Kicking Ashe

Project Enterprise #5

by Pauline Baird Jones

When you save Time’s tush—or its version of one—it ought to cut you a break, not kick your tush some where and some when. Though boo yah on providing a hot guy in leather to pull that tush out of the impact crater that Ashe so did not make despite the somewhat damning evidence to the contrary.

So, the sitrep:

.She's stuck on primitive planet
.Time Tracker suit down
.Lurch (her nanite) unable to connect to any tech (see primitive above)
.Surrounded by a bunch of buccaneer types who haven’t been around nubile, young women cause its against their law
.The one guy (Vidor Shan) she’d like to kiss on the mouth is off limits (time rule)
.Someone gunning for Shan from somewhere in time
.And, oh yeah, some really strange meteorites are making landfall in some very strange ways.

Seems Time has a new hobby: kicking Ashe (and shame on It for doing it when she’s down).

Not that she plans to stay down. Or give up the guy.

Paperback

First published February 19, 2012

About the author

Pauline Baird Jones is the author of quirky, fast-paced romantic adventures that blend danger, laughter, and love in equal measure. She writes across genres—from romantic suspense and science fiction to comedy thrillers and steampunk—but her stories always share the same heartbeat: heroines who discover their courage, heroes who celebrate their strength, and humor as the best weapon in impossible situations. If you’re looking for an escape from the ordinary, her books deliver adventure, romance, and just enough laughter to keep you smiling long after “The End.”

Reviews

[Christy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Time traveler Ashe, along with Lurch, a nanite who lives in her head, lands on a dying planet where she meets up with sexy Vidor Shan. Ashe has met Shan before in another time line although he doesn’t remember her. With her time tracker suit broken and bereft of the technology upon which she depends, Ashe joins forces with Shan and his men as they search for Shan’s lost brother while trying to escape aliens tracking Shan. Time’s running out and Ashe needs to get off this planet but Shan is proving a major distraction even though he’s off limits.

This last installment of the Project Enterprise series proves as good as the ones before it, with a kick-ass heroine going up against an alpha male in a strange, alien world. Lurch is an intriguing addition to the cast of characters and the exchanges between the nanite and Ashe are amusing and fun to read. The witty dialogue and sizzling chemistry between Ashe and Shan make this fast-paced plot even more enjoyable. There’s plenty of action-adventure, suspense and mystery on top of one heck of a romance all woven into a sci-fi all readers will enjoy, no matter which genre they prefer. Jones couldn’t have ended her series with anything better than Kicking Ashe and this reviewer is disappointed to see the series end.

[AnnaM · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kicking Ashe is action-filled and a fun ride. Shan and Ashe have excellent chemistry. The plot is full of twists and surprises. I thoroughly enjoyed this story. And Lurch was cool.

[Judy & Marianne from Long and Short Reviews · Rating 4 out of 5]

Originally posted at: http://lasrsff.blogspot.com/2012/04/k...


Ashe is a time traveler, an agent of the Time Service. To help her is Lurch, a nanite who lives in her head. Their actions start a time tsunami which dumps them on a planet in another time stream. Cut off from their support they must figure out what's wrong with this time, and why a man they know is also in the same time zone - but he believes he belongs there.

I enjoyed reading this book although I would have liked to see more romantic interaction between the two main characters a little earlier. Ashe is a quirky young woman who has a continuous dialogue going on inside her head; when Lurch is silent, she talks to herself. The man she knows from before is Shan, but he doesn't remember her - maybe because their meeting is still in his future. Ashe is instantly attracted to him which confuses her. In the other time she believes he has had a fling with "great, great - not so great" grandma who is also a previous host of Lurch.

Aggressive robots, a traitor in Shan's family, and Ashe's inability to access her full resources: all these things make for a fast moving book with mystery and adventure. I liked the mixture of science fiction and time travel, along with the adventure and underlying mystery of who was out to get Shan and what had happened to his brother.

Ms Jones has created strong characters who interact well with each other with the added internal conversation between Lurch and Ashe. For most of the book Shan is not aware of Lurch, but he does wonder why Ashe occasionally gets a faraway look in her eyes. The minor characters add richness to the story while unexpected mechanical beings make their presence felt.

Whether you prefer straight science fiction or like yours with a dash of romance, this is a very enjoyable read.

[Sworthen · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's been a couple of years since I read the previous book in the series. I remembered Ashe as being the vibrant, energy-filled highlight of that book. But perhaps she worked better that way for me seen from the inside than spending much of a book inside her head.

This book ties off major loose ends from the rest of the series - specifically the previous book, which meant that I wished there was there was at least one otherwise tense moment undermined - for me - by saying, without much in the way of previous reference, "The major bad guy was already defeated."

Also, one aspect of the time travel at the end seemed rather inconsistent to me: "restoring" a fixed point by moving it to a place out of time.

It was a perfectly fine book - I just wished that various aspects of it had worked out (editorially) a little differently.