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Aces High, Jokers Wild #7
Odds Against
Get Up. Stand Up.
America is standing up. Armed with training and new confidence, people who’ve been owned by seven corporations for too long are forming Workers’ Unions, subverting corporate rule, spreading change and demanding lives worth living. The Wildcards land the assignment of advising and supporting the workers in civic actions—AKA, playing pranks for a good cause. The crew is sure it’s the best assignment of their lives…for about five minutes.
And then it starts to get hot.
With summer wildfires eating their way across the West, a mole spilling the details of one mission after another to the Corps, and peaceful workers’ protests countered with escalating violence, this great assignment might be the toughest the Wildcards have faced yet.
Life’s a bitch. She doesn’t pull her punches. Pick your ground and get ready for the fight.
America is standing up. Armed with training and new confidence, people who’ve been owned by seven corporations for too long are forming Workers’ Unions, subverting corporate rule, spreading change and demanding lives worth living. The Wildcards land the assignment of advising and supporting the workers in civic actions—AKA, playing pranks for a good cause. The crew is sure it’s the best assignment of their lives…for about five minutes.
And then it starts to get hot.
With summer wildfires eating their way across the West, a mole spilling the details of one mission after another to the Corps, and peaceful workers’ protests countered with escalating violence, this great assignment might be the toughest the Wildcards have faced yet.
Life’s a bitch. She doesn’t pull her punches. Pick your ground and get ready for the fight.
334 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 22, 2023
9 people want to read
About the author
O.E. Tearmann
22 books61 followersBringing their own experiences as a marginalized author to the page with flawed but genuine characters, O.E. Tearmann’s work has been described as “Firefly for the dystopian genre.”
Tearmann is a member of the Science Fiction Writers of America, the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, a finalist for the Cygnus award and the winner of the 2022 Feathered Quill award. They live in Colorado with two cats, their partner, and the belief that individuals can make humanity better through small actions. In their spare time, they teach workshops on writing GLTBQ characters, plant gardens that showcase sustainable agricultural practices, and play too many video games.
Tearmann is a member of the Science Fiction Writers of America, the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, a finalist for the Cygnus award and the winner of the 2022 Feathered Quill award. They live in Colorado with two cats, their partner, and the belief that individuals can make humanity better through small actions. In their spare time, they teach workshops on writing GLTBQ characters, plant gardens that showcase sustainable agricultural practices, and play too many video games.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
November 6, 2023
Here's to hoping there is a book 8. Cause this series combines like all the dystopian genre in to one compelling narrative.
April 26, 2023
I wouldn’t be conforming to acceptable standards if I wrote a review that recommended a different book. But in the spirit of the Wildcards, I am going to risk insubordination and do what I believe is best for everyone, in spite of what my superiors (er, editors) might say. I am going to stand my ground and fight for a series I believe in!
Okay, team, here’s my idea—and it’s crazy enough that it just might work. Buy The Hands We’re Given, book one in the Aces High Jokers Wild series. And while you’re pulling that book-purchase trigger, buy the newest book in the series, Odds Against.
Read book one. After that, I’ll let you decide if you want to jump ahead to book seven, bypassing all the crazy stunts, parties, rebellions, mistakes and victories, most of which shouldn’t have worked but somehow did, in books two through six and the bonus in-between novelettes. And of course you’ll be missing out on the personal evolution path that each and every Wildcards team member travels while doing whatever it takes to save America. Talk about walking and chewing gum at the same time. times a hundred!
Okay, I’m hearing whispering in the ranks. You need more information. Here, I’ve printed up copies of the back cover blurb for the first book. Take one and pass them around. I’ll give you a couple of minutes to read it.
"Aidan Headly never wanted to be the man giving orders. That’s fine with the Democratic State Force base he’s been assigned to command: they don’t like to take orders. Nicknamed the Wildcards, they used to be the most effective base against the seven Corporations owning the former United States in a war that has lasted over half a century. Now the Wildcards are known for creative insubordination, chaos, and commanders begging to be reassigned. Aidan is their last chance. If he can pull off his assignment as Commander and yank his ragtag crew of dreamers and fighters together, maybe they can get back to doing what they came to do: fighting for a country worth living in."
