The Space Merchants cover art

The Space Merchants

Preview

Audible Standard 30-day free trial

Try Standard free
Select 1 audiobook a month from our entire collection.
Listen to your selected audiobooks as long as you're a member.
Get unlimited access to bingeable podcasts.
Standard auto renews for £5.99 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

The Space Merchants

By: Frederik Pohl, C. M. Kornbluth
Narrated by: Dan Bittner
Try Standard free

£5.99 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for £16.29

Buy Now for £16.29

About this listen

In a vastly overpopulated near-future world, businesses have taken the place of governments and now hold all political power. States exist merely to ensure the survival of huge transnational corporations. Advertising has become hugely aggressive and boasts some of the world's most powerful executives.

Through advertising, the public is constantly deluded into thinking that all the products on the market improve the quality of life. However, the most basic elements are incredibly scarce, including water and fuel.

The planet Venus has just been visited and judged fit for human settlement, despite its inhospitable surface and climate; colonists would have to endure a harsh climate for many generations until the planet could be terraformed.

Mitch Courtenay is a star-class copywriter in the Fowler Schocken advertising agency and has been assigned the ad campaign that would attract colonists to Venus, but a lot more is happening than he knows about. Mitch is soon thrown into a world of danger, mystery, and intrigue, where the people in his life are never quite what they seem, and his loyalties and core beliefs will be put to the test in Frederik Pohl's novel The Space Merchants.

Dystopian Fantasy Science Fiction

Critic reviews

“A novel of the future that the present must inevitably rank as a classic.” —<i>The New York Times</i>
All stars
Most relevant
I managed to get through it in one go whilst at work. If you are heavy into this type of thing then it's decent, however if you just dip your toe in now and again then you can quite easily find better.

Decent.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

fell asleep a few times listening to it, but easy to pickup where I left off. Performance was good, though story was a little dated. Worth the time

Classic sci-fi at it's ok-est

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.