Sleeping Giants - Sylvain Neuvel

Sleeping Giants (Themis Files #1) – Sylvain Neuvel (2016)

(4 / 5)

I have seen this one around for a while and wanted to check it out, I read good reviews of the audio version so thought I would give it a go. The audio was really entertaining!

Young 11 year old Rose sets out on her bike one evening and the earth collapses around her. She comes to underground, in a big cavern, sitting in a giant metal hand. As a grown woman, Rose is put in charge of studying the giant hand and soon discovers that there are other parts of this huge statue all over the world, and it wasn’t made by humans. How big is it? Who built it? And what exactly happens when all the parts are put together??

The story was set out in interviews, journals and reports completed after the events were occurring, and a few during peak events. It was so clever, I loved the format of this one. And on audio it was absolutely BRILLIANT! It really felt like I was in a movie at times! It was awesome! I haven’t listened to many audio books with more than one or two narrators. There were a handful in this one, and it worked so well! Sometimes I get annoyed with narrators voicing different characters, especially of the opposite sex. So that solved that issue because the main characters were all different narrators.

I absolutely LOVED our main nameless narrator. What a great character! I wonder if they go more into his story in subsequent novels? The next two books get a more positive reception than this one did, and I really enjoyed this one so have the next one ready to go!

It was a really chilling, yet fun atmosphere. Little bits of information were given away slowly to reach an exciting climax.

The premise was great! The great big giant metal being was reminiscent of “The Day The Earth Stood Still”, and had similar themes, but at the same time very different.

Would I recommend Sleeping Giants?

Yes I think any sci-fi fan would appreciate this one. And it would be perfect for sci-fi novices, especially the audio version which was so easy to listen to!

I purchased Sleeping Giants at my own expense on audible.com