Everyone up to speed? Any questions? Yeah, you in the back with your hand up. You want to know more about the seven corporations? That’s a big question and I suggest you read the first book. Anyone else? Who’s Aidan Headly? Just a guy trying to do the best job he can in a world gone crazy. But he’s also looking for… wow, would you look at the time. Back to work, team! There’s shenanigans to plan, and books to read!
Odds Against just released on April 22, 2023. You can buy it and the rest of the books in the series at Amazon.
This review was originally published at SciFi.Radio.
Okay, team, here’s my idea—and it’s crazy enough that it just might work. Buy The Hands We’re Given, book one in the Aces High Jokers Wild series. And while you’re pulling that book-purchase trigger, buy the newest book in the series, Odds Against.
Read book one. After that, I’ll let you decide if you want to jump ahead to book seven, bypassing all the crazy stunts, parties, rebellions, mistakes and victories, most of which shouldn’t have worked but somehow did, in books two through six and the bonus in-between novelettes. And of course you’ll be missing out on the personal evolution path that each and every Wildcards team member travels while doing whatever it takes to save America. Talk about walking and chewing gum at the same time. times a hundred!
Okay, I’m hearing whispering in the ranks. You need more information. Here, I’ve printed up copies of the back cover blurb for the first book. Take one and pass them around. I’ll give you a couple of minutes to read it.
"Aidan Headly never wanted to be the man giving orders. That’s fine with the Democratic State Force base he’s been assigned to command: they don’t like to take orders. Nicknamed the Wildcards, they used to be the most effective base against the seven Corporations owning the former United States in a war that has lasted over half a century. Now the Wildcards are known for creative insubordination, chaos, and commanders begging to be reassigned. Aidan is their last chance. If he can pull off his assignment as Commander and yank his ragtag crew of dreamers and fighters together, maybe they can get back to doing what they came to do: fighting for a country worth living in."
Everyone up to speed? Any questions? Yeah, you in the back with your hand up. You want to know more about the seven corporations? That’s a big question and I suggest you read the first book. Anyone else? Who’s Aidan Headly? Just a guy trying to do the best job he can in a world gone crazy. But he’s also looking for… wow, would you look at the time. Back to work, team! There’s shenanigans to plan, and books to read!
Odds Against just released on April 22, 2023. You can buy it and the rest of the books in the series at Amazon.
This review was originally published at SciFi.Radio.
May 18, 2023
This seventh novel in the series is full of changes. The family grows, the Unions make their demands and take the fight to the corporations and new things are growing.
I love this grim but hopeful post-apocalyptical series. The characters are interesting, sympathetic and surprisingly diverse, the themes are futuristic but somehow very contemporary and there's enough action to keep even the biggest fan of urban battle fans interested.
Ideally you should probably read the six previous stories, but Odds Against is well enough written that it also works as a stand alone novel.
I love this grim but hopeful post-apocalyptical series. The characters are interesting, sympathetic and surprisingly diverse, the themes are futuristic but somehow very contemporary and there's enough action to keep even the biggest fan of urban battle fans interested.
Ideally you should probably read the six previous stories, but Odds Against is well enough written that it also works as a stand alone novel.
May 20, 2023
As the 7th book in the series, we see some big change with our Wildcard family. Unlike the others this book does not focus so much on any specific couple, but more the Wildcards as a whole. Once again incredibly well written, this book is packed full of new adventures for base 1407. Impatiently awaiting the final book of the series, it's starting to feel like things will draw to a perfect close.
May 15, 2023
This series continues to have my heart in so many ways. In this book, the biggest highlight was how the Wildcards ongoing efforts to produce their own food and water in self sustaining ways had gotten them the honor of being the first democratic farm. The details were so precise and interesting, that I finally decided on a whim to look up the author information on the Internet. Not only did I find out that O.E Tearmann is a pseudonym for TWO authors (Olivia Wylie & E.S. Argentum) but Wylie is a professional horticulturalist, specializing in neglected gardens and plant evolution. It's clear that her expertise came in handy while writing the wonderful scenes about how Base 1407 grew what they needed to survive and help others.
