Category: Science Fiction

Categories
Science Fiction

SPSFC Semifinalist Review: The Peacemaker’s Code by Deepak Malhotra

As we read through the semifinalist round of the 2023 SPSFC, here is my second full review. If you haven’t been following along, I’m a member of team At Boundary’s Edge and have been posting my individual reviews and scores. These opinions are mine alone and don’t reflect those of the team nor anyone else in the competition. Anyway, let’s look at the book and then you can see my 2nd review out of six to come before the end of April!

BOOKISH QUICK FACTS:
  • Title: The Peacemaker’s Code
  • Series: N/A
  • Author: Deepak Malhotra
  • Publisher & Release: Self, 2021
  • Length: 500 pages
  • SPSFC score: 7/10
HERE’S THE SYNOPSIS FROM AM*ZON:

Professor Kilmer, a renowned historian of war and diplomacy, is collected from his home and whisked off to Washington. Thrust into the highest levels of government as an adviser to the President, the young historian must come to terms with the seemingly impossible, figure out how to navigate a world where not everything is as it appears, and use all the skills and knowledge he has acquired in his life to help save humanity from a conflict of truly epic proportions. A genre-breaking novel that re-examines the human condition and masterfully blends some of the most compelling themes in literature: war & peace, strategy & serendipity, love & friendship, courage & fear, the bounds of possibility, and the limits of imagination. Replete with mysteries that will compel you to keep turning the pages, powerful moments that will stop you dead in your tracks, and insights that will change the way you understand and navigate the world. Most of all… a journey you will not forget.

My thoughts:

My goodness this is a tricky batch of books so far. The first book was exciting but horrendously edited and presented, while The Peacemaker’s Code had my brain in a fog but is meticulously edited and well presented.

This is another surprisingly soft sci-fi. First contact will always be considered a dear part of the genre but I don’t think I’ve ever read a first contact book where the aliens remain an on page idea rather than an entity we don’t actually “meet”.

Hear me out here, spaceships appear and we see the aliens talking, but in 500 pages no character actually meets an alien. they took nearly 200 pages to land on Earth, and there was nothing but debate relating to the aliens leading up to that point.

So the crutch is this: it’s a book about negotiation, superimposed on a first contact setting. I was dying waiting to meet the aliens while the characters just debated and debated various facets that didn’t have any context yet since first contact (other than with radio relays)  hadn’t occured. How much of this can we read before we just meet an alien? Well… 500 pages worth.  Personally I tuned out irrevocably but I’m still giving credit where it’s due, despite that there’s hardly any action. Even when the world is being attacked we get the view from the Situation Room.

That said though, he didn’t set out to write an action thriller so I can’t treat it as something it’s not supposed to be.

So… You gave it a 7? Yes! That all said, I liked Kilmer and Silla and a few of the other characters. I’m not going to fault the author who is a professor at Harvard for writing something his colleagues would love.  There are plenty of interesting ideas buried in the historical comparisons and there’s actually something to say for a book about first contact that keeps the aliens more or less an on page idea only.

What do they want? Why are they here? How do we communicate? Can we save the planet? All the big sci-fi ideas are here somewhere, just not in typical form.

Personally I’m here for more sci-fi, actual aliens, & action, with much less chatter when things are getting heated.  Realistically, I can acknowledge that the MC is a dude I’d love to get a coffee with and let him make me feel like a total idiot while discussing nerdy things.

My favorite idea in the whole book, despite not being a fan of romantic notions in sci-fi, was this feeling of an “us” despite all memories being cleaned out and a situation that repeated itself anyway.

I’m coming in at a 7/10 here, which is about the best score I’ve given in the competition so far. This book is far above average in the self published world but I have to take into consideration that it completely beat my attention span. Sorry professor 😅

Thanks for checking out my semifinalist review of The Peacemaker’s Code by Deepak Malhotra! An e-copy was provided for judging purposes although I read it through Kindle Unlimited. As always, all opinions are my own 🚀

You can find all the competition updates at thespsfc.org 

Categories
audiobooks Fiction Mysteries Science Fiction

The Avram Davidson Treasury: The Sixties (How I’m Getting the Hang of This)

I’m still reading a story here and a story there, and I’ve now made it through The Sixties! The first thing I’d recommend doing is checking out my intro post that also covered stories from the fifties, as I’m not going to repeat myself about the author and collection in general

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In general

Jumping right in, I think I moderately enjoyed the stories from the Sixties more than the Fifties.  Davidson’s penchant for language and linguistics came out in a more accessible format for someone like me, who’s not a genius and just likes reading good stories.

The Real MVP is Spider Robinson’s intro to Sacheverell, because it’s hilarious and now I want to read everything Spider has written. Anyone recommend where to start?

The magic of a google search

Many more good points were made by the authors introducing the stories, the main one being that most of the time Davidson omits “the point” on purpose, and leaves the reader to connect the dots.  I’m not good at this.  LeGuin pointed out that he throws in a lot of humor and extras, to see if people know what they mean, like the term “freemartin”, and it enhances the stories obviously if you catch his hints. That said, I’m so worried that I’m missing a lot of jokes and insights 🤣

A few of the stories so far have just made no sense to me whatsoever, so I jotted down a few keywords and did a Google search. Walla, boom, like magic, a historical backdrop popped out. (I’m looking at you, The Price of a Charm).

