The Long Cosmos

A Novel

By: Terry Pratchett, Stephen Baxter

Narrated by: Michael Fenton Stevens

Length: 12 hrs and 22 mins

Publisher's summary

The thrilling conclusion to the internationally best-selling Long Earth series explores the greatest question of all: What is the meaning of life?

It's 2070-71. Nearly six decades after Step Day, a new society continues to evolve in the Long Earth. Now, a message has been received: "Join us".

The Next - the hyperintelligent posthumans - realize that the missive contains instructions for kick-starting the development of an immense artificial intelligence known as The Machine. But to build this computer the size of an Earth continent, they must obtain help from the more populous and still industrious worlds of mankind.

Meanwhile, on a trek in the High Meggers, Joshua Valienté, now nearing 70, is saved from death when a troll band discovers him. Living among the trolls as he recovers, Joshua develops a deeper understanding of this collective-intelligence species and its society. He discovers that some older trolls with capacious memories act as communal libraries and live on a very strange Long Earth world, in caverns under the root systems of trees as tall as mountains.

Valienté also learns something much more profound about life and its purpose in the Long Earth: We cultivate the cosmos to maximize the opportunities for life and joy in this universe - and to prepare for new universes to come.

©2016 Terry Pratchett, Lyn Pratchett, and Stephen Baxter (P)2016 HarperCollins Publishers

Good series worth listening to

A few slow spots in the earlier books. This one moves along. Great narration as always from MFS.

Great finale to the saga

The long earth series was extremely interesting and made a lot of philosophical and metaphysical points. The characters themeselves didn't seem to have grown with their character arcs but they just seemed to be a p.o.v. for the worlds. The generation and characterization of the worlds were fabulous. I think this was my favorite of the series.

a beautiful farewell

a beautiful farewell to a wonderful story and a peerless author who has touched millions of lives. the performance was fun and funny, and ultimately, beautifully, exquisite.

A Satisfying Conclusion

Everything you'd want to close out the series. love the narrator and an excellent story. 5 stars!

Beautiful and Awe inspiring

Ending the story the way it began, what a beautiful experience. The hard science concepts are a dream of storytelling. This is the best Science Fiction novel series I read yet.

Wish there was more.

The end is such a great jumping off point for more stories. I'd love to see an anthology set in the long cosmos with stories by many different authors.

A Worthy Conclusion

A solid ending to a very good and thoughtful series. More poignant after the loss of Sir Terry, but enjoyable nonetheless.

I read the whole series so I guess I liked it...

This series felt like it never took off the way it should've. The idea of the Long Earth was fascinating with so many possibilities, but then we had to leap almost immediately to space, and stepping between millions of worlds and barely seeing any of them. The characters overall felt bland and soulless. I never liked any of them. They were all very self-absorbed and never cared for anyone except themselves. Joshua came the closest to caring about anyone else with his regrets and other bouts of self-pity. Even the sisters came off rather bland. This particular novel tried to be cute--I understand putting in the little "Easter eggs" for Pratchett fans, but honestly, the Discworld turtle swallowing the exploratory vessel? Other elements were tossed in, like Jan stowing away. Did anyone else cringe at the bales of straw in a "spaceship" for the troll? The troll Sancho morphed into the orangutan librarian from the Discworld novels, practically saying "ook," even. Joshua was becoming an elderly Pratchett with his large hat. I groaned when the traversers conveniently appeared with Nelson's missing grandson. And I so wanted the giant machine the Next were overseeing to be something clever and different. But no, just more bloody stepping. As if an infinity of Earths wasn't enough, now we have an inifinity of universes. Yawn. More stuff that will never be explored or explained. How could an idea so compelling be executed in such a boring way? The novel felt thrown together in the last third, like Baxter was attempting to wrap up loose ends so he could go do something else. The book was released a year after Pratchett's death, and yet there was no mention of it in either the foreward or the acknowledgements at the end. The entire series had a sterile competency to it, so unlike Pratchett's work. Like someone created a list of elements a good science fiction novel has in it, and those items were ticked off by the work, but without art or feeling added. It's amazing how so many great plot elements were combined into such a lengthy book that just never felt very interesting. Loads of interesting ideas that were dropped after a chapter or two. I see a lot of ideas from these books that appear in Dennis E. Taylor's work, which I initially thought showed him in a bad light. However, he does much more interesting things with the same building blocks, so I think he has the right to use them.

entertaining but not compelling

I enjoyed the story overall, when I was listening to it it was entertaining, but the story was slow enough in progression that I did not feel compelled to come back to listen to it each time I stopped. I had to make myself come back and listen, when I did it was okay, but not great.

Very nice

Easy to pick up where we left off. Sad to see it end. Captivating from start to finish.