Local Heavens

By: K.M. Fajardo

Narrated by: Pun Bandhu, Mieko Gavia

“Easily one of my favorite books of the year. Creative, incisive, and elegantly crafted, this one will wow you even as it wrecks you—you’ll be holding your breath to the end.” —Olivie Blake, New York Times bestselling author of The Atlas Six

A bold sci-fi retelling of The Great Gatsby set in the fractured New Americas of 2075, where a futuristic thriller unravels against a backdrop of stark class divides, tangled desires, and the haunting price of the American Nightmare.

A corporate hacker. An elusive billionaire. A society trying to survive the American Nightmare.

New York City, 2075. Filipino American Nick Carraway has just moved to the heart of the fractured New Americas, where he’s struck by the city’s contradictions—shining corporate towers casting bleak shadows over the slums of a crumbling middle class.

When Nick meets alluring, new-money Jay Gatsby, he falls for Gatsby’s frank charm and confident aura. But in a city where the wealthy flaunt tech-enhanced bodies to cheat death, surfaces aren’t all they seem—and as a corporate-sanctioned cyberspace hacker, Nick knows that no secret can stay buried forever. He’s the reason they don’t. And his latest assignment? Investigate Gatsby himself.

As Nick becomes entangled in the dark affairs of the elite—and the devastating fallout of their actions on the city’s most vulnerable—he must reckon with the limits of compassion and accountability across class and status. What takes precedence: Love or truth? Heart or soul?

A brilliant reimagining of Fitzgerald’s classic tale of glamour, desire, and desperation, Local Heavens examines the guardrails of morality…and the price of desire.

Critic reviews

"Pun Bandhu narrates most of this unique cyberpunk reimagining of “The Great Gatsby.” The year is 2075, and Nick Carraway is an expert cyberspace diver. His new contract brings him to New York, where he meets up with his cousin, Daisy; her abrasive husband, Tom; and Daisy’s friend, Jordan. Nick poses as Jay Gatsby’s newest Gen Wealth employee so he can investigate the mysterious man behind the company. Mieko Gavia voices short segments relating to Gen Wealth’s business, showing an impressive balance between saccharine sales pitches and desperate people who are struggling to make ends meet. Bandhu’s excellent pacing enhances tense scenes as Nick delves into Gatsby’s past. Most impressively, Bandhu switches smoothly between Nick’s caution and Gatsby’s charm."

AI Assisted Narrator

Pronunciation of “Ate Daisy” ruined the entire experience. Filipino accents & dialogue included but failed to catch this mishap

Great telling of a retelling.

I've never read The Great Gatsby, so I was drawn to the sci-fi cyberpunk aspects of this story. Those aspects were awesome! The narration and riveting story got me through this book in about 7 hours during a work day.

Languid Deathless Song

A Masterpiece

At the great risk of a horde of pitchfork-wielding Fitzgerald fans coming for me, I’m just gonna say it: Fajardo out-Fitzgeralded Fitzgerald. Local Heavens is a futuristic, cyberpunk re-telling of the now hundred-year-old The Great Gatsby — where people have elaborate body modifications (“mod”), Daisy Buchanan is a “Happy Sleep” (a sort of partial virtual/partial hallucination situation) star, and Jordan Baker plays not golf, but *bullet golf*, with the aid of her extensive body mods, Nick Carraway is a Phillipino-American net diver - Black Mirror/Matrix style. And Gatsby is, well, Gatsby, but with everything you ever wanted for and from him in the OG version. In this unlikely-seeming re-telling, Fajardo somehow manages to expand on the original themes of Fitzgerald’s work, from exploring wealth disparity, to the ever more complex relationships between the characters as their relationships are woven into deeper webs.
An absolute stand-out in an already remarkable novel is Fajardo’s prose. Her turn of phrase is at once sharp and delicate. There are no wasted words, yet each chapter had me reading passages over and over again - just to savor the feeling of the words in my head. In a time of what feels like increasingly cut-and-paste fiction, reading something written with such obvious love, time, and care was an absolute gift. Local Heavens is a book that, upon finishing, you will flip right back to the beginning so you can start all over again.

Also, the audiobook narrator’s voice is 🔥🔥🔥