Audiobook Review: Koban now faces threat from the Thandol Empire

Koban: Conflict and Empire

Written by Stephen W. Bennett, narrated by Eric Michael Summerer.

Publisher’s Summary

The Galactic Federation is confronted by the vast and implacable Thandol Empire, which has coveted the former Krall region of space for eons, a region of space now occupied and claimed by the upstart Kobani. Outnumbered, they face an opponent who possesses new and deadly weapons. An enemy that had thousands of years to develop the means to take on the Krall Empire, and now present the supermen with a weapon that turns their greatest genetic asset into their greatest weakness. The new Federation must find a way to survive the most powerful threat yet to their existence. Once again, the Kobani are between a rock and a hard place, poised on the brink of death and destruction.

 

My Take

The Krall got their asses beat by the gene-modified humans of Koban while the Thandol Empire kept their heads down.  Now the Thandol Empire wants to take on the “Galactic Federation” which is composed of all the old Krall subjugated species.  Apparently they hadn’t paid close enough attention.  Frankly I found this one installment in the series to be a bit rushed and short changed but I still enjoyed it.  Four out of Five Space Opera geek points are thus awarded.

 

https://www.audible.com/pd/Sci-Fi-Fantasy/Koban-Audiobook/B01N8PQ6IJ

Audiobook Review: Feeling Cramped? Need More Space?

New Frontiers:  The Expansion Wars Trilogy Book 1

Written by Joshua Dalzelle.

Narrated by Mark Boyett.

 

Publisher’s Summary

The Phage War had been a devastating conflict for the Terran Confederacy. Even with the destruction of their terrifying, implacable foe, humanity is still reeling. Political alliances are crumbling, and their mighty fleet is in tatters. There is nothing to celebrate, even after such a complete victory.

They soon learn that there are other stellar neighbors – and they’ve been watching the conflict with great interest. One species comes with an offer of friendship and alliance, but humanity is weary and distrustful, their only interactions with aliens having resulted in the near eradication of their kind.

Before the ashes of war have been fully swept away, Captain Celesta Wright is dispatched to the Frontier with a small taskforce to investigate a mysterious signal while the Confederacy struggles to hold itself together. A partnership with this new species could help accelerate the recovery effort, but is the offer too good to be true? Can humanity risk another fight with an advanced alien species right on the heels of the bloodiest war that had ever been waged?

New Frontiers is the first book of the Expansion Wars Trilogy, an all-new adventure in the Black Fleet universe.

My Take:

 

This series follow on the heels of the Blackfleet Series which I will review later on.  Captain Wright had been tasked with trying to track down an elusive new enemy to humans that not only have a technological edge but also a vehement hatred of humans.

I found the writing of the characters extremely well done and the action did not lag in building detail.  Excellent book and a wonderful start to a new series.  Five out of five geek score points!

 

https://www.audible.com/pd/Sci-Fi-Fantasy/New-Frontiers-Audiobook/B06XR59MLQ

Audiobook Review: Book 2 of the Bobiverse.

For We Are Many:  Bobiverse, Book 2

Written by Dennis E. Taylor.

Narrated by Ray Porter.

 

Publisher’s Summary:

The highly anticipated sequel to Audible’s Best of 2016 – Science Fiction winner, We Are Legion (We Are Bob); a book listeners are calling “so much fun”, “what science fiction was meant to be”, and what would happen if “Andy Weir and Ernest Cline had a lovechild”.

Bob Johansson didn’t believe in an afterlife, so waking up after being killed in a car accident was a shock. To add to the surprise, he is now a sentient computer and the controlling intelligence for a Von Neumann probe.

Bob and his copies have been spreading out from Earth for 40 years now, looking for habitable planets. But that’s the only part of the plan that’s still in one piece. A system-wide war has killed off 99.9 percent of the human race; nuclear winter is slowly making the Earth uninhabitable; a radical group wants to finish the job on the remnants of humanity; the Brazilian space probes are still out there, still trying to blow up the competition; and the Bobs have discovered a spacefaring species that sees all other life as food.

Bob left Earth anticipating a life of exploration and blissful solitude. Instead he’s become a sky god to a primitive native species, the only hope for getting humanity to a new home, and possibly the only thing that can prevent every living thing in the local sphere from ending up as dinner.

Listener favorite Ray Porter returns to narrate Bob – and his many incarnations – in all of their geeky glory.

My Take:

 

Humans are now spread to 2 systems and several Bob’s are running a shuttle service from Sol to Romulus and Remus.  Other Bobs continue to explore and are coming to the realization that Fermi’s paradox has an artificial answer…The Others.  This work is rich and humorous at times yet it manages to convey thoughtful entertainment in all of its storylines.  I really want more of the Bobiverse.

 

Five out of five entertainment laughing units for writing and narration.  Enjoy!

 

http://www.audible.com/pd/Sci-Fi-Fantasy/For-We-Are-Many-Audiobook/B01N17THEO

Audiobook Review: Good story but poor performance.

