The Unseen Library

My continued exploration of the fun and entertaining genre that is Star Trek fiction continues, as I check out the latest tie-in novel, Star Trek: The Unsettling Stars by Alan Dean Foster, an intriguing read which serves as a tie-in to the alternate Kelvin timeline, the spinoff timeline that occurred during the 2009 Star Trek film.

The Unsettling Stars is a rather interesting Star Trek read that is the first original novel set in the Kelvin timeline, except for official film novelisations and the Star Trek: Starfleet Academy young adult miniseries. This book was originally set for release back in 2010 under the title Refugees, but it was pulled from publication along with three other proposed novels that tied in to the most recent Star Trek movies. Another one of these books, More Beautiful Than Death by David Mack, is set for release later this year, and no doubt the other two proposed novels from 2010 will be published at some point as well. The Unsettling Stars is the third Star Trek novel released this year (behind The Last Best Hope and The High Frontier), and it is the first one in a series of Star Trek novels I identified in a recent Waiting on Wednesday article. As a result, I was rather pleased to get a copy of the audiobook format of this novel, especially as this book was written by the acclaimed author Alan Dean Foster.

Foster is a veteran science fiction and fantasy author who has been writing since the 1970s. He has written a multitude of novels over the years, including books set in his long-running Humanx Commonwealth Universe, The Damned trilogy, the Spellsinger series, The Taken trilogy, The Tipping Point trilogy and a huge range of standalone novels. Foster also has a large amount of experience writing tie-in novels to popular franchises, having written the official novelisations to several series, including the Alien movies, the Transformers movies, Terminator Salvation and The Chronicles of Riddick. Foster also has a deep connection with the Star Wars franchise, having ghost-written the official novelisation for the original Star Wars movie. He also wrote Splinter of the Mind’s Eye, which was intended to be a low-budget spinoff from Star Wars if the first movie did badly in the box office. Seeing that Star Wars was a major success, Splinter of the Mind’s Eye was released as the first official Star Wars novel, meaning that Foster started the Star Wars expanded universe (which has become a major staple for this blog). Foster has since gone on to write a second Star Wars novel, The Approaching Storm, and he recently wrote the official novelisation to Star Wars: The Force Awakens, nearly 40 years after he first got involved with the franchise.

Foster also has some rather interesting connections to the Star Trek franchise. While The Unsettling Stars is the first original novel that he has written for Star Trek, he has produced some official novelisations of several shows and movies over his career. Back in the 1970s, he wrote the official novelisations for Star Trek: The Animated Series, contained in 10 separate books. He also wrote the official novelisations for the 2009 Star Trek film, as well as for its sequel, Star Trek Into Darkness. However, his most significant contribution to the Star Trek universe has to be the fact that he wrote the story for the original Star Trek film, 1979’s Star Trek: The Motion Picture. As a result, Foster is definitely an interesting author to check out, and while I have not had the pleasure of reading any of his stuff previously, I was rather intrigued to see how this novel would turn out.

Years ago, a time travelling Romulan ship attacked and destroyed the Federation starship the U.S.S. Kelvin, killing the father of James T. Kirk. The changes which occurred following the destruction of this ship resulted in a whole new timeline, similar to the main Star Trek universe in most ways, but with a number of key differences. In this new timeline, Kirk, with the help of his young crew aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise, was eventually able to defeat this powerful Romulan ship, but not before it destroyed the Vulcan home planet. Now, after being promoted to captain of the Enterprise, Kirk and his crew embark on their first mission together.

With their ship repaired after the battle with the Romulan ship, the crew of the Enterprise take it out of spacedock in what is seen as a simple shakedown cruise. However, not long after they set out, they receive a distress signal from a ship just outside of Federation space. Arriving at the source of the signal, they find a single colony ship belonging to an alien race known as the Perenorean. Appearing to be peaceful refugees, the Perenorean request help as they have sustained damaged and are lacking the resources to travel to their original destination. But within moments of contact between the two ships, a second group of unknown alien ships arrive, determined to wipe out the Perenoreans. Despite not knowing the full history of this conflict, Kirk eventually comes to the aid of the Perenoreans, sending their attackers running, although not before they give the crew of the Enterprise a cryptic warning about the people they just saved.

Meeting with the Perenoreans, Kirk and his comrades discover that their new acquaintances are an extremely advanced group of beings whose capacity to learn and innovate seems limitless. Extremely grateful and determined to repay those who have helped them, the Perenoreans endear themselves to the Enterprise’s crew, who decide to help them relocate to a nearby planet. However, not everything is as it seems with the Perenoreans, whose desire to help and improve everything around them comes with its own unique set of issues. Can the crew of the Enterprise find a solution to the problems their new friends are causing or have they unwittingly unleased a terrible scourge on the Federation?

The Unsettling Stars proved to be a compelling and exciting Star Trek novel that I was able to get through quite quickly. Foster comes up with a rather clever and entertaining central story, set in the unique Kelvin alternate timeline, that revolves around a classic Star Trek first contact mission, with some interesting twists to it. The author crafts together a great story that spends a good amount of time with the key members of the Enterprise crew, with a particular focus on Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Uhura and Scott, as well as introducing several other new members of the crew, who each have a couple of scenes. The Unsettling Stars comes across like a typical Star Trek adventure, featuring a good blend of action, adventure, diplomacy and scientific discussion, similar to an episode of one of the shows. No real prior knowledge about the greater Star Trek universe is needed to enjoy this book, although it is geared more towards those readers who have a greater appreciation for the franchise, and who have at least watched the 2009 Star Trek film. Overall, The Unsettling Stars is a gripping and enjoyable Star Trek novel with a great story that I had a fantastic time listening to.

One of my favourite elements of this book was Foster’s inclusion of the new alien race, the Perenoreans. The Perenoreans are a group of extremely friendly aliens that the Enterprise rescue and help relocate to a new colony planet. The Perenoreans are an interesting new alien species in the Star Trek canon, characterised by their great intelligence, ability to adapt and evolve to any situation, and their desire to help anyone they come across. While it is also intriguing to see a new fictional alien species, a large amount of this book’s narrative lies around the crew discovering the true intentions and motivations of this species. While they seem friendly, you just know that they are going to turn out to be sinister or problematic in some way or another. The way that they genuflect is way over the top, and there is no way a whole race of people is that friendly. Also, there would not be much of story if they did not turn out to be problematic in some way. Foster does an excellent job of slowly hinting at their true nature, and it helps build up a good amount of tension throughout the course of the book. The eventual reveal of their secrets is rather fascinating and makes for a great payoff after all the build-up. I also really liked the conclusion to their whole arc, especially as it made use of a fun, but seemingly unimportant story element to wrap the whole thing up. These aliens are an amazing part of this book’s story, and it was one that made me enjoy The Unsettling Stars a whole lot more.

I also think that Foster did a good job of writing this book like it was set in the Kelvin timeline. The Kelvin timeline is filled with all manner of intriguing differences to the main Star Trek timeline, and the author spent a bit of time incorporating these differences into The Unsettling Stars. While at times the book did a feel a little like a tie-in to The Original Series, Foster was always quick to showcase some key elements of the Kelvin universe. Kirk is a little more arrogant and eager for glory in this book, and there are several discussions about his rapid promotion to captain, which results in a bit more scrutiny from Starfleet. McCoy is a bit more of a grump in this novel, and he has a bit more of an antagonistic relationship with Spock. There is also a bit of time spent exploring the new relationship between Spock and Uhura, and there are several mentions about Spock’s new dynamic as a member of a refugee species. I liked seeing the return of Simon Pegg’s fun version of Scotty, whose inclusion makes for several entertaining and enjoyable scenes. I also have to highlight the excellent reference to Star Trek: The Motion Picture that occurred in this book, as the crew of this version of the Enterprise come across a key item from this film well before it becomes a problem. It’s not often that a writer gets to erase the entirety of a film they scripted over 40 years previously, and I quite liked how this event turned out as part of the larger story. I had a fantastic time exploring the Kelvin timeline in this book, and I look forward seeing more of it in the future novels set in this timeline.

As I mentioned above, I ended up checking out The Unsettling Stars in its audiobook format, which was narrated by Robert Petkoff. This is a rather short audiobook, which runs for just over eight hours. While it took me a few days to get through (mainly due to lack of listening time than anything else), most readers should be able to listen to the whole book rather quickly, especially once they get engrossed in the intriguing story. Like every other Star Trek book I have so far listened to, The Unsettling Stars audiobook featured the vocal talents of Robert Petkoff, who seems to be the primary narrator for Star Trek audiobooks. Petkoff is an amazingly talented narrator who has come up with some incredibly realistic voices for key members of the various Star Trek television shows. In particular, he has come up with some fantastic voices for the members of The Original Series, which he uses throughout The Unsettling Stars to great effect, bringing the main crew of the Enterprise to life, while also coming up with great voices for some of the additional members of the crew and the various aliens that they encounter. All of this is really cool, and hearing these similar voices helps bring the reader into the Star Trek zone. If I had one criticism, though, it would be that Petkoff uses the same voices here that he uses for all the other audiobooks based around The Original Series. While I appreciate that the characters in the Kelvin timeline are supposed to be versions of the cast from The Original Series, hearing the Kelvin timeline characters speak in the same voice as their counterparts was a tad disjointing, and it made me forgot at times that this book is supposed to be set in an alternate timeline. A little bit of variation from Petkoff could have potentially helped this, although I am uncertain about what exactly he could have done to set this apart. Despite this minor criticism, I still really enjoyed listening to the audiobook version of this book, and I would recommend this format to anyone who wanted to check out The Unsettling Stars.

The Unsettling Stars is an excellent and exciting new Star Trek novel from the legendary author Alan Dean Foster. I had a great time unwrapping the cool mystery around the new race of aliens that Foster came up with for this novel, and it was fun to see a story in the Kelvin universe. This was a fantastic addition to the Star Trek canon, and I would recommend this to any fans of the franchise who want a clever new read.

Throwback Thursday: Stars Wars: Lords of the Sith by Paul S. Kemp

On April 24, 2020May 2, 2023 By The Unseen LibraryIn Audiobook, Extended Universe, Science Fiction, Star Wars, Tie-in Novel15 Comments

Publisher: Penguin Random House Audio (Audiobook – 28 April 2015)

Series: Star Wars

Length: 10 hours and 56 minutes

My Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Reviewed as part of my Throwback Thursday series, where I republish old reviews, review books I have read before or review older books I have only just had a chance to read.

For my second Throwback Thursday article of this week (what can I say, I was in the zone for reviewing older content) I check out a fast-paced and addictive Star Wars novel that was released a couple of years ago, with Star Wars: Lords of the Sith by Paul S. Kemp.

It is the early days of the Galactic Empire. Under the reign of Emperor Palpatine, few openly oppose imperial rule, and those that do are swiftly dealt with by Palpatine’s ruthless apprentice, Darth Vader. But as the power and influence of the Emperor and Vader grow, so does their desire to rule and oppress every planet in the galaxy, and with that comes the first sparks of rebellion.

The planet Ryloth knows all about oppression and invasion. Following a brutal occupation during the Clone Wars, Ryloth now finds itself under the control of the Empire, which strips the planet of its natural resources while using the people for slave labour. In opposition to this occupation, an aggressive resistance moment has arisen, led by idealistic leader Cham Syndulla and his comrade Isval, a vengeful former slave. Thanks to their excellently placed sources, Syndulla’s resistance has been able to launch some substantial attacks against the Empire, but their actions have gained the attention of the Emperor and Vader. In a bid to assert his dominance on Ryloth, the Emperor sets out on a rare mission to the planet, accompanied by Vader. However, this is the opportunity that Syndulla has been waiting for.

Upon the Imperial’s arrival above Ryloth, the resistance fighters are able to do the impossible and blow up their Star Destroyer. Forced to abandon ship, the two Sith lords find themselves trapped on the dangerous surface of Ryloth with no means to communicate with Imperial command and no reinforcements on the horizon. In a bid to liberate the galaxy from their dark rule, Syndulla and Isval gather all their forces and resources to hunt the Emperor and Vader down. Surrounded by enemies, inhospitable terrain and terrible native fauna, the two Sith Lords appear to be at their most vulnerable. However, what Syndulla and his team fail to realise is that their prey are two of most dangerous beings in the galaxy, and together they are a force of unnatural destruction. Can the resistance fighters take on Emperor and Vader, and what happens when the two Sith lords work out that their biggest threat is each other?

