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Katabasis: A Novel Audiobook, by R. F. Kuang Play Audiobook Sample

Katabasis: A Novel Audiobook

Katabasis: A Novel Audiobook, by R. F. Kuang Play Audiobook Sample
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Read By: Morag Sims, Will Watt Publisher: HarperAudio Listen Time: at 1.0x Speed 12.33 hours at 1.5x Speed 9.25 hours at 2.0x Speed Release Date: August 2025 Format: Unabridged Audiobook ISBN: 9780063021501

Quick Stats About this Audiobook

Total Audiobook Chapters:

39

Longest Chapter Length:

59:26 minutes

Shortest Chapter Length:

06 seconds

Average Chapter Length:

28:34 minutes

Audiobooks by this Author:

12

Other Audiobooks Written by R. F. Kuang: > View All...

Publisher Description

Dante’s Inferno meets Susanna Clarke’s Piranesi in this all-new dark academia fantasy from R. F. Kuang, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Babel and Yellowface, in which two graduate students must put aside their rivalry and journey to Hell to save their professor’s soul—perhaps at the cost of their own. 

Katabasis, noun, Ancient Greek:

The story of a hero’s descent to the underworld

Alice Law has only ever had one goal: to become one of the brightest minds in the field of Magick. She has sacrificed everything to make that a reality: her pride, her health, her love life, and most definitely her sanity. All to work with Professor Jacob Grimes at Cambridge, the greatest magician in the world.

That is, until he dies in a magical accident that could possibly be her fault.

Grimes is now in Hell, and she’s going in after him. Because his recommendation could hold her very future in his now incorporeal hands and even death is not going to stop the pursuit of her dreams….

Nor will the fact that her rival, Peter Murdoch, has come to the very same conclusion.

With nothing but the tales of Orpheus and Dante to guide them, enough chalk to draw the Pentagrams necessary for their spells, and the burning desire to make all the academic trauma mean anything, they set off across Hell to save a man they don’t even like.

But Hell is not like the storybooks say, Magick isn’t always the answer, and there’s something in Alice and Peter’s past that could forge them into the perfect allies…or lead to their doom.

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“Morag Sims and Will Watt provide fittingly erudite performances of this layered audiobook…Sims handles the majority of the work. Her voice captures studious yet vulnerable Alice, while Watt provides a foil in Peter, an academic star with secrets. Their potent combination is thought provoking and affecting. Winner of the AudioFile Earphones Award.”

— AudioFile

Awards

  • A #1 New York Times Bestseller
  • An Amazon Editors' Pick of Best Science Fiction & Fantasy
  • A Barnes & Noble Bestseller
  • Winner of an AudioFile Earphones Award

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About R. F. Kuang

R. F. Kuang is a #1 New York Times bestselling author whose books have been a finalist for the Hugo, Nebula, Locus, and World Fantasy awards. She is a Marshall scholar and a translator and has an MPhil degree in Chinese studies from Cambridge and an MSc in contemporary Chinese studies from Oxford University.

About the Narrators

Saskia Maarleveld is an experienced voice-over actress and Earphones Award–winning narrator. Raised in New Zealand and France, she is highly skilled with accents and dialects, and many of her books have been narrated entirely in accents other than her own. In addition to audiobooks, her voice can be heard in animation, video games, and commercials.

Mary Jane Wells (a.k.a. McAllister Lee) is a British actress, writer, voice-over artist, and Earphones Award and Audie Award–winning narrator. A graduate of the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, she held a recurring role on the BBC’s Half Moon Investigates and narrated the BBC Three television show My Children, which won a Scottish BAFTA.