"Pulling out a beat-to-hell road sign, she pried the solar panel off it and hooked it up to a deep-cycle battery she’d dug out of a portable hand generator that had given up the ghost. She hooked that up to the shell of an old microwave. By rubbing the metal-organic crystals she’d grown and the silica she’d pulled out of a bunch of packing material into the old ace bandages that Tweak had turned over for rags, she’d gotten something that could work for metal-organic framework tapes. She hung the tapes on wires across the inside of the old microwave. Grabbing a drill and some ear protection, she drilled a couple holes in the sides of the box, attached a little fan on the left-hand wall, a heating pad pulled out of old footwarmers on the bottom and a hosepipe on the right side, cementing everything with epoxy. She took the bandages out, sprayed the inside of the gizmo with a food-grade sealant, replaced the bandages, closed the door, put it on the legs from an old wheeled bin and set a bucket under the whole thing. That done, she stood back and studied her prototype. And snorted. “Well ain’t you ugly as sin.”"
This was just one example of many beautiful paragraphs of information put together to illustrate the tenacity and intelligence of the Wildcards. These authors love these characters and I adore how they include characters from all walks of life. Plus, they aren't afraid of their readers. They write at a high skill level and don't pander.
I feel like this book was a transitional book of sorts. So much happened! I am trying not to spoil anything. It continued to push the civilians into going for democracy and using their job contracts to take those first steps. And this takes place in the future that really doesn't seem that far away. The prose is dystopian, yet altogether normal.
""If you look over here, ladies and gentlemen, you’ll see the wall enclosing the Lost Borough of New York. Originally called Staten Island, it has become known as Babylon. When the sea levels first began to rise, the inhabitants crushed their junked petroleum-burning cars into large bricks and used them as an attempt at a sea wall. In spite of this, the area has been badly flooded in the last two decades. As Corporate leadership made their decisions on our strategic adaptation to sea level rise, Staten Island was ruled too costly to maintain and all services were cut off. All workers were relocated. However, some disaffected elements are rumored to maintain a hardscrabble existence there still, and strange rumors abound. It’s whispered that unearthly sounds, strange lights, and all manner of oddities are seen in the waters around Babylon.""
An ongoing concept through all of this series is genetic mutations and genetic code being altered. This book taught me about population adaptability dynamic, which was discussed briefly in relation to evolution.
""In a nutshell," he(Kevin)continued carefully, "It means that a species without a sufficient breadth of variability is dead in the water. That variability is the key to preventing any one thing from wiping the organism out.""
Pretty interesting! In the book, characters such as Tweak are called Gammas because they had genetic testing done on them and they were born with some odd deformities. Tweak has scales on her arms. In years down the line, perhaps her scales will become useful to humans in her genetic line. They may even save their lives.
It was fascinating to read these author's version of the future, and how close it comes to a gigantic red flag with neon flashing lights. But its not all bad. The book has so much hope and happiness. So many great and exciting things happened that made me cheer!! As I understand it, there will be one more book to end the series, and that will be it. I will then have to say goodbye to these memorable characters and one of the most incredible stories I've every read before. Until then, Go Get 'Em Wildcards!
"Pulling out a beat-to-hell road sign, she pried the solar panel off it and hooked it up to a deep-cycle battery she’d dug out of a portable hand generator that had given up the ghost. She hooked that up to the shell of an old microwave. By rubbing the metal-organic crystals she’d grown and the silica she’d pulled out of a bunch of packing material into the old ace bandages that Tweak had turned over for rags, she’d gotten something that could work for metal-organic framework tapes. She hung the tapes on wires across the inside of the old microwave. Grabbing a drill and some ear protection, she drilled a couple holes in the sides of the box, attached a little fan on the left-hand wall, a heating pad pulled out of old footwarmers on the bottom and a hosepipe on the right side, cementing everything with epoxy. She took the bandages out, sprayed the inside of the gizmo with a food-grade sealant, replaced the bandages, closed the door, put it on the legs from an old wheeled bin and set a bucket under the whole thing. That done, she stood back and studied her prototype. And snorted. “Well ain’t you ugly as sin.”"
This was just one example of many beautiful paragraphs of information put together to illustrate the tenacity and intelligence of the Wildcards. These authors love these characters and I adore how they include characters from all walks of life. Plus, they aren't afraid of their readers. They write at a high skill level and don't pander.