Now this is a rather fantastic and captivating Star Wars novel that I have been wanting to check out for a while now due to the book’s cool concept. This is the first book that I have read by Paul S. Kemp, a fantasy author who has been writing since the early 2000s. His first novel, Twilight Falling debuted in 2003, after the author released several pieces of short fiction. Kemp then went on to write several fantasy series and standalone novels, including The Erevis Cale trilogy, The Twilight War trilogy and the Egil and Nix books, most of which fell within the Forgotten Realms shared fantasy fiction universe. Kemp has also written a few Star Wars novels, including Crosscurrent, The Old Republic: Deceived and Riptide, which were part of the old Star Wars Legends canon. Lords of the Sith is Kemp’s first novel in the new Star Wars canon, and he presents the reader with a fun and fast-paced novel that has some intriguing elements to it.

Kemp pulls together an excellent Star Wars novel that has a great story, is full of breathtaking action scenes and features compelling dives into some iconic Star Wars characters and elements of the universe. While I came for all the fun action that was bound to feature in a story surrounding the Emperor and Vader fighting against overwhelming odds, I stayed for the intriguing story that is full of betrayal and manipulations. The author does a fantastic job of utilising multiple character perspectives to tell a fuller story, which showed the perspectives of not only Vader and Syndulla’s resistance but also two Imperial officers stationed on Ryloth: one who is loyal to the Emperor and one who has been working for the resistance. This helped produce a really clever narrative, and it was interesting to see where Kemp took the story throughout Lords of the Sith.

The story is set five years after the events of Revenge of the Sith and focuses on the Emperor and Vader encountering some of the earliest forms of rebellion against the Empire. There are some strong elements from the extended Star Wars universe in this book, most notably with the inclusion of Cham Syndulla, a character who appeared in two Star Wars animated series, The Clone Wars and Star Wars Rebels, and is the father of Hera Syndulla, one of the main characters from Rebels (who is featuring in a lot of other pieces of Star Wars fiction at the moment). However, this is definitely a novel that can be enjoyed by the more casual Star Wars fan, and no real knowledge of the extended universe is needed to follow the plot. As always, though, those readers who are fans of some of the extended universe fiction are probably going to enjoy this book a little more. I myself enjoyed seeing the exploration of the early days of the Empire, an examination of Cham Syndulla’s history between the two animated shows and some exploration of the planet of Ryloth.

Without a doubt, the highlight of this book has to be the amazing action sequences featuring Darth Vader and the Emperor. Kemp went out of his way to show off just how badass these two characters can be, and he did not hold back any punches. Vader and the Emperor get into some major scrapes throughout the book, as they hunt or are hunted by members of the Ryloth resistance or some of the deadly creatures that reside on the planet’s surface. Needless to say, these two characters use all of their deadly Force abilities to take down swathes of opponents, and they come across as pretty impressive characters, especially in the eyes of some of the other point-of-view characters. I loved the reactions from characters like Syndulla or Isval, especially as it becomes more and more apparent to them that their opponents are something too much for them. I have always loved comics and books that showed off how badass Vader and the Emperor can be, and this is one of the better examples of this. Kemp started this book off strong by having Vader crash his fighter onto a ship to board it, before systematically taking down the crew one by one, while Syndulla and Isval are forced to listen from another ship (accompanied by Vader breathing heavily into a comms unit to freak everyone out). This is then followed by a plethora of other cool sequences, which includes Vader and the Emperor decimating a massive swarm of Ryloth’s apex predators and a particularly cool sequence where Vader started force choking several characters aboard a separate spaceship while he was flying upside down above them. All of this was exceedingly cool, and I loved Kemp’s amazing imagination when it comes to these two characters.

I also quite liked the intriguing examination of the unique relationship between Darth Vader and the Emperor that became an interesting central focus of the plot. While the story doesn’t show the Emperor’s point of view, you get Vader’s take on the situation, and through his eyes you see his perceptions of the Emperor, his thoughts on the partnership they have formed, and the knowledge that it will eventually end with Vader attempting to kill Palpatine to take his place. Palpatine, for his part, spends most of the story devising tests and challenges to get into Vader’s head and to ensure that his apprentice is loyal and has no thoughts of overthrowing him at the moment. I liked the compelling and clever examination of these two characters’ mindsets that Kemp pulled together, and I felt that he had a great handle on the personalities of these iconic Star Wars characters. I also rather enjoyed Kemp’s portrayal of the Emperor’s manipulative and purely evil nature, as it is revealed that everything that happens throughout the book is due to his design, and he threw away thousands of Imperial lives to achieve his goals. The revelation of this to some of key characters in this book makes for a great scene and I think that it really encapsulated just how evil the Emperor could be, which was pretty awesome.

Like with most Star Wars books that I read, I ended up checking out the audiobook format of Lords of the Sith, which was narrated by Jonathan Davis. This audiobook runs for just under 11 hours, and can be powered through quite quickly, especially once the listener hears the opening action sequence read out to them. I have to once again highlight that use of the cool music and sound effects that are included in all Star Wars audiobooks in order to enhance the story. Lords of the Sith had some great sound inclusions throughout its run time, and I felt that these definitely had a major impact on my enjoyment of this book. This audiobook features the audio talents of skilled narrator Jonathan Davis, whose work I have previously enjoyed in Star Wars books such as Master & Apprentice and Dooku: Jedi Lost. Davis does an incredible job narrating this book and he comes up with some impressive voices for the various characters featured throughout it. I particularly liked the great voices he came up for key characters like the Emperor and Darth Vader (with the help of some appropriate sound effects) and Cham Syndulla, and they sounded a lot like their appearances in the movies and animated shows. As a result, I really powered through this excellent audiobook, and I would strongly recommend this format to anyone who wants to check out Lords of the Sith.

Lords of the Sith is a fun and exceedingly entertainingly Star Wars novel that I had an outstanding time listening to. Kemp comes up with an exciting and action-packed story that not only explores some intriguing aspects of the expanded Star Wars universe, but which also contains some over-the-top action sequences that shows just how awesome a Star Wars novel can be. Lords of the Sith comes highly recommended to anyone looking for a fantastic and enjoyable read, and I hope that Kemp writes some more Star Wars novels in the future.

House of Earth and Blood by Sarah J. Maas

On April 17, 2020February 13, 2024 By The Unseen LibraryIn Audiobook, Fantasy, Five-Star Books, Murder Mystery7 Comments

Publisher: Bloomsbury/Audible Studios (Audiobook – 3 March 2020)

Series: Crescent City – Book One

Lenght: 27 hours and 50 minutes

My Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Prepare to meet your new obsession! One of the world’s top young adult fantasy fiction authors, Sarah J. Maas, breaks into the adult fantasy fiction genre in a big way with the first book in her brand-new Crescent City series.

Sarah J. Maas is an author that needs very little introduction. She is one of the most highly regarded young adult fantasy authors in the world today, having written two major bestselling series and a couple of standalone young adult novels. Maas debuted in 2012 with Throne of Glass, the first novel in her acclaimed seven-book long Throne of Glass series, and she has since gone on to write a second major series, A Court of Thorns and Roses. I have been meaning to check out some of Maas’s main series for a while now, especially Throne of Glass, as I have heard some very good things about them. Unfortunately, the only book of Maas’s that I have so far read was her DC Comics tie-in novel, Catwoman: Soulstealer, which I really enjoyed, especially as Maas had an amazing understanding of some iconic comic characters. As a result, I was interested when I heard about her new book, House of Earth and Blood, and I was curious to see how her first adult fiction novel would turn out. This is the first book in the Crescent City series, which presumably will be the author’s main body of work for the next few years. I received a physical copy of this book to review, although I eventually decided to listen to the audiobook format to fit it into my reading schedule, and I have to say I was rather impressed.

Welcome to Crescent City, a bustling metropolis where magic and technology meet in a world ruled over by all-powerful godlike creatures. Bryce Quinlan is a half-Fae, half-human, party girl at the low end of her world’s magical hierarchy, content to live her days clubbing and celebrating with her best friend, the powerful werewolf Alpha Danika Fendyr. All that changes the night Danika and her entire wolf pack are brutally slaughtered while Bryce is out partying. Bryce arrives home just in time to encounter the demon that committed the act, chasing it out into the streets before it escapes, never to be seen again.

Two years later, Bryce is a shell of her former self. Still reeling from the death of the closest person in her life, Bryce finds herself without direction or purpose. However, the revelation that a fresh wave of killings that mirror the bloody way Danika and her pack were taken out quickly changes that. Due to her experiences with the unknown species of demon and her intimate knowledge of Danika’s movements and history, Bryce is tasked by the governor of Crescent City to find who or what is summoning the destructive demons and unleashing them upon seemingly random members of the populace. However, Bryce will not be working on this case alone, as she finds herself teamed up with the governor’s personal assassin, the brooding, dangerous and surprisingly attractive fallen angel, Hunt Athalar.

Begrudgingly agreeing to work together, Bryce and Hunt start to scour the dark underbelly of their city, attempting to find any leads to who summoned the demon. However, they soon run afoul of many of Crescent City’s inhabitants, some of whom do not want the pair to uncover the truth. As they dig further, they begin to uncover a terrible conspiracy with terrible connections to Bryce’s traumatic past and which threatens all of Crescent City. However, the closer they come to the truth, the more pain and torment the two damaged souls uncover, especially as both of them try to fight the intense feelings blooming between them. With the fate of Crescent City hanging in the balance, can Bryce and Hunt get to the bottom of these killings, or will they be overwhelmed by all the hurt that is about to come their way?

Well damn, that turned out to be one hell of a book. I do have to admit that I’m not usually a fan of major romantic subplots in the novels I read (I know, typical male, Bryce would probably be calling me an Alphahole), and I was a little apprehensive that the romantic angles described in the book’s synopsis would overwhelm the fantasy story. However, any doubts I had about whether I was going to enjoy House of Earth and Blood were quickly blown away in the early stages of the story, especially once I hit the major plot development about 70 pages in. From there I was absolutely hooked on the story, as Maas kept piling on revelations, shocking moments, character development and an impressive murder mystery. I ended up really loving this amazing novel, and I ended up giving it a five-star rating.

I really enjoyed the way that Maas told this story, and this book contained an expansive and deeply addictive narrative that proved hard to put down at times. House of Earth and Blood is told from several character perspectives, most notably Bryce and Hunt, although quite a bit of the story is shown from the perspective of Bryce’s half-brother, Ruhn Danaan. Having these three main point-of-view characters results in a much more expansive story, as each of them has their own contributions to the plot, although there is a huge amount of crossover between each of their storylines. While Mass tends to focus most of her character development and storylines around Bryce, Hunt and Ruhn, there are a number of additional supporting characters, some of whom have some rather interesting roles throughout the book. Maas also includes a huge amount of foreshadowing throughout the book, hinting at several things that are to come further along in the narrative. While it is obvious where some of this foreshadowing is going, some of it was only noticeable in hindsight, and some of these more subtle inclusions made me really appreciate the author’s clever writing style.

One of the best things about this book was the incredible and intriguing new fantasy world. The Crescent City series is set on a version of Earth called Midgard, which was invaded thousands of years ago by vast armies of various magical creatures, ending humankind’s dominance of the planet. The modern world of Midgard is a chaotic and fascinating place, filled will all manner of magic and creatures who live in a hierarchal system, with all-powerful beings at the top and humans at the very bottom. There are so many cool elements to this world, from the unique magical systems, the different factions and organisations, and a vast multitude of different magical creatures with their own traits and characteristics. Maas dedicates a substantial amount of time exploring all these different elements of her new world, and the result is an impressive and vast setting which serves as a fantastic backdrop to this exciting story. I also liked the rather fun similarities between this fantasy world and the modern world, and it was interesting to see fantasy creatures running around with modern technology such as phones and guns. I also had a rather good laugh at some of the television shows that the author featured in the book, including a rather trashy-sounding True Blood inspired television show, which was made fun of relentlessly for its sexual content (which is kind of ironic considering how much sex was in this novel). Maas is clearly a master of universe building, and she has come up with a really great fantasy world that holds a lot of potential for future novels in the series, as well as opening up the possibilities of spin-off stories around some of the fantastic side characters introduced. I personally would love to see a novel based around the character of Fury Axtar, the mysterious assassin friend of Bryce, who has a minor role in the book.

