio was sampled from Gibson's reading of his own book. Very cool surprise! (as an aside, if you like cyberpunk-esque music, can absolutely recommend this band - check out "Solutions for a Small Planet")

[0] https://haujobb.bandcamp.com/track/penetration-fuck-the-floo... at 2m45s