Frankly I’d just love to read these stories with someone who’s a better literary critic, because most of my insights are coming from the author intros and I’d miss the cool things if not for them, but I’m getting the hang of this!

Let’s talk about a few specific stories for kicks:
  • I read The Sources of the Nile twice, a few days apart, and I made more connections the second time around. Davidson had a lot of angst about what publishers & the public are looking for, I think, and he probably got a kick out of  writing this one
  • The Affair at Lahore Cantonment won an Edgar Award for best short story, and was on my reading list anyway for “reading that takes place in, or has meaning in London“. Personally I’m most enjoying the stories influenced by Davidson’s travels.  On the other hand, this is one of the stories that makes me feel like I don’t appreciate good literature enough.
  • I’m probably dumb. I thought Revolver had some good use of irony but I couldn’t see the humor 🤣
  • The Tail-Tied Kings … This was just weird and mildly disturbing, I don’t want to think about it any more LOL
  • The Price of a Charm I already mentioned above: this is the story that could have been read for what it was, until the end, where something happened and cast the rest into a light that made no sense. Well, insert Sarajevo into a search engine and BAM (no pun intended), a little background carries some of these stories a long way!
  • Sacheverell I also mentioned above, frankly I just took the story for it’s surface value (some guy kidnapped a talking monkey) but it’s a layered story. I just listened to a podcast about it prior to writing this. Anyway, the real MVP was Spider Robinson’s intro to the story
  • The House the Blakeney’s Built I also mentioned above, especially about LeGuin’s intro too.  This is a great story about what Davidson thought a colony would look like about 500 years after a family’s ship crashed.  Hint: it’s not Star Trek where everyone is still a genius.  I loved this one and how the language had devolved. Real or fake, he can write language!
  • The Goobers was straightforward and fun, loved the ending
  • The Power of Every Root … I feel like I should have guessed the ending based off the title but I had gotten too lost in Davidson’s depictions of everything.  As I said, the stories influenced by his travels are my favorites and I’m pretty sure he loved Mexico

Give me a couple more weeks and I’ll read the Seventies! I am reading this collection through a hardcover that I bought years ago, and partially through Audible as the book is currently free with membership. That small print gets me after a while! As always, all opinions are my own

Categories
Science Fiction

SPSFC Semifinalist Review: Heritage by S.M. Warlow

Well well, here we are in the semifinalist round! If you haven’t been following along, I’m a member of team At Boundary’s Edge and like to post my individual reviews.  My opinions are mine alone and don’t reflect those of the team nor anyone else.  Anyway, let’s look at the book then you can see my first review out of six to come before the end of April!

Bookish quick facts:
  • Title: Heritage
  • Series: Tales of the Phoenix Titan, #1
  • Author: S.M. Warlow
  • Publisher & Release: Self, 2022
  • Length: 622 pages
  • SPSFC score: 5/10
Here’s the synopsis from Am*zon:

Heritage is the debut novel from S.M. Warlow and the first instalment of the Tales of the Phoenix Titan series. This space opera is perfect for fans of Firefly, the Expanse, Star Wars and Mass Effect.

Make them proud, son of Earth.

25 years after the fall of Earth, the Commonwealth is locked in a vicious, galaxy-spanning war against the Revenant. Countless worlds have been lost in the fighting, and now one crew must come together and stand in the way of galactic annihilation.

Nathan Carter is an efficient criminal, but when he’s hired to steal supplies from a Commonwealth warship, what starts as an easy job soon transforms into something that could change the course of history. Now, Nathan must work with a group of unlikely allies to protect a woman whose heritage is the key to everything.

My thoughts:

One sentence TLDR: this is a good space opera adventure with plenty of action that had an unfortunately rough editing & presentation.  

The thing with Heritage is that while I genuinely enjoyed the plot, this is a 622 page long book that is absolutely riddled with presentation issues. There are punctuation typos involving commas, colons, and semicolons on every single page. The book repeats itself constantly and the character names keep changing spelling.

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My last gripe is that the text changed sizes inconsistently to emphasize inner monologue, epigraphs, and anything else the author thought should stand out. Anything structurally, I’m willing to give the benefit of the doubt to my EPub reader.

So now let’s pretend that all didn’t happen and talk about the story itself.

The plot is interesting.  We get to see a crew come together and meet quite a few different species of intelligent life.  Everything from cats that can operate sniper rifles with giant paws (what?) to doglike creatures, human types, droids, and many others.  The book certainly isn’t hurting for alien diversity. Between the ships and weapons and history there is a lot of good sci-fi material in there too.

There are many different plot lines to keep things moving.  Some are political and hint at conspiracy.  Others involve drawing moral similarities between different warring factions.  We are tracking down alien artifacts, building a crew, fighting bad guys, pulling off heists; there’s a lot going on.

(That’s a semicolon, in this case used like a super comma to designate a similar main clause that needs more separation than another comma could indicate).

There were a ton of characters too.  I wasn’t believing the romantic aspects but other than that, I liked the crew.  They worked together well despite being from different backgrounds and formed a fairly interesting dynamic.