In addition, Maas has also come up with a rather clever murder mystery storyline that I had an outstanding time unwrapping. The vast majority of House of Earth and Blood’s plot revolves around the murder of Danika Fendyr and her pack, as well as the similar murders that are occurring in the modern day. The subsequent investigation by Bryce and Hunt turned into a rather captivating storyline, as they explored the underbelly of their fascinating city, trying to find leads and uncover who had a motive to kill Danika. This whole mystery storyline goes to some very interesting places, and Maas comes up with a number of red herrings, alternate suspects, potential leads and side mysteries (a missing magical horn and a new street drug), all of which come together into a pretty incredible and clever narrative. I was actually rather surprised about who the culprit turned out to be, although Maas does set up the reveal rather well, and there are some rather clever hints in hindsight. That being said, while I didn’t know who the culprit was in advance, I totally knew where the final showdown with them was going to take place, and how the whole confrontation was bound to go down (there was a literal Chekov’s gun there). Still, it turned into quite a good confrontation scene, and I had a good laugh at the over-the-top way that the villain was taken down for good. This was a rather impressive element of the story, and I hope that Maas includes some more clever mysteries in her future books.

While I really loved the fantastic story, incredible world building and captivating mystery, the true centre of this book are the two compelling and exceedingly damaged main characters who Maas sets the story around, Bryce Quinlan and Hunt Athalar. Maas does some outstanding work setting these characters up, exploring their pasts and developing their personalities and emotions throughout the book. Bryce starts House of Earth and Blood as a seemingly carefree party girl with major daddy issues. However, the loss of Danika in the book’s first act severely changes her, as she has to deal with an extreme amount of guilt, isolation and social hatred in the following two years. This really alters her as a character and turns her into an extremely vulnerable person with a real emotional investment in the case, who hides all her true feelings behind a sassy and angry façade. Hunt, on the other hand, is a powerful fallen angel who lost his freedom and the love of his life in a failed rebellion against the ruling gods of the planet, and has spent the last several decades being tortured and used by the victorious archangels, and is now the personal assassin of the governor of Crescent City. Now known throughout the city as the Umbra Mortis, the Shadow of Death, Hunt is a simmering pot of anger who is resentful of how he has been treated all his life, and who is determined to be set free. Like Bryce, he is deeply invested in solving the case, as its resolution will allow him to take a serious step towards freedom, and on the surface he is the more serious of the duo. However, also like Bryce, Hunt has some major vulnerabilities and he is hurting deep inside. Both Bryce and Hunt are incredibly interesting protagonists, and I am really impressed with the layers that Maas was able bring to their characters, which added a significant amount to the story.

While Bryce and Hunt are amazing characters in their own right, the real magic comes when they are paired together. It is obvious from the start that these two are going to hook up at some point, but the journey to get there was written extremely well. The combination of these two exceedingly vulnerable and complex characters in the story is great, and it makes for some incredible and dramatic story moments, as Bryce and Hunt slowly work out all their issues and history. The way they slowly go from dislike to mutual respect to lust/romance is accompanied with a slow exchange of secrets, facts and personality reveals, and I had an amazing time seeing them come together as a couple. This turned into quite a good romantic subplot, although the two of them have some major bumps and betrayals along the way. Still, there are some rather nice moments in their relationship, from the way that they take care of each other after traumatic events, to funny reveals and mutual moments of protecting one and other. Bryce and Hunt make for a great pair, and I am really impressed with the way that Maas portrayed them and the complex story she wove around them. It looks like there are more secrets and backgrounds about both coming up in the future books, and I am looking forward to seeing where Maas takes them in the future.

While this book had some amazing elements, I did find this novel to be a tad trashy at times. As I mentioned above, this is Maas’s first foray into non-young adult fiction, and she certainly did not shy away from adding all manner of adult content into her book. While I can certainly appreciate Maas wanting to differentiate this book from some of her young-adult fiction work, I honestly think she overcompensated. This book is filled with a huge amount of adult language and sexual content, as pretty much every character in this book is crude, rude, oversexed and incredibly thirsty. While some of this served a purpose, such as showing what sort of party-girl character Bryce was before the traumatic incident, the sheer amount of stuff that Maas included was a bit over the top, and I found it to be somewhat distracting at times. This book also introduced me to the brand-new term, Alphahole. In the context of this book, an Alphahole is the term that Bryce gives to any magical male who thinks that their abilities and power give them the right to control women and run their lives, especially those women with less magical power than them (i.e. humans and half-humans like Bryce). Unfortunately, in this book pretty much every male that Bryce encounters is an Alphahole in her opinion; even the more redeemable characters like Hunt or Ruhn are deemed Alphaholes at the start of the novel, especially once they venture an opinion about her behaviour or actions. While I appreciate that this dislike for domineering men is part of Bryce’s character due to her father, and controlling guys really aren’t that cool in either fiction or real life, I do think that Maas kind of overdid their inclusion just a bit and I was honestly getting sick of hearing Alphahole as a descriptive term by the end of the book (although it became less apparent as the story progressed).

As I mentioned above, I ended up listening to the audiobook version of House of Earth and Blood. This audiobook has a runtime of 27 hours and 50 minutes and is narrated by Elizabeth Evans. I am rather glad that I decided to check out this format of the book. While I probably would have finished it off faster if I had read a physical copy (it took me a few weeks to get through the audiobook), I always feel that I absorb more of the novel when I listen to it, especially with longer books. This proved to be really useful when listening to House of Earth and Blood, as Maas packed so much plot and world building into this immense novel, and I think I ended up getting more out of this book by utilising this format. I have to say that I was also immensely impressed with Elizabeth Evans’s narration. Evans did an incredible job bringing the story to life, and her steady and emotional dictation of the story really helped me get to the end. I really loved the cool voices that Evans was able to come up with for all the characters, and I think that each of them matched the distinctive personalities of each character. Evans produced a huge range of different voices for these characters, and I really liked how she was able to alter them to reflect the ethereal or magical nature of some of the characters featured in the book, as well as hint at how powerful some of these creatures were by modulating her tone and adding a commanding quality to it. This was an impressive and deeply enjoyable audiobook adaptation, and I would strongly recommend it to anyone interested in enjoying House of Earth and Blood. That being said, be careful where you listen to this book, as it can be a little awkward to hear some of the steamy sex scenes when you are out in public. I somehow managed to be out shopping during two separate and particularly graphic scenes, and it proved very hard to keep a straight face while I was trying to grab groceries.

House of Earth and Blood is an incredible adult fiction debut from Sarah J. Maas, who has produced another outstanding and captivating read. There are so many excellent and enjoyable story elements in this book, and I absolutely loved every second I spend listening to it, even though some parts were a little over the top at times. This was an awesome start to Maas’s new Crescent City series, and I cannot wait to see what impressive and addictive story the author comes up with next. This novel comes highly recommended, and it gets a full five-star rating from me.

Hitler’s Secret by Rory Clements

On April 8, 2020August 15, 2022 By The Unseen LibraryIn Historical Fiction, Thriller5 Comments

Hitler's Secret Cover

Publisher: Zaffre (Trade Paperback – 3 March 2020)

Series: Tom Wilde – Book Four

Length: 420 pages

My Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

From the mind of bestselling author Rory Clements comes another captivating historical spy thriller in Hitler’s Secret, the fourth book in Clements’s excellent Tom Wilde series.

In 1941, Hitler’s Germany is at the height of its power, with England under constant bombardment, Europe under German control and the powerful Nazi army smashing aside all resistance in Soviet Russia. At this point in history, Hitler seems unbeatable, and desperate measures are needed if the Allies are to succeed.

In Cambridge, American expat and history professor Tom Wilde attempts to do his bit for the war effort and becomes an intelligence officer. While America is still officially staying out of the war, an upcoming fight with Germany is inevitable. Wilde finds himself enlisted into a top-secret mission that could change the entire course of the war.

Smuggled into Germany under a false identity, Wilde is tasked with recovering a package and delivering it safely back to England. This package is the key to undermining Hitler’s image and influence, as it reveals a terrible secret about the Führer, one that even Hitler himself was unaware of. Trapped deep behind enemy lines, Wilde must use every trick at his disposal to complete his objective and escape the deadly forces closing in on him. However, the more he learns about his mission, the more he is convinced that this is a secret that needs to stay buried, no matter the cost, and he soon must contend not only with the Nazis but with members of his own intelligence agency.

Wow, now that was a really good historical spy thriller. Clements is a fantastic author, and I have been a fan of his for a while now. Clements started writing back in 2009 with Martyr, the first book in his John Shakespeare series of Elizabethan thrillers. I read a couple of the books in this series, and quite enjoyed the fun stories that they contained, but I really started getting into Clements’s work with the Tom Wilde series. I was lucky enough to get a copy of the first book in this series, Corpus, back in 2017, and I absolutely loved the fantastic story that it contained. I ended up sticking with the story in the following years and I managed to read and review the next two books, Nucleus and Nemesis, both of which were rather good reads. I was very happy when I received my copy of Hitler’s Secret, as I thought that the plot sounded pretty cool. It did not disappoint, as Clements has come up with a fantastic and thrilling new read that might be my favourite Tom Wilde book since Corpus.

At the heart of this book lies a truly great thriller storyline, which sees the protagonist journey into Nazi Germany in order to retrieve a special package while also contending with the interests and machinations of several different groups and nations. This turned out to be a fantastic central story element, and I loved all the action, intrigue and danger that results from this mission. Wilde and his allies end up getting hunted throughout the breadth of German occupied territory by some vile and unrepentant villains, including an insane English expat who is having a fun time living in Nazi Germany (which pretty much tells you just how evil he is). Even when Wilde reaches relative safety, he must contend with being hunted by Nazi agents while also trying to avoid supposedly friendly operatives with whom he has a moral disagreement. I loved the constant hunting and running that resulted from this awesome story concept, and the characters engage in a pretty impressive game of cat and mouse. Clements makes good use of multiple character perspectives to show the various sides of this battle of spies, and it was great to see the hunters and the hunted attempt to outwit each other. It was also interesting to see the perspective of the various antagonists, especially as Clements used these scenes to show how evil they are, ensuring that the reader is determined that they fall. All of this led to an impressive and compelling thriller story that made this book extremely hard to put down.

I have to say that I liked Clements’s choice of MacGuffin for this book, which in this case was the titular secret of Hitler. I won’t go into too much detail about what this is, although the secret is revealed rather early in the story, but I did think that it proved to be a fantastic story element. Not only does Clement use this MacGuffin as an excellent centre to his story, but it was also rather interesting to see what secret the author envisions that could have potentially taken down Hitler. Clements made a unique choice regarding that, coming up with something that could have impacted Hitler’s most fanatical base of support. I thought it was quite a clever story element, and I liked how it allowed the author to come up with a couple of exciting conspiracies with multiple sides involved. I also appreciated the moral implications that the MacGuffin inspired, and it made for some great scenes where Wilde was left to choose between the war effort and what he thought was right.