Revenger

Written by Alastair Reynolds.

Narrated by Clare Corbett.

Publisher’s Summary:

A superb science fiction adventure set in the rubble of a ruined universe, this is a deep space heist story of kidnap, betrayal, alien artifacts, and revenge.

The galaxy has seen great empires rise and fall. Planets have shattered and been remade. Among the ruins of alien civilizations, building our own from the rubble, humanity still thrives.

And there are vast fortunes to be made, if you know where to find them….

Captain Rackamore and his crew do. It’s their business to find the tiny, enigmatic worlds that have been hidden away, booby-trapped, surrounded by layers of protection – and to crack them open for the ancient relics and barely remembered technologies inside. But while they ply their risky trade with integrity, not everyone is so scrupulous.

Adrana and Fura Ness are the newest members of Rackamore’s crew, signed on to save their family from bankruptcy. Only Rackamore has enemies, and there might be more waiting for them in space than adventure and fortune: the fabled and feared Bosa Sennen in particular.

Revenger is a science fiction adventure story set in the rubble of our solar system in the dark, distant future – a tale of space pirates, buried treasure, and phantom weapons, of unspeakable hazards and single-minded heroism…and of vengeance.

My Take:

In this work Mr. Reynolds has crafted almost a passable “Steampunk” Space Opera.  The Baubles the privateers loot resist any technology but the simplest so that is what they use.  Adrana and Fura are the heroines of the story, fleeing a misogynistic colony to seek their fortune among the stars and the relics of tens of thousands of years of repeated human re-habitation.

 

I really enjoy the way this author writes his stories so a lot is made up for by the content.  This particular performance may have exceeded the abilities of the narrator leading to a lot of male voices coming off muffled and all of the female voices sounding too alike.  I’m giving this one five for content, three for performance and four overall.  Enjoy!

 

http://www.audible.com/pd/Sci-Fi-Fantasy/Revenger-Audiobook/B01N4PGYYB

Audiobook Review: von Neumann probes with Snark!

We Are Legion (We Are Bob)

Written by Dennis E. Taylor.

Performed by Ray Porter.

Publisher’s Summary:

Bob Johansson has just sold his software company and is looking forward to a life of leisure. There are places to go, books to read, and movies to watch. So it’s a little unfair when he gets himself killed crossing the street.

Bob wakes up a century later to find that corpsicles have been declared to be without rights, and he is now the property of the state. He has been uploaded into computer hardware and is slated to be the controlling AI in an interstellar probe looking for habitable planets. The stakes are high: no less than the first claim to entire worlds. If he declines the honor, he’ll be switched off, and they’ll try again with someone else. If he accepts, he becomes a prime target. There are at least three other countries trying to get their own probes launched first, and they play dirty.

The safest place for Bob is in space, heading away from Earth at top speed. Or so he thinks. Because the universe is full of nasties, and trespassers make them mad – very mad.

My Take:

Bob is a likeable guy who made money instead of doing what he really wanted to do…theoretical and practical physics.  Well now his head has been thawed, his brain scanned and he is the software property of the Theocracy America turned into.  Apparently not all of the Theocracy agrees that these von Neumann probes should be sent out into the Universe to procreate (or replicate) but all the kids are doing it so it’s GO TIME!

 

There are lots of places this story goes and most of the time it is snarky and humorous in it’s telling of horrendous things.  I love this kind of story and the presenter is on the top of his game.  Four out of five enjoyment points for both story and presentation.

 

 

 

http://www.audible.com/pd/Sci-Fi-Fantasy/We-Are-Legion-We-Are-Bob-Audiobook/B01L082HJ2

Audiobook Review: Fallen Dragon rises again here!

Fallen Dragon

Written by Peter F. Hamilton.

Narrated by John Lee.

 

Publisher’s Summary:

In the distant future, corporations have become sustainable communities with their own militaries, and corporate goals have essentially replaced political ideology. On a youthful, rebellious impulse, Lawrence joined the military of a corporation that he now recognizes to be ruthless and exploitative. His only hope for escape is to earn enough money to buy his place in a better corporation. When his platoon is sent to a distant colony to quell a local resistance effort, it seems like a stroke of amazing fortune, and Lawrence plans to rob the colony of their fabled gemstone, the Fallen Dragon, to get the money he needs. However, he soon discovers that the Fallen Dragon is not a gemstone at all but an alien life form that the local colonists have been protecting since it crashed in their area. Now Lawrence has to decide if he will steal the alien to exploit the use of its inherent biotechnical processes – which far exceed anything humans are capable of – or if he will help the Resistance get the alien home

 

My Take:

Lawrence Newton was antsy as a child on the colony world of Amethi where his womanizing board member father, Doug Newton, rode him mercilessly with humiliation and sarcasm to become a carbon copy of himself.  All Lawrence wanted for himself was to explore the stars.  Lawrence thought he was coming around to his Dad’s image in his teens after meeting Rosalyn at a resort and falling madly in love and bed with her.  Discovering two years later that Dad had set that up, with money, set him off on an impulsive rage to go to Earth and work for the competition-Zantiu-Braun.

ZB dangled star flight academy in front of Lawrence to coax him into Security for twenty years.  Twenty years of ground pounding, interstellar piracy and never getting the break he wanted to become a starship pilot.  That is until he pulled off a mission for the Resistance on Thallspring during an “Asset Realization Operation” for ZB.

I think is may be one of my favorite works thus far from this author.  The story was never dull and the delivery was really awesome.  Five stars for the story and four for the delivery.  Four and a half overall.  Well done.

 

 

 

http://www.audible.com/pd/Sci-Fi-Fantasy/Fallen-Dragon-Audiobook/B01M7O5JEY

Audiobook Review: End of The Night’s Dawn Trilogy

The Naked God

Written by Peter F. Hamilton.

Narrated by John Lee.

The third installment of The Night’s Dawn Trilogy wraps up the series in kind of a ‘Let’s get it over with vibe.’  I loved the story and how Mr. Hamilton interwove the character plots.  It just seemed rushed in the end.

So, Louise and Genevieve are in the London archology being used as bait to lure out Quinn Dexter for B7-Charlie to deal with but he’s not really cooperating.  They destroy an entire apartment dome scraper using a Strategic Defense (SD) X-ray laser and only manage to take out a look alike.

Meanwhile, Kiera hurts Al Capone real bad by maiming and torturing Jezebella then flees in a HellHawk with Echels in possession to fly to the Orion Nebula.  They are trying to stop Joshua “LaGrange” Calvert from making contact with the sleeping god thus flinging them back into the Beyond.

It has lots of action, lots of thought provoking concepts and a real keen knack for sucking me in.  Five out of five for addictive qualities, three out of five for kind of rushing the endgame (What happened to Charlie or Jezebella?) and five out of five for narration.  This series is well worth the time and effort!

Deadtree then Audiobook Review: Breaking down the barrier to the Beyond

The Reality Dysfunction.

Written by Peter F. Hamilton.  Narrated by John Lee.

Absolutely immersing literature never mind that the deadtree version is thick as a Washington DC phone book.  The characters are developed and you feel what they feel.  The first breaking into the Beyond occurs because an Involuntary Transport (IVET) named Quinn Dexter conducts a Satanic ritual on a stage 1 colony planet called Lalonde.  The ritual doesn’t cause it so much as something else, something curious, something alien with enough energy to hold the door open to the insane souls scrambling through to possess living humans.

Read this then listened to it on audible.  Out standing.  Five by Five for storytelling, and delivery.

 

Audible  http://www.audible.com/pd/Sci-Fi-Fantasy/The-Reality-Dysfunction-Audiobook/B01DAU1F00

Other Versions   https://www.amazon.com/Reality-Dysfunction-Nights-Dawn-Book-ebook/dp/B004VO4J0I/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1485108071&sr=1-1&keywords=the+reality+dysfunction

 

Deadtree Review: New Live for 80s Porn Star

Starf*cker

Written by Ian Thomas Healy.

Has been 80s porn star John Irish is on the verge of taking gigs just so he can afford to eat cat food. Taking a job where is is the creepy old dude getting enjoyed by Mindy Copperhead he finds out that that there is a planet of women who need him to provide genetic material. The fact that he got himself snipped as protection in his hay day doesn’t seem to be a factor.

The further he gets away from the one gravity of earth the less ancient he feels and some of his hormones are leading him to make interesting choices. Let’s just say that the planet that “lost” all their men to a conquering enemy…is a little bit shady as the unfolding plot will reveal.

I got this work in paperback form from the Author at Fort Collins Comicon. He saw me and of all his works he picked up this one. Not sure what that says about me. The writing and editing was very well done. The storyline is unique…except in several B soft porn movies. I’m giving this 4 out of 5 enjoyment points.

https://www.amazon.com/Starf-cker-Ian-Thomas-Healy-ebook/dp/B009ZJ74K6/ref=sr_1_27?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1485102858&sr=1-27

Ebook Review: The Ship Series

 

 

 

Landfall and Revolution are books 1 and 2 in the Ships Series by Jerry Aubrin.  The two main protagonists, Zax and Kalare, are growing up in an Enders Game type culture where credits and demerits determine their future.  They will either climb the ranks of the military crew of the giant asteroidal ship they live on or they will be frozen to be pooped out on a maybe human compatible world as colonists.

No one in this culture wants to be poop.  I found the storyline to be very entertaining.  This would make for a good tween to teen series as there is some violence and mature decision making.  The editing could use another pass.  Three out of five stars awarded.

 

https://www.amazon.com/Ship-2-Book/dp/B01BOUV4QS/ref=sr_1_1_ha?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1482105220&sr=1-1&keywords=the+ship+series