Myra: A galactic adventure

The Dave Travise Series #1

by Richard Dee

Can changing your name change your life?

Meet Dave Travise, at least that's who his identity chip says he is. An ex-Navy man on the run; somehow he's ended up in a dead man's shoes; on a new ship and on the wrong side of the law.

With no way to prove his innocence, he's just got to play along and keep his head down if he's going to survive. As if he doesn't have enough problems, now he's fallen for Myra, the engineer on his new home.

Pursued by criminal gangs and keeping one jump ahead of everyone, Dave and his new shipmates are going to need all the luck in the Galaxy just to stay alive.

Do we carry who we are with us, no matter what we’re called?

 Find out how Dave’s life changes in Myra and its sequel, Freefall.

"A rattling good adventure story, with… unexpected twists, good characters and plenty of action"

"I could not put it down"

“Richard Dee has a superb gift for creating believable reality, this first person narrative is space opera at its best.”

242 pages, Kindle Edition

Published April 1, 2020

Reviews

[Claire · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading this, managed to finish it in one day due to long train journeys, that and the fact it was easy to read. There was great attention to detail with the types of spaceships, the different government bodies & planets. There didn't seem to be much alien life though.
The flashbacks were written really well and didn't get confusing at all. Myra reminded me of Kayleigh from Firefly immediately and I had a hard time getting to grips with the way she just vanished for six months - if felt uncharacteristic. In fact the last portion of the book when they're living on New Devon was a bit slow and then, and then, and then. We all knew Vlad would be back and the use of Myra's voice for the onboard computer was a bit of a giveaway. An exciting yet tragic ending.
It was a shame about Rixon - I kept thinking he would reappear. We never found out who the other spy was either. I have a character called Griff in my new novel so it was weird reading about him, they're actually very similar! I was really pleased to see there is a follow up book, Freefall, which I will definitely be reading.

[Rich · Rating 3 out of 5]

Started so well.

Really enjoyed the first two thirds of this book. Interesting characters, ideas and plot, and fast paced. Excellent I thought. Then it became more predictable and the writing less descriptive. Almost as if loose ends were finished in a hurry...

The story is told throughout from the perspective of the lead character Dave, who starts the book as a pilot of a Navy spacership helping to keep order in space on the outskirts of the galaxy. Things happen - but I don't want to give spoilers. The writing style is succinct and fairly simplistic and whilst I enjoyed the story I would liked more involvement, more emotion. Might suit YA readers.

[CHARLES WALKER BOWSER · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dee's is a rare type of self published author...he's competent.

Ribbonworld was innovative as the main character is a journalist. The sequel was good but predictable.

Same goes for this series You know who will die about 25 pages before it happens. Whike the stories are entertaining the characters aren't too complex and the plot twists are repetitive across the series...and his work for that matter ... but if you can ignore that... it's fun.

[Dr susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good sci fi adventure

But the body count is distressingly high; the last death was an unpleasant shock. The world building and story are good. I like Dave, Griff, and Ria. I'm really not happy with the ending. I will read Freefall, book 2, but I'm going to read something happy before I fall asleep.

[N.P. Francis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first of this series and the first book by the author I have read. I enjoyed the story but more than that I felt engaged by the characters and like I was experiencing their adventures with them.

[David Yardley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thumbs up for a great Devon author!

Myra, is a well written story by a very competent author. It was a pleasure to read a complete book without having to untangle bad grammar and puzzle over silly spelling mistakes. Three cheers for Richard Dee.😁😁

[Tracey Norman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a cracking read which rattles along at some pace - characters and events hurl themselves at you in the beginning, which echoes the confusion of the main protagonist Dave Travise and which made me feel that I was working things out alongside him. I greatly enjoyed getting to know the characters and ship at the same time as Dave, whilst trying to fit the puzzle pieces together. The pace slows part-way through, echoing Dave's increasing feeling of security (if that's the right word!) in his new life, but the story loses none of its impetus.
Not only is there the touching story of Myra, set against the military backdrop, plus a mystery to uncover, but there are also some excellent action scenes. My particular favourite was the chase scene through the canyon. It is clear that Mr Dee knows vessels and how to steer them - his years of maritime expertise really showed in this fast-paced scene.
As an aside - the cover of this book is exquisite and certainly piqued my curiosity about what was on the pages within!

