Telomeric

The Industrial Age #2

by P.L. Tavormina

EARTH 2.0 IN PERIL

A decade has passed since Odile infiltrated planet Turaset’s combustion industry to bring its covert killers to justice. That act nearly broke her. Now, she wants only to raise her son, Paolo, in peace.

When Paolo’s environmentalist father arrives to take him camping deep in the wilderness, an accident triggers a devastating and strangely curious fugue in the boy. Unconscious, Paolo mumbles fragments of alien technology that could bring an end to coal and oil combustion forever.

Paolo’s father wants to record Paolo’s ongoing trickle of information. He wants to use it to force the ancient ‘telomeric’ man who heads the combustion industry to give up fossil fuels. But Odile, her peace now shattered, simply wants Paolo healthy again. She flees with him in search of a cure as the clock ticks down for humankind's survival.

Telomeric is stand-alone fiction from the world of Turaset.

Genres: Fantasy

416 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 1, 2021

About the author

You can take the girl out of the country, but you can't take the country out of the girl. Give me frogs and turtles and a nice patch of garden any day. :)

Reviews

[Ann Birdgenaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

The battle for survival on Earth's sister planet, Turaset, wages on in Telomeric, The Industrial Age, Vol.2. As Turaset is in environmental collapse because the inhabitants, or rather the powers that be, continue to make the same mistakes that were made on planet Earth; like burning fossil fuels. Despite genetically engineered traits such as longevity and geometrics, humankind is in decline. Paolo, son of a anti-carbon activist mother and environmentalist father may hold the secret to help take on the behemoth combustion industry, and end coal and oil burning on Turaset forever. Fans of the series will enjoy this speculative cautionary tale of the dangers of carbon monoxide on our own planet.

[William Collins · Rating 4 out of 5]

Telomeric by P.L Tavormina, is a solid sequel to the Industrial Age Series. I read, and thoroughly enjoyed, the first book Aerovoyant earlier this year and was glad to return
return to the planet of Turaset to many of the characters, just several years later.

As with the first book, topics such as climate crisis and familial drama continued to be explored here, whilst a new race of people, the telomerics, are introduced. Though this is a science fiction book, I found the characters and plots very realistic and particularly liked the character of Odile and her story arc. I also found it sadly and infuriatingly relatable with how people continue to repeat the mistakes of the past, only to bring about the same result.

[Ed Morawski · Rating 3 out of 5]

Basically this is a story about colonists on a planet called Turaset who fled from a dying Earth some thousands or hundreds (?) of years ago. The population was generically altered in various ways in order to survive and prosper. As such there is a strange mixture of technology in the current timeline. Much of the society is rural with horses and buggies and no power, while the few urban centers have internal combustion vehicles and electricity. They know about computers and spacecraft but don't have any. The term 'steampunk' kept coming to mind.

The plot revolves around factions who to continue and expand the use of fossil fuels or prohibit it altogether in the name of protecting the climate. While it is very well written, it does move at a glacial pace with many meanderings and side trips into complex personal relationships. I felt all the fluff bogged down the story but many will no doubt appreciate it.

I couldn't help but notice though that the main protagonists seemed in their zeal to 'protect' the planet, as guilty as their opponents. They would rather the people starve than use combustion power to better their lives? They commit violent acts for their cause. They plunge cities into darkness. On the other hand, the key industrial magnate, di Gar, is portrayed as a villain, but his accomplishments seem visionary to me. My problem is that I don't believe in human caused climate change in the first place. It amazes me that people scoff at the idea humans could someday control the weather, but blindly accept we are able to ruin the climate. Earth is roughly 4 billion years old while humans have only had industry for less than 200 of those years some purport to say we have affected the climate.

Then here's where the need for suspension of disbelief really kicks in: one of the leaders, Alphonse, wants to ban fossil fuel use and use nuclear energy instead. Now I happen to be a big proponent of nuclear power and I think our current trend of dismantling our nuke stations, especially in California where our esteemed leadership is mandating the use of electric vehicle, is not only foolhardy but incredibly ignorant and will eventually plunge our country into darkness. But guys - in the context of this book's premises it is totally unrealistic.The society doesn't even have air travel!

This is akin to going back to 1800 and handing someone a book on nuclear power and expecting them to build a reactor. Yeah, the knowledge is there, but building a nuclear power station requires a vast, highly technical manufacturing infrastructure just to make the components to do so, not to mention the refinement and enrichment of the actual fuel rods. So to get around this they imply invent a new kind of magical fuel.

I don't want to come off as harsh on this book. It is well written and tells a fascinating story set in a rich but strange world. But, while some reviewers call this 'hard science fiction' I beg to differ and would put in more in the fringes of the fantasy genre

[S. Lynn Helton · Rating 4 out of 5]

This richly detailed climate sci-fi story tells of the race and fight to save the boy Paolo against the backdrop of a race and fight to save the planet Turaset. It continues the stories of characters from Aerovoyant, some 10 years later. While the blurb states that Telomeric is stand-alone fiction, a reader can definitely benefit from reading Aerovoyant first.

Elements I liked:
The story followed basically ordinary people who worked to find solutions to the havoc that combustion was wreaking on their world. Some of the people involved carried inherited genetic augmentations that the world’s first colonizing humans, three thousand years prior, had introduced into their people. Those augmentations were only one of the tools available to help save Turaset. I loved the imaginative variety and the creative ways that people found to use their augmentations together.

The well-written characters are complex and imperfect, a good mix of foibles and nobility. I liked how the story showed the extent to which both sides of the fight for Turaset were willing to do whatever it took to achieve their goals, and how much each side exhibited attributes they ascribed to the other.

Elements I struggled with:
At times, the repetition—of how bad combustion was and how good the alternates would be—felt a bit heavy-handed at getting the message across.

Overall:
This sequel to Aerovoyant is both entertaining—a story of love and adventure—and thought-provoking—highlighting questions and moral dilemmas of how to mitigate humanity’s effect on climate. An engrossing story - well worth reading.

[J.R. Gibson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I selected this book to read as it was one of the books offered in the Goodreads “Ten” author group. Although the plot was interesting, involving an industrial “parallel” Earth like planet called Turaset and problems with its environment, some of the concepts in the story (technological/familial or the characteristics of the different inhabitants of the planets) were difficult for me to understand. This may be because it is the second book in the series, so starting the series from the second story therefore would have affected my view of the story overall. Since this is a large story with lots of detail, I think it might have helped more if I had read the first book in this series, as it was tricky to understand some of the characters motives/thoughts and feelings or why they behave the way they do. In fact, it doesn’t seem fair on the author’s part to leave a negative review based on simply reading the series out of order, so in hindsight perhaps I might have preferred the series more if I had started with “Aerovoyant” the first book, instead. This might have helped me to understand who Myrta was for example, and about her special powers and past.

Having said that, the scene in which the young boy is brainwashed into reading out information non-stop about nuclear fission and the doctor believing there was nothing at all wrong with him was very well written.

[Jenny Graves · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the second book in the series. I was glad that I’d read the first book, and I’d recommend that you read them in order, as the background will help to make sense of this one.

Again, the author has used her knowledge of climate change to write about the dangers of it to humanity through a fictional narrative. This book carries a much stronger warning than the first one.

I found the first half of the book rather slow. The descriptions of travelling through history were intriguing. The second half brought the varies strands of the story together well, though, and the finale was exciting and somewhat unexpected.

There was a reference early on about the benefits of genetic engineering, which I found disturbing. The author suggested that genetic engineering could protect crops against pests. I disagree with this: it allows farmers to use pesticides on their crops without killing the crop, promoting the use of pesticides that are toxic to humans.

One quote that really touched me was ‘But it was love that mattered in the end, not technology. It was the infinite goodness in people, binding brother to sister and husband to wife and parent to child—that was the human ideal to strive towards. Not machines, certainly not domination of space.’ I couldn’t agree more.

If you’re a fan of fantasy, this one has a great message.

[Annika · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a powerful and heart-wrenching book! Telomeric continues the story of the characters that we came to know and love in the first book, and we get to know some of the secondary characters as well. It also introduces telomerics, people who live extraordinarily long lives due to longer telomeres. I’ve always had a soft spot for books that explore what immortality (or, in this case, a very long life) would be like.

What really struck me about the book, though, is the way it explores connections between the personal and the political, between the environment and politics and economics, between people of different cultures and experiences.

The book certainly resonates in our current times, but it’s no basic allegory or morality tale. There are no simple answers or clear paths. The solutions to Turaset’s climate crisis come from legislation, science, activism, economic pressure, and even violence, but each of those solutions come with their own unanticipated consequences. The characters sometimes act from extreme selfishness, sometimes from extreme altruism, and sometimes an unclear muddle of both. Though much darker than the first book, there are spots of light, and it will certainly make you reflect on our own global challenges.

[S.D. · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the third book I've read set in Turaset. It felt like a trip home after a time-lapse and I was catching up on what's happened in my absence.

It’s ten years later. Odile has transferred her energies from her underground-environmental activism to single-parenting her son Paolo. But then Paolo’s father shows up and takes his boy wilderness camping. It all seems like an innocent bonding trip until something freakish happens. An accident. Somehow the unconscious Paolo has become a conduit to some ancient alien technology. His father wants to tap his boy’s new ability and use the information to finally destroy the coal and oil industry on Turaset. Odile’s only concern is for her son’s safety. All she wants is for him to recover and return to their peaceful, rural life. This can’t happen if the boy’s father gets his way. He wants to use the boy’s talents to save the world. With no other option, Odile takes Paolo and escapes in hope of finding a cure.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. There's danger, action, and adventure all wrapped into a fascinating sci-fi world. Even if you haven't read the earlier books in this series, telomeric is a strong standalone novel for science fiction fans.

[Tony Travis · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Telomeric” combines a number of interesting premises and plot lines. For this reason, for many readers, it will be a dense read. There are many names and locations, with “powers” for many of the characters as well, that one needs to keep track of. While it is a slow read, it’s a good read. The underlying plots work well and are thoughtfully explored.

At the heart are two main points: What is humanity really about—love or machines? This leads to a discussion of progress versus harmony with the environment. All in all, it is well done. However, at times, the balance becomes disturbed, with a heavy emphasis on the dangers and human consequences of our actions when we push our environment too far.

The plot lines are handled well but sometimes felt a bit heavy-handed to me. The writing is clear and smartly done. For those who want to dive deeply into another world, with a rich background and intricate details, this book is quite good. It should, in my opinion, be approached slowly, and one must pay attention to details. If not, it won’t be enjoyable, and you may well end up lost. For climate fiction with a sci-fi, steampunk-ish, and fantasy backdrop, it’s a good read. Suspension of disbelief is your friend here.

[Sinmisola · Rating 5 out of 5]

Usually, I’m skeptical about reading a second book before the first, but P.L. Tavormina did a great job with this her second book, which increases public knowledge of the problem of climate change and the impacts of combustion on the environment. It is so well written that glimpses of what is in the first book is cohesive with this stand-alone book. The story offers awareness into how interpersonal interactions alter the intricacy of issues, with familial ties often getting in the way of a character's chosen path of action. While managing human interactions is considerably not easy to fathom, and therefore a more challenging route to walk, scientific solutions frequently appear to be extremely black and white in nature.

This kind of antagonism keeps the plot tense, but it's also highly real in the current social situation, where there is a lot of disagreement and division over the steps that need to be taken to handle the current climate issue. An interesting book with a lot of thought-provocation, but also entertaining and enjoyable. I enjoyed reading this book with its relatable flawed and broken characters. Very nice!

[Balroop Singh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Telomeric highlights the same mistakes that were made on planet Earth. Turaset is under threat due to environmental collapse. People are dying and croplands in the agricultural belt have failed. Alternative fuel is needed to protect their land. Myrta and Gihev believe that their traits would help. Alphonse knows his son’s ability and he wants to use the boy’s talents to save the world but Odile's concern is her son’s safety. She would never endanger her son’s life.

Greed demands a planet “to be used so that it can withstand exploitation,” this idea sickens many who believe that Turaset is not a resource to be burned through, as it doesn’t just belong to the humans, it is a home for flora and fauna too. There is conflict that keeps the plot alive but
a lot of science jargon may put you off. Also the story moves at a snail’s pace while you struggle to understand the intentions of the characters who try to deal with realistic problems. This book is well-written but for me it was heavy reading.

[Sandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

Telomeric is a hard science fiction novel about people struggling with climate change on a distant planet. For me, it served as an allegory for the issues our world faces. It is the second novel of a trilogy; I have read the first novel, but suspect the reader could start here without too much confusion. The science is deeply thought through, the characters face many hard decisions, with plenty of emotion to carry the readers along. At times, the science and dire warnings seemed a bit repetitive, and the action gets buried under all the thought-experiments, but the humanity of the characters countered that, and overall I enjoyed this book. Occasionally, the choices characters made seemed puzzling, or unrealistic, and story problems blew up or resolved too easily. But the best part of the book for me was the conflicts between family members, and between players in the public realm. Many people here have to make hard choices, with huge costs. Very satisfying.

[Laura Koerber · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was a bit of a heavy lift for me, but that's because of me, not the writing. I just like a more straight-forward plot--and I read for escapism. This is not an escapist novel.

It isn't preachy. It isn't depressing--well, a little. It's just realistic about people and how they make decisions both as individuals and as groups. That's a difficult, painful, messy and frustrating process both in the real world and in the novel.

The author is a scientist and that comes through in her writing; this is an intelligently-written book. The word choice, sentence structure, characterizations, and plot all show that the author is a smart woman who has been thinking deeply about our planet and the problems we are facing (or not facing, as is too often the case) and has a gift for expressing herself though the conventions of a novel.

[David Gordon · Rating 4 out of 5]

P.L. Tavormina has done it again with another tale about the present day climate crisis set in the future with protagonists acting as the well meaning but not always correct climate change activists and scientists and the antagonists as greedy science denying political corporatists. It also is a commentary on the physical and mental evolution of humanity as well. Perhaps the most intriguing scenes concern the child character creating an alternate reality. My only critiques is that the story does drag in some parts and one wonders. These people are centuries ahead of us. Why didn't they go straight to solar energy? But if that was the case, there would not have been need for this story.

[Stella Jorette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Odile lives in an ecological dystopia. Drought is killing the family farm because her earth colony is repeating many of the mistakes made on the home world, including burning fossil fuels. Odile was a front line anti-carbon activist in her youth, but that past left battle scars, and she's busy raising her son. Then tragedy draws her back into the fray. All the characters, including the long-lived megalomaniac villain, are complex and conflicted. "Telomeric" is part of a group of stories from the same fictional universe, but reads well as a stand alone.

[Loralee · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book does so well at telling a compelling story with human emotion, relationships, failures, and triumphs at the same time it helps people think about the direction the world is currently headed in. And it does this without coming across as too preachy.

Odile is an amazing, complex character with flaws, and mistakes, but at the same time, a courageous character who does her best to take care of those she loves.

This is a great book for anyone interested in sci-fi, adventures, and/or tales that support the need to take care of our planet!

[Sass Green · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author is a master at painting beautifully drawn characters and settings with a brush stroke of her figurative pen. Attracted by the pain-staking detail the author used to color the interactions between the characters. Very mesmerizing book.

[John B · Rating 5 out of 5]

Often the value of fiction lies in helping us to reflect upon and understand our own world and reality. Three thousand years ago the ancestors of the people of planet Turaset left Earth, a failing planet, to find a healthier world. And now this new planet is at great risk of collapse from combustion – the burning of archaic carbon.

In the excellent hands of this climate-science writer we are offered a story that all of us need to hear and understand as we face our current climate issues. Besides being a cautionary tale, this is a story of love – love for family and love for our world. And this is a story of greed – a story of what happens when one puts one’s own desires above all else.

The characters are compelling, and we are introduced to some who are telomeric – extremely long lived humans. We are asked to consider what it means to live as long as the telomerics of Turaset live - with all the loneliness that extremely long life brings.

The crises unfolding on planet Turaset mirror our own current climate crises and this novel is a parable for our own times.

While this second novel in the series “The Industrial Age” can definitely stand alone, a reading of the first novel, Aerovoyant, offers insight into the world of Turaset and the complicated relationships and problems that our main characters face.

With a PhD in genetics and an extensive background in science, this author brings a scientific knowledge and a passion for addressing the climate crisis that we face here on Earth to her writing.

We are left with the question - What choices do you make when the fate of the world is in your hands? This reader is greatly looking forward to the third installment in this series. There are more parts of Turaset yet to explore!