Audiobook Review – The City Born Great by N.K. Jemisin, Narrated by Landon Woodson (4/5 stars)

Reading Level: Adult
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Length: 46 minutes
Publisher:‎ Macmillan Audio
Release Date: May 12, 2020
ASIN: ‎B082VMMZQ9
Stand Alone or Series: Prequel to The Great Cities Trilogy
Source: Borrowed audiobook from library
Rating: 4/5 stars

“Like all great metropolises before it, when a city gets big enough, old enough, it must be born; but there are ancient enemies who cannot tolerate new life. Thus New York will live or die by the efforts of a reluctant midwife…and how well he can learn to sing the city’s mighty song.”

Series Info/Source: This is a prequel to The Great Cities Trilogy. I borrowed this as an audiobook from the library

Audiobook Quality (4/5): The audiobook was well done and easy to listen to, I enjoyed it.

Thoughts: This would be a great stand alone story and has some amazing concepts. However, if you have already read the first book in the The Great Cities Trilogy “The City We Became” this feels more like a sketch of that one. Yes, it does fill in a bit of background and I do really enjoy the concepts behind this.

Jemisin is an amazing author and this was incredibly well written with amazing concepts. This story was very well done just like all her other writings, however I don’t think it has as much impact if you have already read “The City We Became”. Still it is well written and a short piece, so it’s worth the time you invest to check it out.

My Summary (4/5): Overall I really enjoyed this but think it has less impact if you have already read “The City We Became”. There are some fascinating concepts here and it does provide a bit of background for the series. I would recommend picking it up if you loved the first book in The Great Cities and want more or if you haven’t read that book and want a quick intro to the concepts of that series. It was well done, I hope more books will be released in The Great Cities trilogy at some point!