I also really enjoyed Clements’s choice of setting for this book, as most of the story takes place within Nazi Germany in 1941. Clements has come up with some excellent historical settings for the Tom Wilde series in the past, and I have always liked his central setting of Cambridge in the pre-war period, as it serves as an amazing location for the series’s espionage elements. However, I think that Clements outdid himself by setting Hitler’s Secret in Nazi Germany. This proved to be an incredible and thrilling backdrop to the story, especially as Wilde is forced to navigate vast swathes of the country to get to freedom, contending with patrols, enemy agents who are actively hunting him and even a troop of Hitler Youths. Clements does an amazing job exploring what life would have been like in Germany during this period, showing off the fear and resentment of some of the citizens, the control and surveillance that the Nazis and the Gestapo had over everyone, the brainwashing of German children at school, how the country was locked down and the growing cracks as the invasion of the Soviet Union started to stall and America began entering the war. I also really liked that Clements dived into the complex relationships and rivalries amongst the Nazi high command, especially as part of that rivalry played into the overall story. I particularly appreciated the extensive look at the role of Martin Bormann, Hitler’s secretary, who achieved great power in the Nazi regime. Bormann is a little underutilised in historical fiction, so it was fascinating to see him used in this book, and he proved to be a despicable overarching villain for the story. Clements use of Nazi Germany as a setting for Hitler’s Secret was a brilliant move, and I felt that it helped take this story to the next level.

Hitler’s Secret by Rory Clements was an outstanding fourth entry in the author’s thrilling Tom Wilde series. I loved the complex and captivating story that Clements came up with for this book, and he managed to produce an impressive historical thriller. Hitler’s Secret is a highly recommended book, and I had a wonderful and electrifying time reading it.

Where Fortune Lies by Mary-Anne O’Connor

On April 6, 2020August 20, 2022 By The Unseen LibraryIn Australian, Drama, Historical Fiction2 Comments

Where Fortune Lies

Publisher: HQ Fiction (Trade Paperback – 23 March 2020)

Series: Standalone

Length: 394 pages

My Rating: 4.25 out of 5 stars

From bestselling Australian author Mary-Anne O’Connor comes another fun and intriguing Australian historical drama, Where Fortune Lies, which tells a multi-layered story of people seeking their fortunes in colonial Australia.

1879, Ireland. Anne Brown is a beaten-down young lady, hoping to escape the harsh life of poverty and misery she sees the rest of the women in her family experience. After a particularly cruel night which sees the one good thing in her life taken away from her, Anne flees her hometown, hoping to make a new life for herself in far-flung Australia.

Several months later in London, young gentleman Will Worthington and his sister Mari are shocked to discover that their recently deceased father has changed his will. Instead of the modest inheritance they were expecting, they find that all his money has been left to a mysterious pregnant painted lady who intends to resettle in Australia. With their social standing in London destroyed, Will and Mari, along with Will’s loyal best friend, artist Charlie Turner, follow their father’s mistress to Australia to seek their fortunes.

Upon their arrival in Melbourne, Will Mari and Charlie quickly befriend local businessman Tom McIntosh and his beautiful daughter, Alice, who Will falls in love with. While Will and Mari enjoy the opportunities afforded to them in Melbourne, Charlie spends time in the Victorian Alps with Alice’s brothers, Harry and Richie, and their wild group of friends, who show him how to live the rough colonial life. While there, Charlie finds his artistic inspiration through his work with the McIntosh boys and their wild horses, as well as his love for a mysterious exotic dancer. However, danger lies on the horizon, as Harry and Richie have been covertly engaging in the deadly trade of bushranging. Soon the fates of all these young people will hang in the balance, as tough choices, dangerous loyalties and harsh heartbreaks will impact them all.

Where Fortune Lies is another fantastic read from O’Connor, who has written some exceptional historical dramas in her five-year career. I read my first Mary-Anne O’Connor book last year, In a Great Southern Land, which told an excellent story about a group of people coming to Australia in the 1850’s to participate in the gold rush and subsequent uprising at the Eureka Stockade. I quite enjoyed In a Great Southern Land and I was rather pleased that my review of it was quoted on the back of the copy of Where Fortune Lies that I received. This latest novel follows a similar concept to O’Connor’s last book, with a diverse group of characters journeying to opportunity-rich Australia in order to seek a better life, and O’Connor is once again able to weave together a rich and compelling story of love, family drama and action in the Australian wilds, and I quite enjoyed the fun blend of story elements that the author was able to come up with.

Where Fortune Lies contains a strong character-based story that follows the lives and adventures of several characters who are drawn together by fate, love and family. O’Connor does a wonderful job of introducing these key point-of-view characters, whose story the reader finds themselves getting quite attached to. I really enjoyed the way that the author spaced out the various character threads, taking the time to explore the lives of each of the separate characters. While some of the character arcs do cross over quite a bit (for example, Charlie Turner directly interacts with all the other major characters and serves as a major bridging character), other characters are kept relatively separate from each other, with only a few scenes together. However, these characters arcs still have some subtle interactions, with their actions indirectly impacting other characters’ lives, or the two characters meet or discuss each other without realising who the other person really is. I liked the method of storytelling, as it allowed the reader to get to know each character individually and see the various struggles and difficulties that they are facing, as well as how they overcome them and evolve as people. I really enjoyed each of the character arcs that O’Connor explored, and I think that all of them came to a satisfying conclusion, especially as the various threads combine together at the end of the book with all the main characters finding their final fates. Each of these character-driven storylines had a good blend of adventure, adversity, romance and drama, which I think came together extremely well as an overall narrative.

I really liked the way that O’Connor once again dived back into Australia’s past, this time looking at the turbulent 1870s, and presenting the reader with another view of the country’s iconic colonial history. Where Fortune Lies contains some fantastic examination of various parts of old-school Victoria, including the busting metropolis of Melbourne, and it was interesting to see O’Connor’s depiction of the crossing to Australia and the things that immigrants back in this period would have experienced. Most of the story, however, takes place in the rugged wilds of outback Australia, particularly in the wilderness and small towns of the Victorian Alps. O’Connor presents a fascinating exploration of these communities, and I really enjoyed her depictions of people capturing the wild horses a la The Man from Snowy River. However, the highlight of this jaunt back into history has to be the author’s focus on the bushrangers, the dangerous highwaymen who stalked the Australian outback. A good part of the book’s plot revolves around some of the characters getting involved in bushranging out of desperation or greed, and it was rather intriguing to see how society perceived these criminals. There are a number of references to real-life bushrangers, such as the Kelly Gang and Captain Thunderbolt, and I really enjoyed the parts of the book that focused on this exciting part of Australia’s history. All of this serves as an incredible background to this fun story, and I look forward to seeing what amazing part of Australia’s past O’Connor will explore in her next book.

Where Fortune Lies is another terrific Australian historical drama from O’Connor, who once again combines a captivating, character-driven narrative with an excellent depiction of Australia’s rich and vibrant history. This turned out to be an elegant and enjoyable read that features amazing romantic and dramatic plots, as well as an intriguing dive into the infamous bushrangers of Victoria. A fantastic new novel that once again sees O’Connor continues to shine as one of the most talented authors of Australian historical dramas.

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One Minute Out by Mark Greaney

On March 31, 2020February 2, 2023 By The Unseen LibraryIn Audiobook, Thriller37 Comments

One Minute Out Cover

Publisher: Sphere/Audible Audio (Audiobook – 18 February 2020)

Series: Gray Man – Book Nine

Length: 16 hours

My Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Bestselling thriller author Mark Greaney returns with another fast-paced and incredibly exciting novel that this time explores the dark and shocking world of human trafficking, with One Minute Out, the ninth book in his impressive Gray Man series.

Greaney is a talented thriller author who has written a number of fantastic books since his 2009 debut, including his Gray Man series and seven books in the iconic Jack Ryan series, three of which he cowrote with the legendary Tom Clancy. I started getting into Greaney’s work last year, when I grabbed a copy of his 2019 release, Mission Critical, due to its fun-sounding plot, and I ended up really liking it. Due to how much I enjoyed Mission Critical, I also decided to check out his other release for 2019, Red Metal, which he cowrote with Lt. Col. Hunter Ripley Rawlings IV. This proved to be a very smart decision as Red Metal was an incredible read that was one of my top books (and audiobooks) of the year. As a result, I was rather keen to check out the next release from Greaney when it came out, and I have been looking forward to this book for some time.

Court Gentry is the Gray Man, a rogue CIA operative turned legendary assassin with a conscience, who is known and feared across the globe for his ability to overcome the odds and kill the most well-protected target. While still secretly working for the CIA as part of an off-the-books operation, Gentry still occasionally engages in freelance assassin work, only accepting contracts on some of the world’s most evil and corrupt individuals. His latest job takes him to a remote property in Croatia, where he is hired to kill a former Serbian general and notorious war criminal who has escaped justice for years. While Gentry is able to eliminate his target, he makes a shocking discovery in the building’s cellar: a dark room full of kidnapped women.

Gentry has inadvertently stumbled upon a human trafficking ring that transports kidnapped or coerced women across the world into a life of sexual slavery and untold horrors. Despite his best attempts to rescue the women, Gentry is forced to leave them behind, due to the fear that the women have of their captors. Haunted by what he has seen and the realisation that his actions may have led to terrible repercussions for the captives he encountered, Gentry makes it his objective to relocate and free the women, no matter the cost, while also causing as much pain to the people responsible.

However, this is no ordinary mission for Gentry. The human trafficking ring he is tracking, known as the Consortium, is made up of many different criminal organisations across the world which are highly invested in keeping the operation intact. Forced to work outside his usual intelligence networks, and with no CIA backup on the horizon, Gentry teams up with rookie EUROPOL analyst Talyssa Corbu, who has a personal stake in bringing the Consortium down. Together Gentry and Corbu are able to trace the human trafficking pipeline across Eastern Europe to Italy and America. However, the Consortium is far larger than Gentry and Corbu realised, with an elite and deadly fighting force at their back. Can Gentry once again overcome the odds to bring down his opponent, or will the Consortium and their influential allies be his undoing?

Now this was an impressive and fantastic thriller novel from Greaney, who did an outstanding job with this dark and captivating read. One Minute Out is a substantial and clever book that pits the author’s capable protagonist against a host of the most despicable villains in the world today, human traffickers. Like the rest of the books in this series, One Minute Out can be enjoyed as a standalone novel, and no prior knowledge of the other Gray Man books is required to enjoy this latest entry in the series. While this book is very grim and uncomfortable at times due to its darker subject matter, this proved to be a compelling and enjoyable thriller, which is probably my favourite Gray Man novel so far.

This is a really well-written thriller novel, and Greaney came up with some amazing scenes and sequences throughout the course of this book. One Minute Out is told from a variety of different perspectives, including the protagonist, Court Gentry, several supporting characters and a number of antagonists. This helps produce a large-scale and comprehensive read that dives into several new characters while simultaneously showing off the scale of the opponents that Gentry is going up against. While a large part of the book is told from the third person, Greaney utilises a first-person perspective for the scenes that Gentry is narrating. Not only does this help Gentry’s chapters really stand out but it allows the reader to get some fantastic insights into the mind of the complex protagonists, and why he is so determined to engage in an apparent fool’s errand and help out a bunch of people he has never even met before. I have to say that I was really impressed with the multitude of amazing action sequences that filled this book, as Greaney has his protagonist engage in a number of thrilling, high-octane scenes, which I had a blast reading. While I really enjoyed all the various shootouts, infiltrations of secure targets, examples of tradecraft throughout various European cities and explosive car chases, a couple of scenes really stood out to me. These highlights included a particularly well-written sequence set underwater, as Gentry attempts to escape from several boatloads of killers with only a damaged set of scuba equipment, and a massive assault of a heavily fortified and well-guarded complex out in the dessert, with only a few seasoned ex-soldiers and an insane relic of a helicopter pilot backing him up. All of this helped make for an excellent read, and I really enjoyed where Greaney took the story at times.

One of the most compelling things about this novel is the way that Greaney has anchored his excellent thriller story around a sinister real-life trade that is currently plaguing the world, human trafficking for sexual slavery. As terrible as it is to consider in this modern day and age, human slavery is still a thing, and for many it is a profitable and stable business. Throughout the course of the novel Greaney shines a light on this foul trade, as his protagonist encounters this evil in Europe and deals with a number of characters affected by it. As the book progresses, the reader gains a huge amount of knowledge about this malevolent criminal industry from a bunch of different perspectives. As a result, there is a quite a lot of information about how trafficking rings operate, including the way that the girls are taken, manipulated and broken, as well as the ways that they are transported and sold across the world. Greaney does an outstanding job diving into this subject, presenting the reader with a grim and uncompromising view of all the horrors associated with this trade, and ensuring that no one is left uncertain about how evil the individuals behind it are. I really appreciate the way that Greaney featured it in this book, although those people who are uncomfortable with sexual violence will probably have a hard time reading this book.

