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Encounter
Two extraterrestrials transform the consciousness of a depressed male human and accidentally set up earth and humanity for total annihilation.
Just how far would you go to escape your cubicle?
Would you risk your life and break Intergalactic Federation laws to do so?
N and his clone N2 work in cubicles on a space station run by the intergalactic corporation, Zycorp. Along with other planetary interests, Zycorp holds the patent on human DNA. Similar to the way that humans experiment on animals, Zycorp experiments on humans... and has done so for a very long time.
There is an ongoing dispute among many alien races concerning such experimentation and the overall treatment of humans by their alien patent-registered owners. Whether humans have an evolved consciousness or not is hotly debated, especially as Zycorp now has plans to eradicate humanity entirely.
In an attempt to stave off boredom, our two bumbling cublicle workers interfere with a human subject (using a stolen technology that they don't understand). What they don't know is that their actions have major repercussions—not just for Zycorp— but for the entire galaxy and all life in the universe. You do not have to be a sci-fi fan to enjoy this romp through the known universe and beyond.
Just how far would you go to escape your cubicle?
Would you risk your life and break Intergalactic Federation laws to do so?
N and his clone N2 work in cubicles on a space station run by the intergalactic corporation, Zycorp. Along with other planetary interests, Zycorp holds the patent on human DNA. Similar to the way that humans experiment on animals, Zycorp experiments on humans... and has done so for a very long time.
There is an ongoing dispute among many alien races concerning such experimentation and the overall treatment of humans by their alien patent-registered owners. Whether humans have an evolved consciousness or not is hotly debated, especially as Zycorp now has plans to eradicate humanity entirely.
In an attempt to stave off boredom, our two bumbling cublicle workers interfere with a human subject (using a stolen technology that they don't understand). What they don't know is that their actions have major repercussions—not just for Zycorp— but for the entire galaxy and all life in the universe. You do not have to be a sci-fi fan to enjoy this romp through the known universe and beyond.
- GenresHumorScience Fiction
215 pages, Kindle Edition
First published February 21, 2014
4 people are currently reading
93 people want to read
About the author
Dermot Davis
16 books50 followersDermot is an Irish writer who splits his time between Ireland and the US. His creative work encompasses varied genres and styles with a special focus on human themes and characters transformed by life experience. He is a Gold Medalist Winner in the 2015 READER'S FAVORITE INTERNATIONAL BOOK AWARD, a SOMERSET AWARDS FIRST PLACE WINNER 2013, a First Place Winner in the 2013 USA BEST BOOK AWARDS and a Finalist in the 2013 INTERNATIONAL BOOK AWARDS. As a playwright, Dermot is a recipient of the O.Z. Whitehead Award which was co-sponsored by Irish Pen and the Society of Irish Playwrights
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
July 25, 2016
"Encounter" by Dermot Davis is a fun science fiction story about two idiot aliens who are watching a particular human from their space station as their profession. When their retirement age is brought back by an ill-meaning boss they decide to have some fun and conduct an forbidden experiment with the human.
Sharp, witty and playful this novel puts human beings into the research lab and let's them be taken care of by incompetent people. This is the stuff great satires are made of where a well chosen set up says a lot without having to be spelled out. Davis writes with great slapstick humour but also with clever irony, making this more than merely mindless fun.
Eventually the two aliens need to enter Earth to correct their mistake and this leads to a new dimension of experiences and 'alienation'. This is another great novel by a talented and multi-facetted author. Every novel is different yet 'nails' the subject at hand.
Five books in five weeks, I am a declared fan now.
Sharp, witty and playful this novel puts human beings into the research lab and let's them be taken care of by incompetent people. This is the stuff great satires are made of where a well chosen set up says a lot without having to be spelled out. Davis writes with great slapstick humour but also with clever irony, making this more than merely mindless fun.
Eventually the two aliens need to enter Earth to correct their mistake and this leads to a new dimension of experiences and 'alienation'. This is another great novel by a talented and multi-facetted author. Every novel is different yet 'nails' the subject at hand.
Five books in five weeks, I am a declared fan now.
May 12, 2014
Encounter by Dermot Davis is an out-of-this-world scifi extravaganza that had this reader hooked from page 1. The brilliance of the author is galactic in his capacity to mix wisdom, religion, addiction and every other ion that makes us human and reinvent them all with lashings of humour not seen since The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
Hank is a slob! There that sums him up perfectly. He falls asleep drunk in front of his busted telly every night inside his busted trailer. Unknown to Hank, he is being monitored by two idiot aliens by manipulating the TV as a viewing screen. These aliens, N and N2 are the stars of the story as they mess up everything they do in megaspades. N & N2 are supposed to find suitable human guinea-pigs for their insidious experiments but OOPS! They do the exact opposite.