My last main point is about the quasi cliffhanger. I’d love to read the next book to find out what happens, but I’m not a big enough fan of cliffhangers to read forward unless some form of editing is going to be involved.  I’d like a little more closure from Vol, Russell, and Gordon for where they are going next.  Also I really don’t think Jack’s storyline got enough closure for the amount of time we spent repeatedly hearing about it.

Would recommend for space opera fans that can take the editing

Thanks for checking out my SPSFC book review of Heritage by S.M. Warlow.  I was provided an e-copy for judging purposes and as always, all opinions are my own. Stay tuned for more team reviews!

Categories
Science Fiction

The Hermes Protocol by Chris M. Arnone (ARC Review)

Thanks to Bookish First for my copy of The Hermes Protocol.  If I hadn’t used points to claim this book I wouldn’t have read past the first chapter. I just utterly disliked it. I took some time to think about whether I disliked it due to personal bias regarding pronoun pandering and the book’s ridiculous level of PC content including a drawn out m/m sex scene in chapter one, but no, this is just not a good book.

Let’s look at the book info and my remaining thoughts.

Bookish quick facts:
  • Title: The Hermes Protocol
  • Series: —
  • Author: Chris M. Arnone
  • Publisher & Release: Castle Bridge Media, January 2023
  • Length: 300 pages
  • Rate & Recommend: ⭐⭐ there is probably a niche audience for this but it’s not the sci-fi crowd
Here’s the synopsis via Am*zon:

“Hello? Who are you? Where am I?”

Elise Corto-Intel is an Intel Operative sent on what should have been a routine job to break into a luxury high-rise, crack open a safe, and take what’s inside. But as soon as she touches the tiny microchip, a voice crackles to life in her comms revealing an artificial intelligence named Bastion. In a city-spanning adventure, they must work together in a race against the clock to recover Bastion’s stolen chip, escape from a maniacal hitwoman, and untangle the web of players chasing this illegal artificial intelligence before Elise is terminated from the Corto Corporation, her employer that is also her home, family, and her life.

Chris Arnone’s work of cyberpunk science fiction, THE HERMES PROTOCOL, follows an intelligence operative with cybernetic enhancements as she races through the futuristic otherworldly Jayu City, on a mission that challenges her ideas of family, loyalty, and what defines life itself

My thoughts:

Unfortunately I didn’t read the entire excerpt before requesting this book. I got as far as the cover and being a cyberpunk fan said: “oh cool, this looks awesome”.  Erk, well that’s why I finished it.

The one thing I’ll give Arnone credit for is not lecturing us regarding gender, identity, and whatnot. He hyperfixates on pronouns and confuses me with “they” and does a lot of other things that I don’t want to read about, but at no point does he lecture, which is how he earned two stars.

Besides that, I just didn’t like the book.  The AI gives away it’s entire game as soon as we meet it, so that there’s nothing to build on throughout the text.  I kept wondering what else would be built on the AI & ethics storyline, and the answer is nothing, all the way through to the anticlimactic ending.

The action throughout wasn’t that bad and the book was fast paced, but you can’t convince me that the characters are in danger when they’re more worried about pronouns than the danger.  The action scenes are fairly decent though.

There’s also a bit of a mystery storyline. Who hired who? Who wants the AI chip? Who is this mysterious person?  Looking forward to some epic twist, I was disappointed because the book gave some half assed answer to the who & why, then magically resolved everything.  There are hints at future complications but that does nothing for the story’s current resolution.

Lastly, another issue throughout is that (one would assume) the main character is supposed to be a pretty decent intelligence operative? For all the mishaps, fails, forgetting of situational protocol, not being able to fight, and other flops… I just never got the impression that Elise was good at her job.  She should be able to seduce someone. She shouldn’t gawk when she’s impersonating security. In every single situation she seemed like a crappy operative.

Overall, even though I’ve thoroughly examined the fact that I might just dislike this book because of the content, the truth is that it’s just not as good as a lot of other cyberpunk that I’ve read.  It’s PC Mr Potato Head with these cybernetic limbs and while there are some cool aspects, overall I can’t recommend The Hermes Protocol. (Oh, and for all of the stress related to the protocol, it magically became not a big deal at the end).

Thanks for checking out my book review of The Hermes Protocol by Chris M. Arnone.  I claimed my copy through my Bookish First points, and thank the website and publisher for my arc in exchange for an honest review. As always, all opinions are my own ♥️

Categories
Literary Fiction Science Fiction

The Avram Davidson Treasury: The Fifties

I’ve been following the SFF community for a few years now, four of which I’ve been fairly active online, and I can honestly say that I’ve never once seen Avram Davidson mentioned in any sort of bookish dialogue.  I’ve been trying to read more short stories, sample different American authors, and I’ve been holding onto the Avram Davidson Treasury for years now without reading it too closely. I tend to gravitate towards authors who are eclectic, are known to clash with publishers, and have found another to feature on veterans day as Davidson was a medic with the Navy in WWII.

Anyway, over the past few weeks I’ve read a story here and a story there, and have finally finished the first section: stories from The Fifties.