I felt that the dark subject of human trafficking served as a rather intriguing plot point for this novel, and it definitely worked well with the spy thriller genre of the series. The main benefit is that it presents the reader with a truly despicable and completely unlikeable group of antagonists for Gentry to go up against. Thanks to the author’s use of multiple viewpoints, you get to see inside the heads of several of the Consortium’s leaders, and you swiftly learn that they are an extremely vile and irredeemable bunch of characters who the reader instantly roots against. I liked the way in which the story followed Gentry progressively working his way up the trafficking ladder, from the low-level way station that he accidently discovered, through the corrupt police in several Eastern European towns, to the organisation’s middle management, their larger auctions, right up the bases of the Consortium’s leader in America. This results in a variety of different opponents and obstacles that he must overcome, ranging from low level street thugs to elite South African mercenaries trained in similar methods as Gentry. I really enjoyed seeing Gentry use his espionage tradecraft to tear through the less competent criminal elements at the lower end of the group, before going up against the better trained, elite enforcers of the organisation. Thanks to the author’s depictions of them, it was quite fun to see the upper leadership of the Consortium slowly get more and more scared and desperate after each of Gentry’s operations against them, and their eventual fates turned out to be extremely satisfying.

I also quite liked the way that for the majority of the book Gentry is working outside of the system, without his usual CIA backup or resources. This forces him to engage in a less sophisticated battle against his opponents, relying more on his skills than having any backup or intelligence, which I thought made for a much more credible narrative with higher stakes. Thanks to author’s use of the first-person perspective for Gentry’s character, you get a much more in-depth explanation for his tactics and methods, which I enjoyed and found to be rather fascinating. I also enjoyed the author’s inclusion of several female side-characters, who Gentry works with to bring down the Consortium. The main one of these is Talyssa Corbu, who utilises her financial expertise to help move the plot along and point Gentry to his next target. While Corbu is a bit of a pain at the start of the book, due to her incompetence, she grew on me over time, especially as she became more determined and capable, especially when more of her backstory was revealed. I was also quite impressed with the depictions of several female characters who were taken prisoners by the traffickers, and who eventually helped Gentry take them down. Having the women work to free themselves was a nice touch by Greaney, and I particularly loved one scene where several of the women defied typical convention and helped save Gentry, with realistic explanations for how they obtained their relevant skills (thank goodness for equal opportunity Eastern European military training). All of this led to an extremely exciting and highly compelling story, and I really enjoyed the full extent of One Minute Out’s story.

I ended up listening to the audiobook format of One Minute Out, which was narrated by Jay Snyder, who has narrated several of Greaney’s books in the past. The One Minute Out audiobook ran for around 16 hours, and I was able to clear through it in a few days. I found the audiobook format to be an excellent way to enjoy the novel, and I strongly felt that listening to this book helped me connect a lot more with the story and characters. Snyder did an amazing job narrating this book, and I was especially impressed with the way that he brought all of One Minute Out’s characters to life. Not only did Snyder provide an excellent and fitting voice for Gentry, but he also produced some great voices for the other characters in the book, coming up with a range of realistic accents to show off the diversity of the cast. This turned out to be a fantastic and entertaining way to enjoy One Minute Out and I think that I will be checking out more of Greaney’s books this way in the future.

One Minute Out by Mark Greaney is an outstanding and exceptional new thriller which takes the reader on a dark and action-packed adventure around the world. This proved to be a deeply exciting and truly compelling entry from Greaney, who once again shows why he is one of the top thriller authors in the world today. This was an impressive new entry in the fantastic Gray Man series, and I cannot wait to see where Greaney takes this epic series in the future.

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Throwback Thursday – Predator One by Jonathan Maberry

On March 26, 2020March 5, 2023 By The Unseen LibraryIn Audiobook, Five-Star Books, Science Fiction, Thriller, Throwback Thursday16 Comments

Publisher: Macmillan Audio (Audiobook – 7 April 2015)

Series: Joe Ledger series – Book Seven

Length: 16 hours and 55 minutes

My Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Reviewed as part of my Throwback Thursday series, where I republish old reviews, review books I have read before or review older books I have only just had a chance to read.

For this latest Throwback Thursday, I decided to I wanted something fast-paced and action-packed, so I went and checked out another book in Jonathan Maberry’s dark and thrilling Joe Ledger series with the seventh book, Predator One.

Those familiar with my blog will be aware of my recent love affair with the Joe Ledger series. I first encountered this series back in late 2018, and after massively enjoying the tenth book, Deep Silence, I have been slowly reading and reviewing my way through the entire series from start to finish. There are so many different things that I enjoy about these novels, including the outstanding action, gripping stories, fantastic characters and the crazy scenarios each book is set around. When combined, these elements help produce some truly incredible books, and I had an amazing time reading several Joe Ledger novels last year. I also read the first book in Maberry’s Rogue Team International series, Rage, which was one of my top books (and audiobooks) of 2019. I am hoping to finish off all the remaining books in the Joe Ledger series this year, and Predator One is the first one that I have so far checked out in 2020. I have to say that I was once again blown away with Maberry’s writing ability, as Predator One is another epic and remarkable read which gets a full five-star rating from me.

It is the opening day of the new baseball season, and Joe Ledger, point-agent for the high-tech counter terrorist organisation, the Department of Military Sciences (DMS), is enjoying a well-earned day off. Everything seems to be going well, the sun is shining, the beers are flowing, and a decorated military pilot is about to throw out the first ball. Then a model airplane flies out onto the field, a replica of the one flown by the war hero. Everyone assumes it’s a harmless prank, everyone except Ledger, who can only watch in horror as the toy plane explodes. Within seconds, a swarm of bomb-laden drones appears, devastating the crowd and leaving Ledger injured in the wreckage of the stadium.

As Ledger attempts to process what has happened, a series of coordinated attacks are taking place across America. While some of the attacks appear random, several are deliberately targeting the friends and family of key members of the DMS, attempting to distract the agency and take them off the board. It soon becomes clear that an old enemy has risen from the flames, determined to get revenge on those that they believe have wronged them in the past, including Ledger and everyone he loves. Worse, they have teamed up with a force of pure evil whose deepest wish is to torment and destroy the head of the DMS, the mysterious Mr Church.

Diving back into the action, Ledger and his team attempt to find and neutralise the source of this new threat. But at every turn, they find themselves outmatched, outmanoeuvred and severely outgunned, as the enemy has access to advanced technology that allows them to take control of America’s military vehicles, aircraft, ships and drones. As the attacks against America worsen, their opponents even gain control of Air Force One, with the President aboard, and start to fly it towards New York City. Can Ledger save the day one more time or have the DMS finally come up against an enemy even they can’t outsmart?

Wow, just wow. Predator One is another impressive and extremely captivating thriller novel that I had an outstanding time listening to. Maberry has come up with another incredible, action-packed story which utilises his trademark writing style to present a first-rate novel. Readers are treated to a multi-layered story, which cleverly features multiple character viewpoints, flashbacks and deep examinations of a several major characters’ pasts and motives. All of this allows Maberry to tell a complex and intriguing thriller story that never lets up on the excitement. The various storylines flow together perfectly thanks to the short chapters and constant dancing between different character perspectives, and all the storylines lead up to an epic and memorable conclusion. Maberry really knows how to ramp up the tension and the excitement throughout the book, and the final couple of hours are exceedingly thrilling, as several exhilarating scenarios come into effect at the same time. All of this results in a deeply exciting read, which I really loved and is another perfect Joe Ledger story.

Just like so many books in this series, amongst the best things about Predator One are the fantastic antagonists and their over-the-top plot against America, Joe Ledger and the DMS. For the main antagonist, Maberry goes back to some of the earlier books in the series, and brings back the Seven Kings organisation, which is being led by an old, established opponent of the DMS. While a new, complex villain for this book could have been fun, I really loved the author’s use of the historical antagonist, especially as they have been substantially transformed since the last book, and they are now aiming for a destructive end. This older antagonist is paired with the mysterious, evil character, Nicodemus, and together they form quite a partnership. Nicodemus is a character that has been hinted at and featured in the shadows of several previous books, so it was really cool to see him in a more substantial role. The key to Nicodemus is his extremely enigmatic persona and history, as no one quite knows who or, more importantly, what he is. He seems to have some sort of mystical abilities, and it is hinted in this book that he is some form of demon or devil, although it is never fully revealed. This mystery and mystique make for a quite an intriguing addition to the series, and the two main antagonists work together quite well as an evil, villainous pairing. On top of them, Maberry also throws in a good secondary antagonist who acts as a crooked assistant to the leader of the Seven Kings and who serves as a useful narrator, as well as the standard sexually depraved henchmen. Combined, these excellent antagonists make for a fun and exciting opposition for the main characters and they help produce some extremely interesting storylines.

I was also a major fan of the fantastic and complex master plan that Maberry envisioned for the antagonists of this book, which served as a fantastic basis of much of the story. Maberry crafted a sinister and exceedingly destructive campaign of terror and destruction that culminated in the takeover of Air Force One with the President and other key characters on board, sending it on a kamikaze mission. This proved to be a rather fun villainous storyline to follow, and I enjoyed seeing it unfold from both the protagonists’ and antagonists’ points of view, as these different perspectives led to some very intriguing scenes. I also liked the way that that the origins of the plot were explored in a series of interludes, allowing the reader to become familiar with the key players of the scheme, and get hints of the full extent of the planned destruction. It was also rather cool to see these antagonists land some real blows against the DMS. Maberry has never been shy about killing off key side characters (for example, he killed off the main secondary character and primary love interest in the second book, The Dragon Factory), and he ensures that some real damage is done to some DMS characters in Predator One. This helps add a real emotional edge to the story, and I liked the way that it upped the stakes, as well as the obvious emotional and psychological impacts that it had on some of the series’s well established, long-running protagonists.

Maberry makes sure to bring back the full and unique bevy of good-guy characters for this seventh book, most of whom have appeared in multiple books before. At the fore is the series’s titular protagonist, Joe Ledger, who is the sole first-person narrator in the book, with around a third of the story told from his point of view. Ledger is his usual witty and damaged self in this book, infecting his parts of the story with his wicked humour and sarcasm, while also unleashing his barely hidden rage and special brand of hyper-violence. Ledger goes to some dark places in Predator One, especially after his friends and allies are attacked, and the way he ends the villain is particularly gruesome and memorable. In addition to the usual examination of Ledger’s complex psyche, I really liked the way that a number of other side characters got some substantial sequences in this book. Joe Ledger series stand-out character Mr Church gets quite a lot to do in this book, and it was excellent to not only see him calmly lead his people in a severe crisis, but also react to some substantially personal attacks from the shadowy Nicodemus, who he has some obvious history with. The DMS’s psychiatrist, Rudy Sanchez, also gets quite a few scenes in this book, as he and his family come under substantial attack from the antagonists. It was really intriguing to see Rudy, whose usual role is to calm and centre the rest of the protagonists, come apart a bit in this novel, and it was quite stirring to see him pull himself together in a major way. I have to say that I also really enjoyed the inclusion of Toys as well, especially as Maberry has written a rather good redemption arc for him in this book. Thanks to the author’s use of multiple viewpoints, each of these characters, and more, get multiple moments to shine in this novel, and this helped create a full and captivating thriller tale, especially as the reader inevitably becomes invested in these characters’ survival.

I can’t go past a Joe Ledger novel without commenting on the exquisite and ultra-violent action sequences that are heavily featured throughout the book. Maberry is an expert at writing detailed and explosive action scenes, and Predator One is filled with a substantial amount of battles and fights, with all manner of armed and unarmed combat. These scenes are an absolute delight to behold, and it is always cool to see these well-crafted fights come to life. There are a number of large-scale battle sequences throughout this book, and Maberry did an amazing job switching between several fights that were happening simultaneously towards the end of the book, resulting in some extremely action-packed and exciting sections of Predator One. I really enjoy the way that the author breaks down the fight, and it is interesting to hear about the tactical reasons or destructive capabilities for certain moves or weaponry. All of this makes for a really cool book, although readers should be warned that there is a lot of extreme violence in this book that might not be for everyone, especially the graphic torture scenes.

Just like the previous Joe Ledger novels I have been lucky enough to enjoy, I chose to check out Predator One’s audiobook format, which was narrated by the exceedingly talented Ray Porter. Running at 16 hours and 55 minutes, this is one of the longer Joe Ledger audiobooks (not by much), but I found myself able to power through it in only a few days, and the audiobook format remains my favourite way to enjoy a Joe Ledger book. Porter’s outstanding narration is the highlight of this format, and I will never get tired of praising his vocal work in this format. The voices that Porter comes up with for these productions are pretty damn awesome, and he has perfected some amazing voices for the characters featured in this series. I once again have to highlight Porter’s take on Mr Church, as his version of the character has some real presences, authority and gravitas. I also liked some of the voices that he did for the villainous Nicodemus, especially as the script called for a change of accent and voice mid-sentence, something which Porter pulled off perfectly, and which made the character sound pretty sinister in this format. However, nothing can top the amazing work that Porter puts into the series’s titular protagonist, Joe Ledger, as the narrator is scarily in sync with this character, and expertly portrays all his emotion, personality and raw sarcasm. I cannot emphasise enough how impressive the Joe Ledger audiobooks are, and if you are keen to check them out, this is the format to do it in.

Predator One by Jonathan Maberry is an outstanding and captivating tale of revenge, destruction, action and war, as the author’s team of elite warriors go face to face with an army of pure evil. This was an intense and thrilling read, which I once again completely failed to put down multiple times. Filled with amazing characters, including some very well-crafted evil antagonists, a fun story, violent action sequences and some outrageous story elements, this book is relentlessly entertaining and it proved to be an impressive addition to the Joe Ledger series. Predator One comes highly recommended, especially in audiobook format, and I look forward to finishing off the final two books in the series later this year.

Star Wars: Dooku: Jedi Lost

On March 17, 2020August 9, 2023 By The Unseen LibraryIn Audiobook, Extended Universe, Science Fiction, Star Wars, Tie-in Novel21 Comments

Publisher: Penguin Random House Audio (Audio Production – 30 April 2019)

Script: Cavan Scott

Cast: Orlagh Cassidy, Euan Morton, Pete Bradbury, Jonathan Davis, Neil Hellegers, Sean Kenin, January LaVoy, Saskia Maarleveld, Carol Monda, Robert Petkoff, Rebecca Soler and Marc Thompson.

Length: 6 hours and 21 Minutes

My Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Prepare for another deep dive into the Star Wars canon with an audio drama that explores the past of one the biggest villains from the prequel movies, Count Dooku, with Dooku: Jedi Lost.

Dooku: Jedi Lost was one of the more interesting pieces of Star Wars fiction that was released last year. Based on a script written by Cavan Scott, an author who has written a multitude of comics, novels and radio drama tie-ins for several different franchises, Jedi Lost was originally released as an audio production featuring several different actors, with the script also released in novel format a few months later. I have been meaning to check out this unique story for some time, as it was one of the few pieces of Star Wars fiction that I did not read in 2019. This is actually one of the first entries I am ticking off my Books I Wish I Read in 2019 list (barring The Russian by Ben Coes, which was an honourable mention), and I am really glad I decided to check this piece of fiction out.

For many in the galaxy, Count Dooku of Serenno is one of the most dangerous and evil villains that ever lived. The leader of the ruthless Separatists during the Clone Wars, apprentice to Darth Sidious and master of several ruthless assassins, Dooku is rightfully feared and hated by many. However, he once was one of the most respected and powerful members of the Jedi Council. A former apprentice to Yoda himself, and the mentor to two exceptional Padawans, Rael Averross and Qui-Gon Jinn, Dooku dedicated decades of his life to the Jedi, before suddenly leaving and taking a different path. But how did such a revered Jedi turn to the dark side of the Force? That is a question that Dooku’s new apprentice, Asajj Ventress, is trying to understand when she is given a mission to find Dooku’s missing sister. Searching for leads through Dooku’s journals and messages, Ventress is given unprecedented access into Dooku’s past.

The son of the ruthless Count of Serenno, Dooku was abandoned as baby by his father the moment his abilities with the Force were identified, only to be rescued by Yoda. Upon learning the truth about his birth years later, Dooku struggles with balancing his duties as a Jedi with his connections to his family and home planet. Conflicted, Dooku finds comfort in his friendship with the troubled young Jedi Sifo-Dyas and the mysterious Jedi Master Lene Kostana, whose mission of locating and studying Sith artefacts fascinates Dooku and leads him to his first experiences with the dark side of the Force. As Dooku rises through the ranks of the Jedi Order, he finds himself stymied by the bureaucracy and corruption of the Republic and the hypocrisy of the Jedi Council. As the first waves of darkness fall across the galaxy, how will the younger Dooku react, and what will Ventress do when she realises what sort of person her new master is?

Dooku: Jedi Lost is an incredible and deeply captivating piece of Star Wars fiction that cleverly dives into the past of one of the franchise’s most iconic villains to present a compelling and intriguing story. I ended up listening to the full cast audio production of Jedi Lost, and I really enjoyed this fantastic and intriguing book. The plot of Jedi Lost is uniquely set across several different time periods, with the details of Dooku’s life being relayed to a younger Ventress at the start of her Sith apprenticeship through journal entries, detailed messages, oral histories and even some visions of the past. Scott did an excellent job of setting his story across multiple time periods, which allowed Jedi Lost to showcase the life of the titular character while also presenting an exciting, fast-paced and at times dramatic narrative that includes several plot threads that jump from timeline to timeline. All of this results in an excellent Star Wars story which features some fascinating inclusions to the franchise’s lore and which is enhanced by the incredible audio production.

At the centre of this book lies an intriguing and captivating exploration of one of the most significant antagonists in the Star Wars canon, Count Dooku. Jedi Lost contains quite a detailed and compelling backstory for this character, and you get to see a number of key events from his life. This includes his complicated childhood, the forbidden communication he had with his sister, the connection he maintained with his home planet, parts of his apprenticeship under Yoda, the tutelage of his own two apprentices, his time on the Jedi council, his first brushes with the dark side of the Force and finally the chaotic events that led him to leave the Jedi order and take up his position as Count of Serenno. Every part of this background proved to be extremely fascinating and it paints Dooku as a much more complex character, with understandable motivations and frustrations. He actually comes across as a much more sympathetic person thanks to this production, and readers are going to have an amazing time finding out what events and betrayals drove him away from the Jedi and towards his new master. The storytelling device of having Ventress read and analyse Dooku’s old messages and journal entries ensures that the story quickly jumps through the events of his life, and no key events really seem to be missing. I personally would have like to see some more detail about Dooku’s training under Yoda or his teaching of his apprentices, although I appreciate that this was already an expansive production and there was a limit on what could be included in the script. I also wonder what sort of story this could have turned into if this was told exclusively from Dooku’s point of view, however, this first-person narration probably wouldn’t be as feasible as a full cast audio production. Overall, those fans who check out Jedi Lost are in for quite an in-depth and fascinating look at the great character that is Count Dooku, and I am sure many will enjoy this exciting examination of his backstory.

In addition to exploring the character of Count Dooku, Jedi Lost also presents those dedicated Star Wars fans with a new canon look at the Star Wars universe before the events of The Phantom Menace. You get an intriguing look at the Republic and the Jedi Order in the years leading up to events of the Skywalker Saga, and it was fascinating to see the similarities and differences between the various eras in the Star Wars lore. In particular, I found in interesting to see that the groundwork for the Clone Wars and the fall of the Jedi order had already begun, with ineffectual leadership, corruption in the Senate and complacency in the Jedi Council all eventually leading the dark events of the future. Jedi Lost also shows the earlier days of several Jedi who were supporting characters in either the movies or the animated shows. In particular, this entry focuses on Sifo-Dyas, the Jedi who foresaw the Clone Wars and was manipulated into creating the Republic’s clone army. The story explores how Dooku and Sifo-Dyas were close friends growing up, while also showing the origin of his prescient powers, and he proved to be a rather compelling side character. Jedi Lost also saw the introduction of Jedi Master Lene Kostana to the canon. Lene Kostana was a rebellious Jedi who scoured the galaxy for Sith artefacts in the belief that the Sith were going to rise again. She proved to be an interesting mentor character for Dooku, and her recklessness and unique way of thinking had some major impacts in Dooku’s character development.

I also liked how this piece of Star Wars fiction focused on the early career of Asajj Ventress, one of the best Star Wars characters introduced outside of the movies. Much of the story is set immediately after Dooku claims Ventress as his apprentice and personal assassin, which allows the reader a compelling view of Ventress’s early brushes with the dark side of the Force and the initial corruption and manipulation she experienced under Dooku. This proved to be quite an interesting part of the novel, especially as the reader got to see Ventress’s thoughts and reactions to several revelations about Dooku’s past. Thanks to the way that the audio production is set out, Scott also included a rather cool element to Ventress’s character in the way that she is hearing the voice of her dead former Jedi Master and mentor, Ky Narec. While Ky Narec’s voice was mainly included to allow Ventress to share her thoughts in this audio production without becoming a full-fledged narrator, this ethereal character gives the reader a deeper insight into Ventress’s character. I also enjoyed the discussion about Ventress’s past with Narec, and it helped produce a much more in-depth look at this fascinating character from the expanded universe.

Like most pieces of expanded universe fiction, Jedi Lost is best enjoyed by fans of the Star Wars franchise, who are most likely to appreciate some of the new pieces of lore and interesting revelations. This production also bears some strong connections with another piece of Star Wars tie-in fiction that was released last year, Master & Apprentice by Claudia Gray. Master & Apprentice was one of the most impressive Star Wars novels released last year, and it featured a story that focussed on Dooku’s apprentices, Rael Averross and Qui-Gon Jinn. Jedi Lost heavily references some of the events that occurred or are represented in Master & Apprentice, and it was interesting to see the intersections between the two separate pieces of fiction. I particularly enjoyed seeing more of the unconventional Jedi, Rael Averross, and it was great to see some additional interactions between the proper and noble Dooku, and this rough former apprentice. Despite all of this, I believe that Jedi Lost can easily be enjoyed by more casual Star Wars fans, although some knowledge about the prequel films is probably necessary.

People familiar with this blog are going to be unsurprised to learn that I chose to listen to the audio production of Jedi Lost rather than read the book that was produced from the script. I have a well-earned appreciation for Star Wars audiobooks, which are in a league of their own when it comes to production value; however, Jedi Lost is on another level to your typical Star Wars audiobook. As I mentioned above, Jedi Lost was released as a full cast audio production, which is essentially an audio recording of a play. This was the first piece of Star Wars fiction I had experienced in this medium, and I really loved how it turned out. The cast did an amazing job with the script, and they acted out a wonderful and highly enjoyable production which I thought was just incredible. The production runs for just over 6 hours and 20 minutes, and they manage to fit a lot of plot into this shorter run-time (in comparison to normal Star Wars audiobooks), as the use of dialogue results in a lot less narration. Due to the way Jedi Lost is structured, with Ventress reading out journal entries or having Dooku’s tale told to her, there is a little more narration of events then a production like this would usually have. I think this was necessary to ensure the reader was clear on what was going on at all times, and it didn’t ruin the overall flow of Jedi Lost in any way.

Jedi Lost features a very impressive and talented group of actors who go above and beyond to make this an awesome audio production. As you can see from the cast list above, this production made use of 12 separate narrators, each of whom voice a major character (with some of the actors also voicing some minor characters as well). Many of these narrators have expansive experience with voicing Star Wars audiobooks, and I have actually had the pleasure of listening to several of these actors before, including Euan Morton (Tarkin by James Luceno), Jonathan Davies (Master & Apprentice), Sean Kenin (Death Troopers by Joe Schreiber), Robert Petkoff (multiple Star Trek novels, most recently Picard: The Last Best Hope by Una McCormack) and Marc Thompson (Dark Disciple by Christie Golden, Loki: Where Mischief Lies by Mackenzi Lee and Scoundrels and Thrawn by Timothy Zahn).