Now they have to travel to the worst dump in the universe - Earth to correct their mistake.
Once on Earth, Dermot goes into warp speed with the humour as N & N2 experience humanity first hand. I couldn't stop laughing as they fall foul of everything we fall foul of only multiply the effects exponentially to the Nth degree.
I so enjoyed spotting movie moments too and without a doubt this FIVE STAR scifi with humour is so highly recommended I would bet everything this will become a movie success.
Hank is a slob! There that sums him up perfectly. He falls asleep drunk in front of his busted telly every night inside his busted trailer. Unknown to Hank, he is being monitored by two idiot aliens by manipulating the TV as a viewing screen. These aliens, N and N2 are the stars of the story as they mess up everything they do in megaspades. N & N2 are supposed to find suitable human guinea-pigs for their insidious experiments but OOPS! They do the exact opposite.
Now they have to travel to the worst dump in the universe - Earth to correct their mistake.
Once on Earth, Dermot goes into warp speed with the humour as N & N2 experience humanity first hand. I couldn't stop laughing as they fall foul of everything we fall foul of only multiply the effects exponentially to the Nth degree.
I so enjoyed spotting movie moments too and without a doubt this FIVE STAR scifi with humour is so highly recommended I would bet everything this will become a movie success.
December 17, 2015
I'd recommend this book to anyone with a sense of humour. Although Sci-Fi based you don't have to be a fan of the genre to enjoy it.
Some clever writing going on here as we discover not only that we're not alone but Earth is little more than an experimental asset to planets with more advanced technology. Readers will delight in recognising their friends' and co-workers' little personality flaws in the aliens responsible for monitoring dim Earthlings.
As with other books by this author the book has great readability and entertainment value although I didn't think the story really kicked off until N and N2 landed in Roswell. From then on I found it a riot.
It maybe won't change your life but it will put a smile on your face.
Some clever writing going on here as we discover not only that we're not alone but Earth is little more than an experimental asset to planets with more advanced technology. Readers will delight in recognising their friends' and co-workers' little personality flaws in the aliens responsible for monitoring dim Earthlings.
As with other books by this author the book has great readability and entertainment value although I didn't think the story really kicked off until N and N2 landed in Roswell. From then on I found it a riot.
It maybe won't change your life but it will put a smile on your face.
May 26, 2014
This was one of the more charming sci-fi novels I've read in recent memory. Fun, humorous, and well-written, this one is a few steps below The Hitchhiker's Guide series, but has a verge all its own. Very enjoyable read'
June 4, 2014
This novel is an absurd, funny, satirical science fiction tale that takes a dim view of humanity’s place in the cosmos. Its premise is that a congress of advanced aliens has been monitoring human behavior from afar, concluded continued human existence is undesirable, and decided to exterminate the lot. The question then is: Will humanity survive?
The tale unfolds from alien and human perspectives. First, the aliens. We meet several who live and work aboard a gigantic spaceship for a bureaucratic company called Zycorp, rife with office politics and run by idiots (echoes Intech in the movie Office Space). Key players are N and N2 (N’s clone), a pair of renegades who hate their boring lives as cubicle workers. Paradoxically, these guys jabber like hipster earthlings, love Elvis, Tesla, Marilyn, and blue denims, and have many other odd attributes not usually associated with fictional aliens. (Imaginative, reminiscent of Douglas Adams’ fiction.)
We also meet several human characters. The main one is Hank, a depressed former scientist who drinks too much, survives on junk food, lives in a trailer, and works as a janitor.
Now, the plot. As the alien congress prepares to exterminate humanity, N & N2 use a Zycorp device to give Hank a quantum mind jump that transforms him from a slob to a sort of demigod. They abandon the spaceship, travel to earth, transform themselves into the images of Elvis and Marilyn, and try to track Hank down, having several adventures along the way. Zycorp operatives follow N & N2. Alas, by the time N & N2 reach Hank’s trailer, he has left to present himself at United Nations Headquarters in New York. Hank eventually gets there and makes a splash. Telling what happens next would be a spoiler, so you’ll have to read the book to find out what happens to humanity, Hank, N & N2, and everyone else.
The book is well written, consists mostly of dialogue, and moves at a good pace. The dialogue is witty, the descriptions colorful and evocative. Beside the humor generated by the absurd characters and plot, I was amused by some of the unique problems the aliens encountered; for example, the difficult relationship between N and his clone, the unexpected effects shape changing can have on identity, the complexity of providing bathroom facilities for multiple alien species on the same spaceship.