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This is a cool book though. The cast of science fiction authors who selected and introduced stories are a true who’s who of everyone, sharing fun facts about the author himself and the stories within. I don’t know if I would have picked up on a lot of idiosyncracies and plot points without those comments, and I feel like I’m learning a lot about early SFF in general

Peter S. Beagle calls our attention to the careful language used in ‘Ogre in the Vly‘, a theme that I did notice throughout. Davidson tends to pay a lot of attention to accents and language in general.  The Hugo winning short story “Or All the Seas With Oysters” is introduced by Guy Davenport, saying how the story lives on through plagiarism and it’s tenacity in making everyday objects into something so sinister.

Some I really enjoyed (Help! I am Dr. Morris Goldpepper and The Golem), some were sad (Now Let Us Sleep) and others I had to read a few times before grasping but laughed at the end (Author, Author).  Others just went over my head, like Dagon, Ogre In the Vly and Take Wooden Indians. I can see where Or All the Seas With Oysters won a Hugo but also, some of these are just good reading. Others, uh, not so much.

This post just deleted half of itself somehow and I can’t even think of what is missing, send help… I know I had commented in general that short stories are hard.  Trying to glean meaning and “what I’m supposed to be getting out of them” can be hard, especially when it’s 2023 and these were written in the fifties.  That’s why I liked the author introductions so much.  I always feel dumb reading short stories because I forget them SO quickly too.

If I missed anything I have four more eras to write about here and am curious to see how his writing changes over the years.  I’d also be interested in checking out the episodes of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction that he edited, to see what eclectic types of stories he brought in.

Categories
Author Interviews & Guest Posts Science Fiction

The Sunday Brunch Author Interview Series Features JCM Berne!

Hey everyone, Brunch is back! Don’t confuse it with the guy on YouTube who started a new brunch, this is the Sunday Brunch Author Interview Series! We are now into year three of interviews featuring indie and traditionally published SFF authors hanging out and talking books, publishing advice, nerding out, random everything, and of course Brunch.

Episode 28 features indie author JCM Berne! He is the author of the Hybrid Helix series, a wonderfully readable and witty sci-fi space opera adventure with superheroes!

Read on for JCM’s thoughts on superhero sci-fi roots, sentient AI, his favorite Star Trek, and so much more. Enjoy!

🥞Welcome to the Sunday Brunch Series! As an introduction, can you tell everyone an interesting thing about yourself that isn’t in your author bio?

🎤My college and grad school roommate, John Chu, is a Hugo award winner. It’s extra funny because we weren’t really involved with writing at the time – it’s not as if we were in a creative writing program together; he was an electrical engineering student and I studied philosophy. I have one biological child and one adopted child; my wife, who I knew in high school (a very long time ago), also has one biological and one adopted child. All coincidence!

🥞What’s your brunch order today?

🎤 I’ll start with a bottomless mimosa and I’ll end up on the floor. Something about brunch mimosas makes them irresistible to me!

🥞Hmm let’s jump into talking about The Hybrid Helix and your superheroes in space, space opera! I love the concept of bringing big action figures into sci-fi. What led you to this mashup?

🎤I don’t really think of it as a mashup! Superheroes and sci fi have always gone together. Superman came here from another planet in a spaceship. The Fantastic Four got their powers from an accident in space. Jim Starlin wrote stories set entirely on other planets with no human characters whatsoever back in the 70’s (he invented Thanos and told a ton of Warlock stories that were amazing). More recently you have films like the 3rd Thor movie and Guardians of the Galaxy. I wanted to tell stories that honored those antecedents, mostly because I think superheroes fighting spaceships is cool. I do it in prose form because I can’t draw and because I’m too much of a control freak to share my vision with other people (like artists!)

🥞 This had me thinking, and he is 100% right! So much superhero content that we know and love is based in sci-fi. It’s cool, it works, it’s classic

Ok, so did you have any part of the whole series mapped out when you started, or was it a play by play writing each book?

🥞I get ideas for future books as I write. When I started writing Wistful Ascending I knew I wanted Rohan to grow and change, but I wasn’t sure how. I thought of the rough outline for Return of The Griffin while writing WA, and so on. Right now I have a very detailed outline for book 4 and a very loose idea for 5 and scattered bits and pieces for later books. I know how I want the series to end, and I thought of that while writing Return. So it’s a combination – I know what I want the characters to be in the broadest sense, but I didn’t try to fill in every detail before writing the first book.

🚀💢🚀Book….5? I love that more is coming🚀💢🚀

🥞One of sci-fi’s long running themes with first contact stories, is, I guess – who or what else is out there? I liked your bear-people (and their anatomy 🤣), how did that alien race form in your mind?

🎤I’m not entirely sure! There was a manga I read back in the 80’s or early 90’s in which a bunch of characters had animal heads – wolves, bears, etc. – for no apparent reason. It wasn’t explained, not that I remember, it was probably just something the artist thought was cool. (I want to say it was Outlanders but honestly I’m not sure). I remember a scene of a bear-headed character with his mouth hanging open, shocked by something, and it stuck in my head. I have no idea why. It wasn’t even my favorite manga or character.

I didn’t really intend for the Ursans to be a big part of the series past the first four chapters or so of Wistful Ascending. But they became useful, and now I’m stuck with them! But they’re fun to write, so no complaints.