There is some truly outstanding audio work done in this production, with several actors producing near-perfect replication of several iconic characters from the Star Wars franchise. I particularly have to praise Orlagh Cassidy for her exceptional portrayal of Asajji Ventress; her take on the character sounded exactly like the Ventress that appeared in The Clone Wars animated show. I was also deeply impressed by Jonathan Davis’s Qui-Gon Jinn and Marc Thompson’s Yoda, both of which were incredible replications of the characters from the movies. Davis also did a great job once again portraying Rael Averross, a fun character who he first brought to life in Master & Apprentice, and I loved the somewhat laidback voice he provides for Rael, especially as it reminds me of an older cowboy character from a western (I personally always picture Sam Elliott when I hear it). Other standout stars in this production include Euan Morton, who came up with a great take on the titular character Count Dooku. Morton was able to produce an impressive and commanding presence for this character, and he did a great job modulating the character’s voice to represent the various jumps in age that the character experienced. The same can be said for Saskia Maarleveld’s Jenza and Sean Kenin’s Sifo-Dyas, whose characters also aged extremely well throughout the course of the production. I also really loved the voice that Carol Monda provided for new character Lene Kostana, and I felt that it fit the character described in Jedi Lost extremely well. I honestly loved all the rest of the voices that were provided throughout this production, and each of them brought some real magic to Jedi Lost.

Just like with a normal Star Wars audiobook, one of the standout features of the Jedi Lost production was the incredible use of the franchise’s iconic music and sound effects. I really cannot emphasise enough how amazing it is to have one of John Williams’s epic scores playing in the background of a scene. Not only does it really get you into the Star Wars zone, but this music markedly enhances the mood of any part of the book it is playing in. Hearing some of the more dramatic scores during a touching or tragic scene really helps the reader appreciate how impactful the sequence truly is, and nothing gets the blood pumping faster during an action sequence than Duel of the Fates or some other fast-paced piece of Star Wars music. The sound effects utilised throughout this production are not only really cool but they also have added significance for an audio production like Jedi Lost which relies on dialogue rather than narration to establish the scene. Having the various classic Star Wars sound effects reflect what is going on can be really helpful, and often the clash of lightsabers and the pew-pew of blaster bolts give life to a battle sequence. I always appreciate the way that certain sound effects can help paint a picture of what is happening in the room that the dialogue is taking place. Having the susurration of a crowd or the light hum of a starship engine in the background always makes a book seem more impressive, and it makes for a fun overall listen.

Dooku: Jedi Lost was an incredible and wonderful production which I had an extremely hard time turning off. Cavan Scott’s clever and intricate script, combined with the outstanding audio production, is a truly awesome experience which I deeply enjoyed. I loved learning more about the character of Count Dooku, and I think that Scott came up with a fantastic and intriguing background for the character. Jedi Lost is an excellent piece of Star Wars fiction, and I am extremely happy that I listened to it. Highly recommended to all Star Wars fans, and if you decide to check out Jedi Lost, you have to listen to the spectacular audio production, which is just amazing.

Star Trek: Picard: The Last Best Hope by Una McCormack

On March 4, 2020August 20, 2022 By The Unseen LibraryIn Audiobook, Extended Universe, Science Fiction, Star Trek, Tie-in Novel15 Comments

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio (Audiobook – 11 February 2020)

Series: Star Trek: Picard – Book One

Length: 11 hours and 40 minutes

My Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Get ready to dive back into the Star Trek universe with Picard: The Last Best Hope by Una McCormack, the latest Star Trek novel which ties into the events of the Picard television show. The Last Best Hope is an outstanding novel that serves as a bridge between Star Trek: The Next Generation show and the current Picard series.

Nearly 20 years before the events of Picard, both the United Federation of Planets and the Romulan Star Empire faced an unprecedented calamity. Scientists have just discovered that the Romulan sun is in the process of going supernova, turning into a destructive force that will devastate the Romulan home system and have significant negative follow-on effects on the remaining planets within Romulan Space. In order to ensure the evacuation of their people, the Romulans grudgingly request aid from the Federation, who assign Jean-Luc Picard to the mission.

Picard, promoted to the rank of admiral, quickly finds himself in charge of the largest and most difficult operation in Starfleet history. The evacuation mission is a vast undertaking, requiring Starfleet to relocate hundreds of millions of Romulans to distant planets in only a few short years. Lacking resources and manpower, Picard begins the evacuation process as best he can, with the invaluable help of his new first officer, Rafaella “Raffi” Muskier. Meanwhile, back in the Federation, Geordi La Forge attempts to come up with new ways to increase Starfleet ship production on Mars. The best solution is the creation of a new, synthetic workforce, and La Forge calls in an old colleague, the brilliant scientist Bruce Maddox, who reluctantly halts his lifelong work on artificial life to help build these new synthetics.

As the evacuation progresses, Picard takes solace in every small victory his team can achieve, but this mission seems doomed to fail. Debates from ambitious Federation politicians, distrust and fear from the Romulans they are trying to help, and interference from the Tal Shiar, the Romulan secret police, all hinder the mission. However, Picard is not one to give up easily and is determined to save every Romulan he can from the impending disaster. But even the great Jean-Luc Picard is unprepared for how his mission will end. Everything is about to change, and Picard and the galaxy will never be the same again.

Star Trek is one of those popular franchises that always produces a ton of extra content each year in the forms of novels and comics, so it was no surprise that material related to Picard would eventually be released. The Last Best Hope is the very first Picard tie-in novel, although I expect that additional books will come out in the future. Indeed, IDW has already released a Picard tie-in comic, Countdown, which I will probably check out at some point. This first Picard novel was written by veteran tie-in author Una McCormack, who has previously delivered several great Star Trek books, including last year’s Star Trek: Discovery tie-in, The Way to the Stars. McCormack does an amazing job with The Last Best Hope, producing a captivating and incredible read that expertly leads into the new show.

Before I dive too deep into this review, I think that it is necessary to point out that this book was released on the 11^th of February, between the third and fourth episodes of Picard. That means that this book contains quite a few mentions of events and reveals that occur in the initial episodes of the show, especially as McCormack clearly had early access to the show’s scripts. While this ensures The Last Best Hope a much more complete and in-depth tie-in novel, it does mean that this book contains some spoilers for the television series. In addition, as I have been religiously watching Picard every week, my review is influenced by the events of the first six episodes and it also contains some spoilers from the show.

The Last Best Hope is a wide-ranging Star Trek canon novel, set across several years of Star Trek history (2381 to 2385) that explores one of the biggest prequel events mentioned within Picard, the explosion of the Romulan sun and the attempts by Picard to evacuate them. This leads into a powerful and clever novel which shows all the trials and tribulations associated with this exercise, as well as several other events that lead into the show. McCormack makes excellent use of a number of different character perspectives to create a full and rich narrative around this plot, which also explores some major Picard characters. While I did think that parts of the story ended rather suddenly, with no real lead-in to the disaster on Mars that changes everything, this book is a first-rate novel which I powered through in extremely short order.

One of the major appeals of this book is the fact that it serves as a prequel to the events of Picard and provides readers with additional background and context to the adventures currently happening in the show. This is done in a number of ways, from providing the reader with greater background about certain characters, showing the origins of a number of the storylines from the show and serving as a bridge between the events of Picard and The Next Generation. The Last Best Hope features an excellent introduction to several of the newer characters in the show, such as Agnes Jurati, Raffi, Elnor and the Qowat Milat nuns, and it was intriguing to see how these characters slotted into the pre-history of the show. At the same time, McCormack also examines what happened to several established characters from The Next Generation after the events of Star Trek: Nemesis, including Picard, Bruce Maddox, Geordi La Forge and even a little bit about Worf (he becomes captain of the Enterprise!). McCormack also provides an explanation about several key occurrences and storylines that are touched on within the show, such as the creation of the synthetic workers that destroyed Mars, Picard’s resignation from Starfleet and the extent of several key relationships. There are also some potential hints at where the show might go in the future, and I will be interested in seeing if those pan out at all. I was pleasantly surprised with how much background that McCormack was able to fit into The Last Best Hope, and the different revelations and expansions on the information provided in the show make this a fantastic read for those currently watching Picard.

The Last Best Hope features some very impressive character work, and I feel that McCormack did an excellent job capturing the personalities and histories of several key characters from the new show. I really appreciated her portrayal of Picard, and this book featured several key aspects of his character, such as his dark moods, his determination and his ability to inspire absolute loyalty in his subordinates. I liked how the reader gets to see how Picard deals with the seemingly impossible task assigned to him, especially as his emotions throughout the book range from hope to absolute despair, as multiple obstacles and problems seem to dog everything he does. One of the major parts of his character explored in this book is the way that Picard’s ideals and beliefs seem a little out of touch with the world he lives in. This is something that is shown throughout the Picard television show, as the old-school captain is now living in a much darker and more desperate world. I am really glad that McCormack tried to capture this in her novel, and it was really compelling to see Picard being completely oblivious about the darker realities of the galaxy. All of this is really compelling to see, and I think that it serves as a good basis for some of the ways Picard acts in the current show.

Aside from Picard, a number of other characters are featured throughout the book, many of whom have some really interesting and compelling stories. I personally found the tale of Raffi, Picard’s new first officer, to be particularly good, as the reader gets to see how she became so messed up and obsessed with proving that the Romulans where behind the destruction of Mars. You also get a better understanding of why she was so mad that Picard quit on her and the mission, especially after she sacrifices everything for him, thanks to the way he inspired her. McCormack also spends significant time exploring the character of Bruce Maddox, and it was especially intriguing to see this character between his appearances in The Next Generation and Picard. You also got to see the origins of his relationship with Agnes Jurati (indeed, based on release dates you learn about this relationship in this book before it is mentioned in the show), and it was great to see how it unfolded and how close the two of them were. Of course, this also has a more sinister and heartbreaking edge to it if you look back at this relationship after the events of the fifth episode of Picard. I also liked the Geordi La Forge storyline; it was interesting to see his struggle to increase Starfleet ship production. However, the best part of this portrayal occurs at the end of the book, and I will be curious to see how they show off his survivor’s guilt if the character ever appears in Picard.

One of the things that I really enjoyed about this book was the way McCormack slowly starts to alter the tone of the novel to represent the change between the lighter The Next Generation and the darker Picard shows. At the start of the book, the story is more in line with the tone of The Next Generation, with Picard embarking on a humanitarian mission with his idealism and belief in the greater good intact. However, as the mission progresses, things start to get darker, as the various obstacles to the Romulan relief mission become more apparent. The dark and callous manipulation of the Romulan leaders and Tal Shiar as well as the xenophobic politics of certain Federation politicians becomes more and more apparent, resulting in a darker tone. McCormack also attempts to replicate the more adult tone of the current show with a greater reliance on swearing (never have I seen so many F-bombs dropped in a Star Trek novel, oh the humanity!) and hints of mass murder, genocide and extinction-level events. All of this makes for a slightly different Star Trek tie-in novel experience, and I personally enjoyed some of the subtle changes McCormack made to the tone.

I personally really enjoyed seeing the entirety of Picard’s attempts to evacuate the Romulans from their soon to be exploding sun. This has been one of the most fascinating events mentioned in the show, with several parts shown or alluded to in Picard. McCormack really dived into this event, showing many of the various aspects of such an operation, including the science, politics and diplomacy associated with it. From the start, this whole mission is painted as a near impossibility, not just because of the scale of calamity and the number of people affected but because of the mindset and suspicion of the Romulans they are trying to save. To put it into context, this operation would be like the United States trying to evacuate a similar sized country that had North Korean levels of state led secrecy and distrust towards the organisation trying to save them. The sheer scale and difficultly of this mission are constantly raised, and yet Picard and his team seem to find a solution to many of the problems presented to them. Of course, anyone who has seen the first episode of the show knows how this is going to end, so seeing the characters getting so invested in their mission is a bit of an emotional blow. That being said, this book contains a lot more context for some of the Federation’s decisions, and in particular the character of Admiral Kirsten Clancy (Starfleet’s CNC in the second episode of Picard), comes across as a whole lot more sympathetic. Overall, I felt that this was an amazing expansion on the events mentioned in the show, and it was really cool to see how the whole operation unfolded.