[Oliver Tooley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Richard has cited Asimov as one of his influences, which is evident in this sci-fi adventure. The start, with its emerging back story, was brilliantly written. The middle tended to be episodic at times, like the literary equivalent of "Elite" the space trading game for PC.
The ending worked though and was rather unexpected.
Possibly I should have read "Freefall" first though.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

If I had to put my psych-profiler hat on, I’d say this book is best suited to fans of military sci-fi, and sci-fi action adventure written in the classical style. That is to say, it is not your typical dystopian fare that populates so much of the sci-fi market these days. The military action isn’t non-stop, if you happen to be a purist of that genre. Instead we get a fair amount of political intrigue and a good mystery to puzzle out across the span of the book. This one might even pass as a military sci-fi and Mystery fusion.

The standout features for me were: 1. The author writes to the hard sci-fi end of the spectrum, meaning he knows his science and while keeping the book accessible to the lay reader, he doesn’t include things that just don’t make sense from a scientific point of view. 2. He throws you into the thick of things and lets you find your way around until you get comfortable with the rules of his world. This may be favored by some readers, but it may take more patience on the part of others who might feel a bit lost until the pieces start clicking together. 3. Dee excels at action-writing, which is so important for this kind of tale.

Of the three stories of his which I’ve read thus far and enjoyed, this one took me the longest to get into. I think it had to do with the fact that there’s a lot going on action-wise, and with how many characters are thrown at you, and on top of that there is a mystery to be puzzled out. But about a third of the way in I was fully committed. So have patience, and you will be rewarded.

[Swordfish · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book, there are some well-written characters and some good plot twists.

I did feel it was a book of 2 halves, the start is quite fast-paced and carries you along with the storyline, the characters are well-developed and it all makes for a cracking start to the book . Later on however it becomes much slower and doesn't hang together quite as well - although the ending is pretty good if not entirely unexpected.

Definitely worth reading if sci-fi/fantasy is your thing. I'll be getting the follow-on book Freefall on the strength of this book - the writing is good and the storyline reminded me of Firefly :)

[D. Messing · Rating 5 out of 5]

Utterly fantastic story! It had the rare, magical ability to suck me into the story itself! Other than ch 31 coming out of nowhere, and making it really confusing for a few minutes, though it would work great in the beginning of the story to add depth to the first meeting of Griff and Dave. The pace was a nice mix of slower with lots of details, and faster with enough details to keep you in the story, but not too many that you feel like you're drowning in words. Same as with the last book of this authors that I read, exceptionally well done and very, very enjoyable!

[Emily Knight · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have given this book 3 stars because although I was transported to other worlds through the story, i found some aspects difficult to understand.
Space travel, and future worlds hold a fascination for me and this romance/adventure story unfolds against this backdrop.
In particular, I liked the strength of the characters in the midst of adversity and how they fought their battles to become survivors.
I found some of the detail distracting and caught myself skipping chunks of descriptive information about the ships which impacted negatively on my enjoyment of the story progression.
I think this book would suit most science fiction and space exploration enthusiasts.
Well done Richard Dee - I think your cover design is beautiful.

[Mandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The person called Dave Travise is an ex-Navy ship navigator called Finn Douglas who is on the run and has the real Dave Travise's identity chip. He is on a galactic trading ship on the wrong side of the law and he is playing along and keeping his head down while he gets used to this very new life. To complicate his life he has also fallen for Myra the ship's engineer. Life then gets very confusing as they are also being pursued by a criminal gang - can they stay one step ahead of them?

The story is told from the perspective of Dave (Finn). The book started a little slow but soon got going as the action started to happen and events started moving along at a fairly rapid pace. There were a few twists and turns plus surprises in the story. Everything was well written so that I understood what was going on but as it was told from Dave's point of view it felt a little one sided. The ended was a little bit of an anticlimax but I still enjoyed the book.