I’ll tell you a secret – when I wrote them I didn’t have a clear idea about their origin. I figured that out while plotting Blood Reunion.

As far as that particular anatomical detail… I’m pretty sure Ursula was teasing. Never rely on narrators in my stories!

(🤣I took it as Canon 🤣) You’ll have to read to find out what this refers to

🥞Your ships and space station were sentient! What characteristics should a well written sentient AI have?

🎤I love this question. All organic things have such a vast array of drives that we evolved with. Hunger, thirst, pain, etc. An artificial being doesn’t have to have any of that. Their drives are going to be whatever they were designed to have – maybe an urge to serve, or to be useful, or to follow orders – and/or drives they choose themselves, if you imagine that they can self-program.

Which just means that a well written sentient AI has to have desires and needs, but there’s no reason to make them similar to organic creatures. You have a blank slate! If you think about whoever designed and built them you can figure out a lot about how they’ll behave.

Then, it’s always fun to have them malfunction in some way. After all, not every organic creature works ‘right.’ So I throw in a few AI’s that are not quite sane.

🥞I love audiobooks and I’ve heard it’s a bit hard for indie authors to connect with good narrators and have a good production experience, can you talk about yours at all or offer any tips?

🎤 My narrator, Wayne Farrell, did a fantastic job. I’m not sure whether finding him was skill or luck. I simply put my book up on ACX and offered money, listened to 50 auditions, and he was the best of them all. And while he’s worth every penny, I had to shell out quite a bit to pay him, and that came out of pocket. I’m lucky to have a fairly well-paying day job. Not every indie author has those kinds of resources.

I think if I had less cash to invest I’d try to find someone with less experience who would be willing to work more cheaply or for profit sharing. I know a couple of narrators looking to break in right now!

🥞Wormholes, sentient space stations, and the mention of a transporter incident in Wistful Ascending ‘s book plug… Would you like to share your favorite Star Trek series and why 😆

🎤 Hmm… probably DS9! I was raised on the original series and I haven’t really watched the shows that have come out over the past five years, just because I don’t subscribe to the right streaming services. I like DS9’s level of grit and the way the setting (a space station instead of a traveling ship) allowed for long term stories to develop. With something like Voyager, the recurring stories felt very forced – after all, the ship was traveling in a line, trying to get home. I’m a fan of big plots, not standalone episodes.

🥞 💯💯💯💯. Yep. DS9 is the only acceptable answer in my book 🤣

🥞 What other nerdy things are you into right now?

🎤 Generally, I read a lot of comics (mostly Marvel and a few independents), manga, manhwa, and sci-fi and fantasy novels. I watch a lot of martial arts and science fiction movies and tv shows, South Asian action movies and comedies, and cartoons from all over. I go through phases. My eyesight deteriorated a little in the past decade and I’ve read a lot less print than I did when I was younger (it’s nothing serious, just makes it inconvenient). I played quite a bit of D&D in my younger days, but not recently. On the creative side, all I do is write – I don’t paint miniatures or anything like that. I’m not much of a gamer, either.

🥞Do you have a favorite book, author, series of all time? (I know how hard that question is😅)

🎤I  don’t know! Probably Malazan Book of The Fallen. There’s so much depth and complexity to it, if I could only read one thing for the rest of my life, that would be it.

“Favorite” is such a tough word. Master of Kung Fu comics were super meaningful to me when I was young, but I don’t know that they hold up as well as some other things. I really like the first 35 or so volumes of Naruto. Jhereg, Dresden, and P.I. Garrett loom very large in my mind

🥞Thank you so much for taking the time to interview! This last is an open forum for you so feel free to talk about anything else you might want to say!

🎤Thank you so much for this opportunity!

Book 4 of the Hybrid Helix, Shadow of Hyperion, should be out this year. I’m hoping for September.

I just finished a wuxia fantasy novel that is very strange. I’m not sure if it will ever see the light of day, but if it does, you can bet I’ll plaster it all over social media.

It’s been an absolute thrill to become part of the indie book community this past year! Reviewers are so important, because without you, readers have no easy way to find stories that will work for them. I’m so grateful for you all!

You can find the author online at

Thank you so much for tuning into the Sunday Brunch Series!  I’m opening back up to authors so do feel free to contact me if you’d like to feature.  As always, thank you all for supporting indie authors and do check out the link if you are interested in JCM’s books!

Categories
Science Fiction

SPSFC2 Quarterfinalist Review: The Empyrean by Katherine Franklin

The Empyrean by Katherine Franklin

The At Boundary’s Edge team has narrowed our original allocation down from 28 books to 7 “Quarterfinalists”, all of which we are now reading in full and scoring out of 10 points. The top three books will move forward as semifinalists. As always, this is my own review and reflects only my own individual opinion and score, not that of the team

As one additional note here, the first round is now complete! We chose to read seven full books and you’ve seen my reviews for each of those.  Soon there will be semifinalist announcements from the competition and I’ll know which six books we are reading next!

Alright everyone, my last “quarterfinalist” review is for a space opera called The Empyrean! Let’s take a quick look at the book first and then I’ll share my thoughts.

Bookish Quick Facts:
  • Title: The Empyrean
  • Series: Galaxy of Exiles #1
  • Author: Katherine Franklin
  • Release: Self pub, 2022
  • Length: 478 pages (Paperback length)
  • SPSFC Rating: 5.5/10
Here’s the synopsis via Am*zon:

Emotion is a weapon. Harnessing its power could destroy worlds.

Palia’s emotions are in turmoil. After watching her son succumb to Empyrean fire, she barely escapes the same fate. Guilt ridden and alone, she will not stop until his killer is brought to justice.

The Protectorate forbids Ferrash to have emotions. That suits him, since he cannot avoid the people who control the Empyrean. Making this sacrifice prevents them from hijacking his feelings and using them as a weapon against him.

When Ferrash spots Palia’s ship venting atmosphere, he is forced to save her. Having an enemy from the Hegemony on board could see him accused of treason. But when the Empyrean reveals its potential as a destroyer of worlds and Palia’s link to it, Ferrash knows he can’t let her leave.

With billions at risk of succumbing to the Empyrean weapon, can the enemies join forces and prevent the same fate that killed Palia’s son?

My thoughts:

I first want to add the disclaimer that I purchased the audiobook (I can only stare at an e reader for so long). I physically read the first 150 pages in order to judge technical presentation, editing, etc.  The fact that I listened to the rest is not affecting my score nor am I going to comment on the experience, other than that it was a decent production and James Alper seems like a solid narrator.

So, about the book! I liked the overall idea quite a bit.  The story opens with a planetary explosion and utter devastation, vivid imagery, and it was enough to snag my attention from the get go.

Broadly, I can appreciate the plot regarding interstellar weapons potential and the fact that emotion could be harvested as a source of power, magic, fire. The Empyrean is full of interesting concepts.

It’s also got a few likeable characters and, my favorite part, a hilarious but all too brief episode with a rather large animal companion.

Where this story ended up falling flat for me was in execution.  There were some big, overarching mysteries hinted at throughout, and the thing is that for an author to hold onto those mysteries and just keep dropping hints, the reward has to be worth it.  I really truly hate to say that the “answers” fell flat for me and that the entire final resolution was a bit of a weak setup for the next book in the series.  Many characters and events appeared and vanished throughout without the page time they needed to land an impact.

While individually I liked Palia and Bek, Farrash felt pretty out there. The romance felt more like a proximity attraction without much to ground it on, so the … Uh … Pinnacle of Action scene didn’t land either. The concept did, I get what the author was going for, I just couldn’t see it.

I’m smacking myself because this sounds harsher than I mean it to.  For editing and presentation this is one of our stronger books, and if I had spent a tiny bit less time feeling lost I would have enjoyed it much more overall.  It’s a great plot that just got lost in the execution.

(Plus, I’m one of those blind-ish people who endlessly appreciate books that are turned into audio and made affordable).

TLDR: Overall – The Empyrean held a great idea and a lot of wonderful imagery, but overall it didn’t hit home for me.  I’m rating 5.5/10 for SPSFC purposes and would recommend for fans of space operas with broad scopes!

Thanks for checking out my book review of The Empyrean by Katherine Franklin! I was provided a free digital copy for judging purposes, although I purchased the audiobook on my own to help me finish our books (and save my eyes) within the allotted time frame. As always, all opinions are my own 🚀

Categories
Science Fiction

SPSFC2 Quarterfinalist Review: Empire Reborn by A.K. DuBoff

The At Boundary’s Edge team has narrowed our original allocation down from 28 books to 7 “Quarterfinalists”, all of which we are now reading in full and scoring out of 10 points. The top three books will move forward as semifinalists. As always, this is my own review and reflects only my own individual opinion and score, not that of the team

As the first round winds down to a close in the next week, I’m back with ‘quarterfinalist’ review number 6 out of 7! I’m also absolutely ecstatic to say that I finally found a book that I personally believe has a chance of making the top ten.  Empire Reborn is meticulously edited and the best presented, every character motivation makes sense, her ideas translate to paper 100% of the time, and it hits all the space opera first in a series checks.  Again these are only my personal thoughts but I’d throw down for this book!

Let’s take a look at the book itself and then I’ll share the rest of my thoughts.

Bookish quick facts:
  • Title: Empire Reborn
  • Series: Taran Empire Saga #1 (Cadicle Universe #12)
  • Author: A.K. DuBoff
  • Publisher & Release: Self, March 2021
  • Length: 388 pages (Kindle Length)
  • Rating: 8/10 for SPSFC purposes (⭐⭐⭐⭐) and yes for space opera fans
Here’s the synopsis via Am*zon:

A forgotten enemy’s return reignites an ancient war.

Jason Sietinen lives in the shadow of greatness. He’s worked hard to become a TSS officer in his own right, but having war heroes for parents is hard to top.

When Jason is assigned to investigate a mysterious attack, he finds evidence of powerful transdimensional beings never before seen. Or so he thought.

Jason soon learns that critical information was lost through the millennia: Tarans had an ancient treaty with the aliens. Unfortunately, rogue actions by a shadow faction within the Empire just broke the peace.

With the future of the Empire hanging in the balance, Jason must find a way to unite the Taran worlds, including the lost colony of Earth, against the mounting threat. There’s just one problem: how do you fight an enemy you can’t see or touch?