Another great facet of The Last Best Hope which made it such an intriguing book was its compelling examination of the Romulan people. McCormack really dives into Romulan culture and society in this book, presenting some intriguing details about this race. In particular, she examines the Romulans’ deep-seated need for privacy and secrecy, which is a defining part of their species. McCormack does an excellent job highlighting how this desire for secrecy impacts them as a race and a culture (secret multi-room Romulan music for the win!), and how they barely trust other members of their own species, let alone members of the demonised Federation. Seeing how this obsession with lies, secrecy and the appearance of saving face with the Federation impacted the species’ chance for survival is a compelling and intriguing part of the book. McCormack also dives into other parts of Romulan culture and society, mainly the role of the Tal Shiar, the Romulan secret police, who have long been a shadowy force within Star Trek lore. Seeing the fear and apprehension that this organisation causes amongst ordinary Romulan citizens, as well as the lengths they will go to maintain secrecy and security, is pretty crazy and it certainly enhances an established Star Trek antagonist species. I also enjoyed seeing more of the Qowat Milat, the Romulan warrior nuns who Picard befriends and helps evacuate from Romulan space. The Last Best Hope contains several encounters with the Qowat Milat, and we get to learn a bit more about them, the role they play in Romulan society and how they interact with the Tal Shiar, with whom they have an adversarial relationship. All of this is deeply, deeply fascinating, especially for those readers who love learning about Star Trek lore, and I really enjoyed seeing all the Romulan inclusions featured in this book.

I ended up listening to the audiobook version of The Last Best Hope, which is narrated by Robert Petkoff. This new Star Trek audiobook runs for 11 hours and 40 minutes, which can be listened to fairly quickly, especially once you get stuck into the compelling story. I really enjoyed listening to The Last Best Hope, mostly thanks to the incredible voice work of Robert Petkoff. Petkoff seems to be the go-to narrator for all things Star Trek these days, as he has lent his superb vocal talents to a huge number of other Star Trek audiobook adaptions in recent years. I have previously enjoyed his work on such books as The Antares Maelstrom by Greg Cox, The Captain’s Oath by Christopher L. Bennett and Available Light by Dayton Ward. In each of these previous books, I have been greatly impressed by Petkoff’s ability to recreate the voices of key characters from the Star Trek television shows, including most of the characters in The Original Series and The Next Generation. He continues this amazing voice work in The Last Best Hope, providing near-perfect impressions of characters like Picard and La Forge, which really helps the reader immerse themselves into the story. While his impressions of some of the newer characters from Picard are not as accurate (keep in mind Petkoff would have recorded this book before Picard aired), he does provide clear and distinctive voices for each of the characters utilised in the books. I also love the accents he provides to the various alien races and nationalities in this book, and I especially enjoy hearing him attempt to replicate the speech patterns of certain aliens, like the Vulcans. Thanks to this incredible voice work, I absolutely loved listening to the audiobook for The Last Best Hope, and I would strongly recommend this format to anyone interested in this latest Star Trek novel.

Picard: The Last Best Hope by Una McCormack is an excellent and deeply captivating read which serves as a perfect prequel tie-in novel to the current Picard show. There is so much information and detail about the Star Trek universe prior to the events of the current television series contained within in this novel, and I loved seeing the author expand on the intriguing new universe that has been hinted at in the show. This is a must-read book for all Star Trek fans, especially those who have been loving Picard, and even non-Star Trek fans will enjoy this book’s powerful story and the fantastic plot device of the Romulan rescue mission. The Last Best Hope is probably the best Star Trek novel I have had the pleasure of reading so far, and I am extremely excited to see what other tie-in novels they release around the awesome new Picard series.

The Holdout by Graham Moore

On March 4, 2020August 20, 2022 By The Unseen LibraryIn Audiobook, Five-Star Books, Murder Mystery, Thriller4 Comments

Publisher: Orion/Penguin Random House Audio (Audiobook – 18 February 2020)

Series: Standalone

Length: 10 hours and 15 minutes

My Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

From acclaimed author Graham Moore comes an amazing new thriller story that is one part legal drama, one part murder mystery and 100 per cent awesome: The Holdout.

The Holdout is an outstanding standalone book that I have been looking forward to for a little while now. I really enjoyed the sound of the premise when I first heard about it, so I was really glad when I received a copy of this book. Moore is probably best known as a Hollywood screenwriter, having written the screenplay for The Imitation Game, which won him an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. However, Moore is also a novelist, having previously written two books, The Sherlockian and The Last Days of Night, the latter of which I read and enjoyed back in 2016. The Holdout is Moore’s first foray into contemporary fiction, and he has produced quite a fantastic read.

It was the trial of the century. Jessica Silver, the 15-year-old heiress to a vast fortune, vanishes and the prime suspect is her African American teacher, Bobby Nock, with whom she was having an inappropriate relationship. With substantial evidence against him, a verdict of guilty for Jessica’s murder seemed assured, until one juror voted not guilty. This one holdout, Maya Seale, refused to alter her verdict and was eventually able to convince the other jurors to change their votes. Their resulting decision would shock the country and change the juror’s lives forever.

Now, 10 years later, Maya is a successful defence attorney who has tried her hardest to move on from the infamous trial that ruined her life, until Rick Leonard, her fellow former juror and secret lover during the trial, tracks her down. Rick has spent the last 10 years obsessing with case, believing that they let a guilty man go free. Now, to mark the 10th anniversary of the trial, a true-crime show wants to interview each of the jurors in the hotel they were sequestered at during the trial. At the end of the interview, they will be presented with new evidence that Rick has uncovered which he believes definitively proves Bobby Nock’s guilt. While initially reluctant to go, Maya ends up making an appearance, only to find Rick dead in her hotel room.

Now the prime suspect in Rick’s death, Maya is forced to relive the infamy that has dogged her for years. Determined to prove her innocence, Maya begins interviewing the only potential witnesses to the crime, the former members of the jury who were gathered at the hotel. However, her investigation reveals that Rick has been digging up dirt on each of the former jurors, and several of them may have had a motive to kill him. As she digs deep, Maya begins to believe that the solution to this current murder lies in the trial that brought them together. Did they let a guilty man go free all those years ago, and is that decision coming back to haunt them with lethal consequences?

Wow, just wow, this was a pretty incredible thriller novel. Moore has pulled together quite a compelling and complex read which presents the reader with a fantastic and intricate story that combines an excellent legal thriller with a captivating murder mystery to create a first-rate read.

The Holdout’s story is told in alternating chapters, with half of the chapters set back during the original trial in 2009, and the rest of the book is set 10 years later in the present day. The 2019 chapters are told exclusively from the point of view of Maya as she attempts to uncover who killed Rick Leonard, while each of the chapters set in the past are told from the perspective of a different juror as they observe the events surrounding the trial. This is a really clever storytelling technique as it presents the reader with two connected but distinct storylines. The storyline set during the original trial is a legal drama-thriller in the vein of 12 Angry Men or Runaway Jury, and it shows various points of the Bobby Knock murder trial and the jury deliberations that followed. Through the author’s use of multiple perspectives, the reader is able to see how the various members of the jury came to their ultimate verdict, what factors influenced their decisions and what they thought about the various people involved in the case and their fellow jurors. The storyline set in the present day, on the other hand, reads more like a murder mystery, and it deals with the protagonist’s hunt to find Rick’s killer in order to prove her innocence. Both of these separate storylines work extremely well together, especially as the Maya storyline explores the impacts of the events that occurred during the older timeline. I also think that Moore did an excellent job jumping between the various time periods and character perspectives, and this clever storytelling style helped to create a compelling read with a fun flow to it.

At the centre of this novel lies two fantastic and complex mystery storylines set around 10 years apart. The first one of these revolves around what happened to Jessica Silver in 2009, while the other involves the murder of Rick Leonard in 2019. Both of these separate cases are really intriguing, and they present the reader with some clever twists, compelling potential theories, alternative suspects and conflicting evidence, so much so that the eventual solutions to these mysteries are actually quite surprising. While both of these two mysteries work really well by themselves, the real beauty is in the way that they combine together throughout the book. The solution to the Rick Leonard murder is strongly rooted to the original 2009 trial with the jury, while the eventual revelation about Jessica Silver doesn’t come out until the events of the 2019 murder are concluded. I really enjoyed seeing both of these mysteries come together, and it was cool to see the motives for one case be revealed in a prior timeline, while the protagonist investigated in the present.

I also had a great appreciation for the legal aspects of The Holdout, as the author dives deep in the United States court system and shows off what happens during a murder trial. There are some tricky legal scenes throughout this book, and one of the major appeals of the 2009 storylines is seeing the entirety of the murder trial unfold. Moore also does a great job exploring how the jury system works and how jurors deliberate and decide upon a person’s innocence and guilt. There are some intriguing examinations of the jury system throughout the book, and it was interesting to see what information they are given and how a jury could come up with one verdict when the rest of the country has already decided. The use of multiple perspectives works well during the 2009 part of the book, and I quite enjoyed seeing how the disparate jurors had different opinions about the information presented to them. The 2019 storyline also contains some intriguing legal scenes which are shown from the perspective of Maya as a successful defence attorney. As a result, these scenes contain fascinating information about legal strategy and defence plans, and it was a little scary to consider innocent people being advised that their best legal strategy for a crime they didn’t commit was to claim self-defence. The Holdout also tried to show the chaos that surrounds a high profile court case, including examining the crazy media coverage, the impact of public perception, and the fact that people involved are often more concerned with making money or advancing their careers rather than finding out who actually committed the crime. All of this is extremely fascinating, and I enjoyed seeing Moore’s take on the current legal system, especially as he comes across as somewhat critical of it at times.

Moore has also filled this book with a number of complex and relatable characters in the form of the jurors, who you get to know throughout the course of both storylines. Thanks to the two separate timelines, you get to see how the events of the trial affected these people as each of them had their lives completely ruined thanks to one decision they made 10 years ago. Thanks to the use of multiple perspectives during the earlier timeline, you actually get to briefly see inside the mind of each of the jurors, and explore how events in their past lives, plus the stress of the trial helped influence their verdict. I also found it fascinating to see how the not-guilty verdict impacted on other characters associated with the trial, such as the family of Jessica Silver and the accused, Bobby Nock. This was especially true in the case of Bobby, who, despite being found innocent, was controversially prosecuted for another crime and was then subsequently hounded by the media for years, resulting in some compelling scenes around this character in the 2019 storyline. I also have to point out the underlying theme of obsession that the author expertly inserted into this story. Obsession with the trial affected several characters within the book, causing many of them to act in unpredictable ways to achieve their goals. This obsession came from a number of places, including from guilt, a sense of righteousness, a desire for revenge or to find justice, and it was quite compelling to see what this obsession drove some characters to do. One member of the jury in particular is driven to do some very dark things that were completely out of character to the person who was introduced in the earlier storyline, and this characters development was extremely fascinating to behold. Moore did an amazing job with these characters, and I really liked seeing how the events depicted in the book influenced and impacted them.

I ended up listening to the audiobook format of The Holdout, which was narrated by Abby Craden. The Holdout audiobook runs for just over 10 hours and I found myself flying through this novel, especially when I became obsessed with working out the overall solutions to this book. Craden is an excellent audiobook narrator, and I previously enjoyed her work on Recursion by Black Crouch last year. For The Holdout, Craden comes up with a number of distinctive voices for the various characters featured within the book. Each of these voices fit their respective characters extremely well, and I think that Craden did a good job portraying these character’s various ethnicities and genders. All of this really helped me to enjoy this incredible story, and this format comes highly recommended as a result.

The Holdout was an absolutely incredible read that does a fantastic job showcasing Graham Moore’s superb skill as a master storyteller. This amazing novel expertly combines together a compelling legal thriller with an addictive murder mystery in order to produce a first-rate story with some captivating twists and intriguing character developments. The Holdout gets a full five-star rating from me, and I am very excited to see what this remarkable author produces next.