The tale unfolds from alien and human perspectives. First, the aliens. We meet several who live and work aboard a gigantic spaceship for a bureaucratic company called Zycorp, rife with office politics and run by idiots (echoes Intech in the movie Office Space). Key players are N and N2 (N’s clone), a pair of renegades who hate their boring lives as cubicle workers. Paradoxically, these guys jabber like hipster earthlings, love Elvis, Tesla, Marilyn, and blue denims, and have many other odd attributes not usually associated with fictional aliens. (Imaginative, reminiscent of Douglas Adams’ fiction.)
We also meet several human characters. The main one is Hank, a depressed former scientist who drinks too much, survives on junk food, lives in a trailer, and works as a janitor.
Now, the plot. As the alien congress prepares to exterminate humanity, N & N2 use a Zycorp device to give Hank a quantum mind jump that transforms him from a slob to a sort of demigod. They abandon the spaceship, travel to earth, transform themselves into the images of Elvis and Marilyn, and try to track Hank down, having several adventures along the way. Zycorp operatives follow N & N2. Alas, by the time N & N2 reach Hank’s trailer, he has left to present himself at United Nations Headquarters in New York. Hank eventually gets there and makes a splash. Telling what happens next would be a spoiler, so you’ll have to read the book to find out what happens to humanity, Hank, N & N2, and everyone else.
The book is well written, consists mostly of dialogue, and moves at a good pace. The dialogue is witty, the descriptions colorful and evocative. Beside the humor generated by the absurd characters and plot, I was amused by some of the unique problems the aliens encountered; for example, the difficult relationship between N and his clone, the unexpected effects shape changing can have on identity, the complexity of providing bathroom facilities for multiple alien species on the same spaceship.
March 23, 2014
The book’s subtitle says, “A comedy about escaping your cubicle...” This is exactly what this book is: a comedy, in fact, a hilarious, witty and enormously creative comedy. But it is more. It is also a book about us – you and me – about humanity and the direction we are heading. That these two elements of the book, clowning and reflections on morality, manage to go hand in hand, so to say, is actually quite amazing. The events and the plot of the comedy part of the book are outrageously funny, the morality part is commendably reflective. Mixing these two elements could easily have made the book kitschy. However, the way the authors managed to merge them, at first slowly and hardly noticeable, but towards the end of the book in a more dominant way, and yet, without ignoring the comedy tone of the book, is impressive and makes “Encounter” a very enjoyable read. This is not just a book for sci-fi fans, this is a book for everybody with a willingness to ignore reality for a few hours and to engage in a journey of comical absurdity and universal integrity.
May 19, 2014
This is the third book I have read from this amazing author. He also wrote Brain: The Man Who Wrote the Book That Changed the World, and Mr. Psychic. I loved these other two books and gave them full rankings.
This one is a different outtake but with the same formula for humour and a spiritual transcendence at the end. This time, it is space beings that observe Earth and even join in on the fun at Earth.
My favourite part of this book was when an attractive character, Marcy, picks up the two aliens, who have switched to human form as two good-looking young men, and their banter is really hilarious. An example: she says, "My name is Marcy, by the way," and one of the aliens says something like, "Nice to meet you, Marcy By the Way." And so on, she asks them questions, and they respond with bizarre answers because they know so little about Earth.
This book is never boring, it's just that some of the humour falls flat. But there are so many zingers, that enough find their mark!
This one is a different outtake but with the same formula for humour and a spiritual transcendence at the end. This time, it is space beings that observe Earth and even join in on the fun at Earth.
My favourite part of this book was when an attractive character, Marcy, picks up the two aliens, who have switched to human form as two good-looking young men, and their banter is really hilarious. An example: she says, "My name is Marcy, by the way," and one of the aliens says something like, "Nice to meet you, Marcy By the Way." And so on, she asks them questions, and they respond with bizarre answers because they know so little about Earth.
This book is never boring, it's just that some of the humour falls flat. But there are so many zingers, that enough find their mark!
June 13, 2014
I was given a free copy of this book via LibraryThing in return for an honest review.
An amusing book that turned the usual story about superior aliens on its head, this book is a quick and enjoyable read. Filled with zany, unique characters, enlightenment, cubicles, obnoxious supervisors, alien technology, and fan-aliens [like fan-boys for aliens], you are bound to recognize someone you know, work with or for. It will have you laughing or shaking your head depending on your sense of humor.
I give this book a B-.
An amusing book that turned the usual story about superior aliens on its head, this book is a quick and enjoyable read. Filled with zany, unique characters, enlightenment, cubicles, obnoxious supervisors, alien technology, and fan-aliens [like fan-boys for aliens], you are bound to recognize someone you know, work with or for. It will have you laughing or shaking your head depending on your sense of humor.
I give this book a B-.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews