The Ship Who Searched

Brainship

Hypatia Cade—a headstrong, smart, and spunky 7-year-old girl—falls ill after contracting an alien virus that renders her a quadriplegic. Robbed of her mobility, Tia's only hope to be free of the prison of her body is to train to be one of the legendary star travelers, a brainship—a cyborg human being and interstellar spacecraft. Following her training, she must find the right partner to be her brawn, the human element every brainship requires.

When the disease that debilitated Tia threatens thousands more, selecting a brawn who is her true soul mate may allow Tia to find the origin of the terrible plague—and perhaps even a cure.

©1999 Anne McCaffrey (P)1999 Phoenix Books, Inc.

Prefer unabridged but not too bad

The abridged version leaves out much of the soul searching and parentheses that Ms Lackey indulges in, which is good. But this version, as other readers have said, goes a little - just a little - too far. The scene where Hypatia chooses a 'brawn' is cut drastically and looses it's coherance. The bits with the bear are cut too much. Lars is cut too much. Etc. The book is cut to a little more that two hours. A three hour version would be much better.

I love Anne McCaffrey

A great story for any age. No sex. No violence. Well read. I love McCaffrey. She is my favorite author.

The story is still enjoyable

However, as others have commented, the abridgement is very poorly done, with characters making reference to comments made earlier in the story that were cut, and, in one case, a character "replies" to a question that was not asked.

As this is a story I know very well (I have lost count of the number of times I've reread it), I'm frustrated by the editing. While some of the edits don't noticeably interrupt the flow of the tale, others are so glaringly obvious, I find myself pausing the book for a period of time.

I love all the Brain Ship Books

I’ve read the actual paper back copies of the entire book. My only regret with the audio version is that it isn’t the entire book. I think the narrator’s voice is perfect for this book. At least as far as Hypatia goes. Listening to the abridged version does make me want to go out and buy the actual print version, which of course I already had long before I ever heard of Audible. Excellent job, in any case!

Unabridged Version

This is my favorite of Anne MacCaffrey's Ships series - however, the abridgement detracts from the story. I would love to hear this as an unabridged version.