My thoughts:

The first thing you probably noticed is that this book is very deep in an already existing universe.  Past events are referred to fairly frequently but the author also does a good job setting up this series on its own merit.  All the big pieces are there to create something multifaceted and interesting going forward.

 I believe in presentation and editing, both of which were accomplished near flawlessly here.  I think I found one tiny grammatical typo and that is huge compared to the rest of our book allocation. Technical merit aside, space operas should have these big casts, big stakes, and big moral discussions, all of which DuBoff has here.

 I wasn’t a huge fan of the slang (really, fok vs fuck and shite vs shit, etc, isn’t going to break any language barriers) but otherwise I have nothing else bad to say.  It makes sense to have similar language roots between descendant cultures but I think that facet needed something…just a different approach.  It didn’t affect the book though, plus she was consistent with it, and I got what she was trying to do. Not the biggest deal but that’s my only nitpick here.

Theme wise, she tackles some big sci-fi tropes and moral dilemmas.  There’s multiple instances of first contact, force vs diplomacy, the integration of new government,  interdimensional cause and effect, and a lot more.  I generally overall just like what she did her even if it ultimately wasn’t the most exciting read.

Oh heck, did I mention telekinesis as a weapon? The book didn’t need the Men In Black tie-in but it was there, and I believe it’s going to come into play moving forward. There’s a whole idea of this telekinesis tying into an upper dimension that I’m waiting to learn more about too.  Also planet sized space leviathans.  Realistic characters.  Big ideas that suit this genre well.

TLDR & Overall: this has all the good space opera elements and is presented as well as the average trad pub book.  I hope I get time to read more of DuBoff’s books, I did already download the next one for when time permits.  I also truly hope we see this one in round two 😅

Thanks for checking out my book review of Empire Reborn by A K. DuBoff.  I was provided a free copy for judging purposes although found it on, and used Kindle Unlimited. As always, all thoughts are my own 🚀 

Categories
audiobooks Dystopian Science Fiction

1984 by George Orwell (Revisiting the Classics)

With a book this popular that has been beaten to death in every literary way possible, how does one talk about it in a simple book blog post?

I tend to just focus on my own reading experience. I used to live for these satirical, dystopian, cautionary authors, and have found a lot of the classic titles for free on Audible. It’s been a great way to refresh my memory on these amazing books that I read so long ago.

Especially today with everything and it’s mother being referred to as “Orwellian”, I think it’s a relevant time to re read 1984.  I probably hear that phrase at least twice a week on the news and laughed recently when the last indie dystopian book that I read used it.

Anyway ~ the other reason I picked 1984 up now is that I’m trying to read as many books as possible set in London before I go in March!  With how Russian-esque this book is, I completely forgot it took place in London.

So, about 1984 itself.  One of the things that I liked most reading it as an adult was the linguistic portion, especially the appendix at the end where he explains the principles of Ingsoc (English Socialism).  To me language is the most essential part of anything, and I strive to expand my knowledge daily.  In reverse, stripping language away so that people don’t even have the words to express dissent, could accomplish the means of The Party moreso than anything else.  Duckspeak, UnGood, Double Plus UnGood … Yeah, I definitely like that aspect the most and think the new language is most unique thing Orwell wrote.

I’ve also never thought of war as a way to blow excess resource and manpower so that no one else can have it.  One of the many things that made me go “hmmm”

I almost feel like Doublethink is real these days too.  Everything in America has two polarities right now and often times it gives me a headache.  Ex: I’m a nurse, I know my science, but then people scream opposing ideas at me for years and I know it’s plain stupidity but it’s almost enough to dissociate at times.  There are tons of examples of this & I can see where Winston’s mind just fractured under torture.

Some other places where I’ve seen 1984 in modern action besides the daily news are …. Star Trek! The Next Generation, I had to look up the episode but remember when Picard was captured and tortured but refused to say that 2+2 didn’t equal 4? Season 6, Episodes 10 and 11, highly recommend.  I also think (vaguely) and I can’t prove this but when I first heard Team America’s Dicks, Pussies, and Assholes speech, that it was based on 1984′s ‘three classes of people’ concept.

Back to the book… I do definitely think it’s a relevant cautionary tale and that it should continue to be read in schools.  Governments are trying to tell us everything like what cars to drive and how to cook, and certain factions of society are trying to force the rest of us to think a certain way and accept certain lifestyles… Everything is just so polarized. It’s relevant.

Broadly speaking, it’s also just a well written book.  Slightly predictable but an enjoyable read, chilling at times, and makes me think.  I remember tuning out in high school when we got to the super long chapter about reading the book, and I did it again as a 30 something.  Otherwise I really do think it’s a fine overall read.

Tl:DR: overall, this is one of the more readable classics and I absolutely think it stays relevant today. I used to live for this group of satirical & cautionary authors and 100% still enjoy reading it today. Going back via audio was a great choice to refresh my memory and experience it slightly differently than the first time around.

Bookish Quick Facts:

  • Title: 1984
  • Series: N/A
  • Author: George Orwell
  • Released: 1949
  • Length: 339 pages
  • Rate & Recommend: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ for everyone!

