Bernard Jan's Blog - Posts Tagged "science-fiction"

One of the best trilogies I've ever read. Scary, gripping, moving. Highly impressing.

Unlike some novels I have been reading with a serious effort like I was plowing through a field devastated by drought, The Wool Trilogy by Hugh Howey is exactly the opposite. A perfectly balanced deep fall through a silo, which forces the reader to keep falling and falling, unable to stop himself and put the the books down until he hits the end.

Science fiction? Maybe. But only for the reason of being set in a Dystopian future.

The scariest thing was looking at a daringly realistic portrait of our society today. What happened to humanity?!? Plausibly unintentionally (or maybe intentionally after all), upsetting parallels of the real world are screaming into our faces like a wake-up call. If we do not do something to light up the flames of humanity and share with our loved ones and the stranger on the street, we will all end up in our present-day versions of silos eventually to be suffocated and poisoned, reduced to mere things, numbers.

Howey gave us a masterpiece. But he has also shown us the safe path to our future. This is the gift we should cherish, even if we chose not to believe that silos could actually happen.

BJ
www.bernardjan.com

Viral Spark by Martin McConnell

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


When relationships among humans just seem not be working the way we want them to, it is the artificial intelligence and things like tablets we have created who are reaching out in an attempt to communicate with us and sing! Even though it is completely surprising and unbelievable for Robert who maintains robots at work, because machines don't have feelings, he quickly adjusts to it and embraces the idea, becoming fond if it. The real question is, though, can such form of relationship exists and survive when a virus has infected the global network in the future world in which humans completely depend on technology?

Viral Spark is an easy read and the science fiction novella that will capture your attention whether you like or not the vision of the “robotized” future of mankind Martin McConnell has presented and offered to us. Make sure not to miss it.

BJ
www.bernardjan.com



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Bernard Jan

The Kill Order by James Dashner

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


The best books are not those with happy endings but the ones that make your blood boil and make you silently scream from joy or despair. You sympathize with their characters and relate to them; you cheer for them and want to help them through their trials and hopeless situations because they are real to you; they are your new best friends and you don't want to see them harmed or dead. But not all good stories have a happy ending. Just like in real life, our favorites and darlings are robbed of their choices, and instead of laughing and celebrating their victories with them, we end up with tight throats, moist eyes and swallowing tears.

The Kill Order by James Dashner is a high-paced octane-fueled dystopian science fiction thriller. In the story of survival of the human race on the Earth devastated by solar flares, chances are so slim that they almost equal to zero. Those (not necessarily the lucky ones) who managed to survive the scorching effect of the Sun that melted the glaciers and flooded the East Coast of the United States with a tsunami of boiling waters are yet to face the real trials.

In order to save the humankind, that is, a selected few, a deadly virus—known as the Flare—is released with the purpose of controlling the remaining population. The infection, though, very quickly escalates and is out of control, and the real battle for their lives starts for Mark, Trina, Alec, Lana, Deedee and their friends against the infected.

The Kill Order is the first prequel book of the equally successful three novels in The Maze Runner series: The Maze Runner, The Scorch Trials and The Death Cure, and the fourth of five installments overall.

Without pretended modesty, I cannot wait to read the last installment, The Fever Code. I look forward to the new opportunity and satisfaction to remind myself of the Glade and the Gladers, the Maze, the Grievers, WICKED, the Flare, the Cranks, the Right Arm, the Immunes, the Bergs, the Post-Flares Coalition, Thomas, Theresa and all their dead and alive friends. For, each of these books in their own way shook me to the core, and this is what a good book should do to its readers.

BJ
www.bernardjan.com



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Bernard Jan

Godeena by Stjepan Varesevac Cobets

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


My reading of this page-turner of a SF novel took much longer (52 days) than expected but that is not because it didn't grip me but rather due to various circumstances and reasons. April and May were months when (almost) every EU author was crazy and busy studying and complying with the GDPR. Besides that and to name just the two of reasons/circumstances, the author of Godeena, Stjepan Varesevac Cobets, asked me to stop reading the e-book he sent me in exchange for an honest review. He would hire a new editor and polish his novel. I'm so glad he did it!

While I stumbled and got stuck in the language spider-web of the old version, the new one came with a happy exhale of relief that turned my second reading into fun and pleasure! Godeena, a hostile and mysterious planet that devours its inhabitants, expeditions of teams of scientists and two teams of Special Forces alike, now shines in its full glory and terror!

If you've read the old edition of this book, read it again now. You will look at it with clear, different eyes. This action-and-death-filled story deserves your full attention as it forces you to speed through it while the team of criminals is gathered from the notorious prison to be sent on a rescue mission which seems to be doomed to failure before it started. The intriguing set of characters, weaponry, training and situations that pull your fingers to click-forward the pages faster and faster is a guarantee for the experience you will love and enjoy.

So put your helmet (or glasses on), buckle up and get ready to be launched to system Naude, planet Godeena and the huge, preserved and uninhabited city Absolute. I know you can't wait to find out what kind of terror is waiting for you there! I couldn't!

BJ
www.bernardjan.com

p. s. A message and a plea for writers: Follow the good example of Godeena and edit and professionally edit your books! Your readers deserve only the best from you.

Bernard Jan



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Memories From The Darkness: A Control Freakz Novella Collection by Michael Evans

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Forever Gone (Control Freakz #0.5)

In Forever Gone, the first novella in the Memories From The Darkness collection set before the first book in the Control Freakz series, a young author Michael Evans describes with maturity of an experienced writer the heartbreak, doom and fall of one marriage and lost love. Determined to escape a controlled life from the hands of her husband Wilburn Ash, the President of the United States, the First Lady Danielle finds her freedom in a divorce and plotting a secret plan to stop the fanatic rule of the most powerful man in the world who can end her life at any moment or sign of rebellion before he destroys everything else.

Shattered Pasts (Control Freakz Series #1.5)

A great dark novella about a young girl Dulce, a sole survivor of the Camp Camel bombing, who struggles to reconcile with her past in which she lost everyone she loved. Even when she is welcomed in the rebel organization of the White Knights which is trying to save both the people and the country from the merciless hands of the American government, she knows that won’t be easy. Apocalyptic scenes of destruction and the atmosphere of dystopian world sunk in fear, in Shattered Pasts, the second novella in Memories From The Darkness: A Control Freakz Novella Collection, are fantastic.

Dream On (Control Freakz Series #2.5)

Things get better, more exciting and unreal as we travel through Memories From The Darkness: A Control Freakz Novella Collection! In Dream On, Justin, who gave his life to the secret organization Syndicate of Truth, wants it back. Sacrificing thirty years of his life meant nothing, because when he betrayed the most powerful of the powerful ones, he started to pay the ultra-high price. There is only one way to his freedom and liberation from the days filled with regrets, guilt, nightmares and one beautiful but haunting dream of being reunited with his lover Rose Parker, imprisoned in Area 51. But to make this dream become a reality, he will have to give up everything else.

In The Shadows (Control Freakz Series #3.5)

From Forever Gone to In The Shadows, the circle is closed. In this emotional finale, one more and for the last time Jacob meets his old ally. This is his desperate attempt to ask for help to see his real family, or what is left of it, before the world is destroyed. And the world will cease to exist because the monster Jacob has created has started its countdown. It seems there is no one who will stop the President Wilburn Ash in killing everyone. But will the remaining time be enough for Jacob to get so much needed help and with it one last chance to see his family so he can tell them how much he loves them? A great last novella of this exciting, intriguing and dark post-apocalyptic thriller series.

BJ
www.bernardjan.com

Check out my review of Control Freakz.

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Bernard Jan



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Renegade by Michael Evans

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


If you didn’t yet read the first three books of Conspiracy Chronicles by Michael Evans, please do it now! In the fourth book of this awesome series, Renegade, this prolific and very talented teenage author shifts into the highest gear so far.

It is a full action near future science fiction thriller for young adults and those who are not afraid to feel young and love such books, with death waiting around every corner, mass murders, incredible shooting scenes, and blood up to your knees. And it all takes for Sam and his friend Jake to put an end to the ruthless dictatorship and prevent a horrible genocide to occurring in China after millions of human lives were lost in the similar way in America. But will it be enough?

A crazy, good read; don’t miss it!

BJ
www.bernardjan.com

My reviews of Breakdown (ex Deadwave), Blood Brothers and The Last Migration.

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Bernard Jan



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Aftershock by Michael Evans

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


To the fans of sci-fi, YA, technothrillers, apocalypse, dystopia, and conspiracy books: please read all four books in the Conspiracy Chronicles series because you don’t want to miss anything until you get to the Book 5, Aftershock. So much has happened, and is going on in this latest installment, as Sam, Jake and Ai try to save China—and the entire world—from the natural disaster engineered by President Li and the Party.

The very thought of an earthquake gives me enough creeps and terror even without thinking of the man-made earthquake of the magnitude and size to destroy hundreds of millions on the eastern seaboard of China. But the most impressive parts of Aftershock to me are unforgettable and unbelievable action scenes on the oil rig in the East China Sea. If this book series ever turned into a movie, Hollywood and the Marvel Cinematic Universe films would have a serious competition!

This novel is a nuclear bomb made of robots and futuristic technology ready to explode. And its author, Michael Evans, has no second thoughts before pressing the “activate” button and giving us one huge AFTERSHOCK. This book detonates from the beginning to the end!

BJ
www.bernardjan.com

My reviews of Breakdown (ex Deadwave), Blood Brothers, The Last Migration, and Renegade.

Follow me on Twitter.

Bernard Jan



View all my reviews