REVIEW: Nucleation by Kimberly Unger

Blurb:

We are live, we are live, we are live. . .

Helen Vectorvich just botched first contact. And she did it in both virtual reality and outer space.

Only the most elite Far Reaches deep-space pilots get to run waldos: robots controlled from thousands of lightyears away via neural integration and quantum entanglement. Helen and her navigator were heading the construction of a wormhole gate that would connect Earth to the stars . . . until a routine system check turned deadly.

As nasty rumors swarm around her, and overeager junior pilots jockey to take her place, Helen makes a startling discovery: microscopic alien life is devouring their corporate equipment. Is the Scale just mindless, extra-terrestrial bacteria? Or is it working―and killing―with a purpose?

While Helen struggles to get back into the pilot’s chair, and to communicate with the Scale, someone―or something―is trying to sabotage the Far Reaches project once and for all. They’ll have to get through Helen first.

~Amazon

REVIEW of Nucleation

written by Aidan Zingler of ReshapingReality.org

Overall Thoughts: For a science fiction tale, this book not only impressed me with its use of physics, specifically entanglement of particles, but blew me away with its scope of imagination. The characters leap off the page with such personality, and the book kept twisting and turning with surprises every step of the way.  

Plot Overview: The story follows the tale of an operator who works for a corporation exploring the far reaches of space. Helen plugs herself into the company's quantum entanglement system and sends her consciousness to a "waldo," where she operates robot machinery in a far away solar system. Her work is fairly mundane at first - eject the payload, which is the necessary ingredients for the nano technology (called "eenies") to collect matter around that system's star until enough is reached to build the jumpgate. Except Helen discovers that the spacecraft housing the payload is covered in a weird dust that shouldn't exist (all their eenies recycle all non-used stuff, so no dust or other matter should exist) but then a feedback signal fries her navigator's brains. This horrifying incident catapults Helen into a dangerous and wild mystery full of corporate espionage, possible aliens, quantum weirdness, and rivals trying to silence her attempts to find answers.

Thoughts on Characters: Helen, Keller, Ivester, Hofstaeder, and the rest of the cast all felt unique and superbly drawn. Each held motivations that overlapped or conflicted with others to create delightful tension. Also, PTSD and trauma were covered and dealt with in humane ways that made sense to the world and to the reality of how trauma actually affects humans, which was incredibly refreshing to see in a novel.

Plot Impressions: What a wild ride this was!! The plot followed a loose three act structure. It had me guessing and wondering where we'd go next, and just when I thought I figured out the mystery, a surprise unleashed which had me reexamining my theories. I felt that the ending was a bit abrupt, but then the ending does leave room for any sequels if the author wishes to explore this world and its unique technology again.

Recommend? Yes. Definitely worth the read!

My rating: 5 of 5 galaxies

This review may also be found on Aidan's Goodread's page.

Find Nucleation at your local library, your local bookstore, and these retailers:

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Review: The Ghost Tree by Christina Henry

 

BLURB:

When the bodies of two girls are found torn apart in the town of Smiths Hollow, Lauren is surprised, but she also expects that the police won't find the killer. After all, the year before her father's body was found with his heart missing, and since then everyone has moved on. Even her best friend, Miranda, has become more interested in boys than in spending time at the old ghost tree, the way they used to when they were kids.

So when Lauren has a vision of a monster dragging the remains of the girls through the woods, she knows she can't just do nothing. Not like the rest of her town. But as she draws closer to answers, she realizes that the foundation of her seemingly normal town might be rotten at the center. And that if nobody else stands for the missing, she will.

~ Amazon

REVIEW

Witches are real, as Lauren soon learns. And so are curses. Little does she know that her favorite tree is called the Ghost Tree for good reason.

Up front: the first half of the novel is a delectable horror story; the second half is YA paranormal mystery/thriller.

PROS

The Ghost Tree starts out chilling, disturbing, nauseating. It ends as a captivating, dark adventure. The novel is a fast read. That’s saying something. I’m a slow reader. I can dwell inside a novel for a month or two before I manage to finish it. This book took me about a week and a half. Speed readers could have it read in a day or two. This is because it’s an easy book, neither deep nor complicated. 

Fast pacing and clear, to-the-point writing keep you rolling along. As does the story itself. The story grabs hold and doesn’t let go. That sounds trite, but it’s true. In fact, I began to feel rather addicted. Though I had lots of responsibilities to see to, I kept sneaking into my cushy reading chair to devour another chapter or two. 

I loved our main character from the beginning. Lauren is adorable. Not in a “cute adorable” way, but in the “I adore you because I have so been there” way. Her innocence, awkwardness, and strength pulled at my heartstrings, and suddenly I remembered what it was like to be 14, which earned her my enduring pity.

The relationship interactions between Lauren and her mother, Lauren and her best friend, Lauren and Jake were one of the triumphs of the novel. Henry hit the teenage struggle right on the dot.

CONS

As much as I enjoyed the novel, there were several things that drove me nuts.

To-the-point writing. Wait, how is this a pro and a con, and why would to-the-point writing be a con anyway? This boils down to personal taste, but it affected me so hugely that I can’t not mention it. The narration was written in such a to-the-point way that it lacked poetry, artistry, complexity. Not once did I run across a line that caused me to stop dead in my tracks and gasp in glorious ecstasy, which is one of the reasons I read in the first place. Gorgeous word-craft, no matter the genre.

For all that, the writing voice seemed extremely appropriate for the main character (a 14-year-old girl) and readers of the same age. Except for the level of gore in the early chapters and once near the end, and the amount of promiscuous sexual activity by a 15-yr-old (none of which is shown or discussed in any level of detail), I would easily chalk this novel up as a YA.

I kept running across one of my pet peeves as well: felt/feel/feeling. When a writer studies writing, one of the tips we encounter is, “Don’t tell the reader how a character feels. Show them.” The word “feel” is used so often throughout the book that the word began to flash like neon. I started circling each use of the word. There are a couple sections where every other sentence has the word “feel” in it. See where I’m going with this?

I could be wrong, but I would say that this novel was written extremely quickly and handed over to an editor who knew the author’s work would sell because of past success.

Nor did the twist work for me. Almost as soon as “He” is mentioned, I figured out who “He” was. “He” is clearly our perpetrator. So obvious was the answer to this mystery that I began to wonder if Henry meant it to be a mystery at all. When “His” identity is revealed during the endgame, it wasn’t a twist in the slightest. Was this intentional? *shrug* I can’t say.

Lastly, I can’t say I was satisfied with the resolution either. I expected the last few pages to deal with the fallout of this tragic curse, [spoiler] for the town to outwardly, loudly mourn the deaths of their daughters and hell to rain down on a few heads. But the only result we see is the delusion lifting and being replaced by a kind of brain-fog or shock. All in all, I’d say the ending was rushed, the consequences whitewashed in order to bring the novel to a sudden conclusion.

TREASURES

Timely themes top the list. Among them: racism, police brutality, difficult teenage relationships. Henry handles these topics in a sensitive, believable manner. Their place in the story will resonate with contemporary readers.

CONCLUSION

I haven’t read a great deal of horror, but the horror novels I have read usually leaving me feeling dissatisfied. I am waiting for that horror novel that has me scared and/or disturbed from cover to cover.

The Exorcist has been the only one, to date, that has managed to accomplish this and provide glowing satisfaction by the time I read the last page. Granted, that’s a big shadow to follow. Is it fair to hold that classic up as the standard? Why not.

That said, I have invested in another of Henry’s novels. I shall embark upon Alice soon. I have been hoping and waiting for just such a take on Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Crossing fingers it’s everything I’ve hope it is.

In the meantime, I give The Ghost Tree 3 out of 5 magic wands:

Find The Ghost Tree at your local library or these retailers:

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OTHER COVERS