Here’s the (I believe original) synopsis:

The new novel by George Orwell is the major work towards which all his previous writing has pointed. Critics have hailed it as his “most solid, most brilliant” work. Though the story of Nineteen Eighty-Four takes place thirty-five years hence, it is in every sense timely. The scene is London, where there has been no new housing since 1950 and where the city-wide slums are called Victory Mansions. Science has abandoned Man for the State. As every citizen knows only too well, war is peace.

To Winston Smith, a young man who works in the Ministry of Truth (Minitru for short), come two people who transform this life completely. One is Julia, whom he meets after she hands him a slip reading, “I love you.” The other is O’Brien, who tells him, “We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness.” The way in which Winston is betrayed by the one and, against his own desires and instincts, ultimately betrays the other, makes a story of mounting drama and suspense.

A Quick Note on the audio: the version I listened to was by 11h22m by Blackstone Audio, narrated by Simon Prebble. I think he’s a great narrator for the story and gave a wonderful performance of equal parts hope & horror. 

Categories
Science Fiction

SPSFC2 Quarterfinalist Review: Earthship by John Triptych and Michel Lamontagne

The At Boundary’s Edge team has narrowed our original allocation down from 28 books to 7 “Quarterfinalists”, all of which we are now reading in full and scoring out of 10 points. The top three books will move forward as semifinalists.  As always, this is my own review and reflects only my own individual opinion and score, not that of the team

As the first round winds down to a close in the next week, I’m back with ‘quarterfinalist’ review 5 out of 7!  Today I’m talking about another book that I voted to read in full, and feel like overall it was a positive decision.

Bookish quick facts:
  • Title: Earthship
  • Series: N/A
  • Author: John Triptych & Michel Lamontagne
  • Published: Self, 2021
  • Length: 578 pages
  • Rate & Recommend: ⭐⭐⭐✨ or 6.5/10 for SPSFC purposes. I recommend for fans of apocalyptic stories like 2012
Here’s the synopsis from GoodReads

Our world will be destroyed. Only a chosen few can escape.

In the near future, a cataclysmic collision with a rogue planet destabilizes the sun, causing an exponential increase of its output. With the ever-increasing heat, life on earth will be extinguished within a decade.

As the global crisis deepens, it falls on a handful of individuals who will determine whether humanity survives. NASA scientist Dr. Olivia Quinn must outwit a corrupt government system and warn the public before it’s too late. Veteran astronaut Valerie McKinnon and her son Sawyer are in a race against time to build a space ark that could rescue countless lives. And Armand Balkan, a cutthroat trillionaire who seeks to maintain his empire by any means possible, could either save or doom them all.

My thoughts:

I generally enjoyed reading Earthship and consider it a slightly above average self published work.   It has super short chapters, lots of action, moves forward quickly, and covers a huge scope of storytelling through many different plotlines.

The thing with end of the world plots though is that there are only so many ways to tell that story, and this one took it on a global.scale. The downside is that there’s a verifiable metric ton of head hopping that left me confused at times. There are tons of names to keep track of, multiple big storylines, and at the end of the day there are many loose ends trailing off into space.

The characters are easy to root for but there are just way too many.  This would have made a great movie but trying to compact it into a book would have been better served with a more streamlined plot.  Each point of view added something to the story but definitely were not necessary.  The first six, possibly 7 chapters were all from different perspectives and it made my head reel.  Also towards the 3/4 mark they threw in a rather large religious cult storyline that changed the tune of the book and added even more complications. I have mixed feelings on it including that the book already had enough going on and that I couldn’t really believe how influential the cult got,

Regardless, I love a good end-of-the-world plot. 😆 Earthship tackles issues like the building of space stations and generation ships, who survives, who dies, what do the people remaining behind have to deal with? It doesn’t really go hard into moral debates though, just mentions these themes as a matter of fact. It’s equal parts exciting, gory, sad, and properly horrifying at times. I liked the characters but never had time to get attached to any of them and they were all 2-dimensionally static as this was a pure action flick.   I am ok with that, I would rather read big disasters and military coups than character growth, but I also like having something to grab onto.

Technically speaking, the book has a fairly good presentation.  It was at least spell checked although it had more than a few word placement errors.  I like the cover. One of my biggest qualms was the passing of time not being shown except by character comments.  I think if months or years are going to go by in between these short chapters, it’s best to show dates.

There’s a lot of inconsistency in character motivations too. With time passing randomly and no development it was often hard to place characters from one appearance to the next.  He changed chapter styles too towards the end of the book, going to multiple points of view within one chapter.  Again, an exciting read if you don’t follow details too closely.

Overall – the less you think about this one the better. For an action flick in book form it provided a proper amount of entertainment.  The ending left a lot of loose ends as some space operas will, but I think we should have had a little more general closure. It’s been designated as a stand alone so I would have loved an epilogue. A good idea that ended up falling flat on execution.

TL:DR

Earthship is a good action story that had way too much going on. I read it quickly and enjoyed it but can also pick at issues all day.  I would recommend for fans of action, adventure and apocalypse type fiction.

Thanks for checking out my book review of Earthship by John Triptych and Michel Lamontagne. A free copy was provided for SPSFC  judging purposes but I found my copy on Kindle unlimited. As always, all opinions are my own 🚀