Survey Ship by Andrew BeeryMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Story: ****
Performance: ***
I read this one twice … and yes it was good enough to do that. The narration was decent, but not great. Female voices in particular were an obvious struggle so I would rate the performance just above Alexa. Fortunately the story itself was good enough to carry it (which is not typical in my experience) and the whole is good enough to grab the next two books in the series (that and the mild cliffhanger ending).
The primary protagonist is a tough as nails xeno-archaeologist cut in the image of an Indiana Jones motif with all the expected brass and snark, making this a fun adventure. Said hero is recruited to find a missing “survey ship” aka colony ship. The bad guys are fairy standard evil empire corporations (standard trope). There is a bit of intrigue and espionage, but the focus tilts more toward military sci-fi where the tech details are pretty solid (a pleasant surprise after becoming used to BFM masquerading as science). To make it work, the author needs to engage in info-dumps … however, these are very short and seamlessly working into the narrative at decision points in enough humor to make these appear as an important part of the entertainment and world building. Regardless, the author has obvious done the homework and I was extremely happy with the result; however, the detail might not work as well for everybody.
Over all ... the standard tropes are so well executed that you barely notice that you have heard them before. It's just fun entertainment that is worth the investment.
I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.
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Lost Ship by Andrew Beery
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Performance: ***
Story: ***
This the second of a military sci-fi where the main characters trade up their starship to a colony ship and everybody gets promoted; except they are pretty much the same (with little to no character growth) … and now we get a perfunctory romance/love triangle that seemed awkward and out of place. The basic plot has the newly acquired colony ship running away from the bad guys while trying to keep flying while fighting off internal saboteurs (I don’t know about anybody else, but for me it was hard to avoid a comparison with Battlestar Galactica here). The sarcastic humor is still fun, but does start to wear thin by the end as it is typically used to hide exposition and brief data dumps within the story. The world-building within the military trope was very well done and makes the whole series a solid example of the genre.
I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.
#LostShip #ExodusEarth #FreeAudiobookCodes #KindleUnlimited
Battleship by Andrew Beery
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Story: **
Performance: ***
This is the 3rd of a Military Sci-Fi trilogy that started off very good and then failed to grow. If you get this far, it is worth finishing, but don’t expect it to be as good. The snark that was so much fun in the first installment descended into an avalanche of pop culture references (Star Trek, Dune, Aliens, et al) and testosterone laden witticisms that eventually irritated more than entertained. In fact, the entire Hollingsworth arc was just plain stupid and actually highlights a lot of the crude innuendo that was actually pretty cringe worthy.
The basic story was less military and more an attempt humorous alien first contact that didn’t work at all for me. Add to that a main character that is eventually revealed as a mary sue that has a hand full of doctoral degrees along with significant space fighter experience and decades of large space ship experience that allows her to pretty much dominate an alien scourge that was previously unstoppable in a a fairly predictable (and somewhat sudden and unsatisfactory) conclusion. In fact, the whole galaxy hates me trope was way over done here and only served to allow the MC to strut her stuff.
I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.
#Battleship #ExodusEarth #FreeAudiobookCodes #KindleUnlimited
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