I feel like this book was a transitional book of sorts. So much happened! I am trying not to spoil anything. It continued to push the civilians into going for democracy and using their job contracts to take those first steps. And this takes place in the future that really doesn't seem that far away. The prose is dystopian, yet altogether normal.
""If you look over here, ladies and gentlemen, you’ll see the wall enclosing the Lost Borough of New York. Originally called Staten Island, it has become known as Babylon. When the sea levels first began to rise, the inhabitants crushed their junked petroleum-burning cars into large bricks and used them as an attempt at a sea wall. In spite of this, the area has been badly flooded in the last two decades. As Corporate leadership made their decisions on our strategic adaptation to sea level rise, Staten Island was ruled too costly to maintain and all services were cut off. All workers were relocated. However, some disaffected elements are rumored to maintain a hardscrabble existence there still, and strange rumors abound. It’s whispered that unearthly sounds, strange lights, and all manner of oddities are seen in the waters around Babylon.""
An ongoing concept through all of this series is genetic mutations and genetic code being altered. This book taught me about population adaptability dynamic, which was discussed briefly in relation to evolution.
""In a nutshell," he(Kevin)continued carefully, "It means that a species without a sufficient breadth of variability is dead in the water. That variability is the key to preventing any one thing from wiping the organism out.""
Pretty interesting! In the book, characters such as Tweak are called Gammas because they had genetic testing done on them and they were born with some odd deformities. Tweak has scales on her arms. In years down the line, perhaps her scales will become useful to humans in her genetic line. They may even save their lives.
It was fascinating to read these author's version of the future, and how close it comes to a gigantic red flag with neon flashing lights. But its not all bad. The book has so much hope and happiness. So many great and exciting things happened that made me cheer!! As I understand it, there will be one more book to end the series, and that will be it. I will then have to say goodbye to these memorable characters and one of the most incredible stories I've every read before. Until then, Go Get 'Em Wildcards!
June 4, 2023
This series is best if you read them in order. Book 7 in this series Odds Against just keeps bringing it. The wild cards show what they are made of and continue to survive and make head way. You just can't wait for the next book to see where they are going this time in the continuation of their lives. I've laughed and cried at times with all that goes on. But they continue to try to bring back democracy. Love the storyline, love the fight they have and can't help but wait for the next book. Definitely worth the read...
May 6, 2023
Intriguing characters and plot made this series one I have enjoyed reading. Enjoyed following along on their journey and interactions as they fought to survive in a dystopian world. Loved seeing how their story evolved and how they fought for a better world. Loved the emotions, interactions, drama, action, intrigue, and twists. Loved following along as they moved forward to get what they wanted for themselves and others.
June 8, 2024
The people of America are waking up, standing up, and standing their ground, and the Wildcards are there to help lead the way...and the Corporations are fighting back. They don't like losing control AND money. They are fighting back, and they fight dirty. This is another rollercoaster ride of emotion and adventure, and I loved every heart-pounding word. More, More, More. (Please).
I received a free copy via StoryOrigin and am voluntarily leaving this honest review.
I received a free copy via StoryOrigin and am voluntarily leaving this honest review.
May 1, 2023
The resistance is moving forward and it's exciting to see where they will go. Lots of action and emotional moments. I have to say it's a scary place to be.
This series is truly amazing written with so much heart you will fall in love with this crew.
This series is truly amazing written with so much heart you will fall in love with this crew.
May 24, 2023
This was a great series and I would recommend it to all. The author did a great job ending this series and is a good sci-fi read. I am not typically a sci-fi reader but the author did a great job with this whole series and kept my attention throughout the entire thing.
December 13, 2023
Loved it
Always love reading this series from Miss I E Tearmann. Her world is well built to your imagination and her characters are always waiting for you to learn more of their world.
Always love reading this series from Miss I E Tearmann. Her world is well built to your imagination and her characters are always waiting for you to learn more of their world.
May 20, 2023
These books just keep getting better and better. Loved hearing about Tweak she has always been my favourite.
September 24, 2024
A solid entry in the Aces High, Jokers wild series. Good characters and an interesting story-line.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews