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Emily is a teenage girl pulled from our world into a world of magic and mystery by a necromancer who intends to sacrifice her to the dark gods. Rescued in the nick of time by an enigmatic sorcerer, she discovers that she possesses magical powers and must go to Whitehall School to learn how to master them. There, she learns that the locals believe she is a "Child of Destiny" - someone whose choices might save or damn their world, a title that earns her both friends and enemies.
Escaping wrongful imprisonment wasn't something Connor had in mind, but being put into stasis aboard Earth's first interstellar colony ship was something he couldn't have prepared for. For 300,000 colonists, the new colony brings the promise of a fresh start...a second chance. Connor might be the wrong man for the colony, but he's the right man to see that it survives what's coming.
The Hundred Worlds have withstood invasion by the relentless Hok for decades. The human worlds are strong, but the Hok have the resources of a thousand planets behind them, and their fleets attack in endless waves. The long war has transformed the Hundred Worlds into heavily fortified star systems. Their economies are geared for military output, and they raise specialized soldiers to save our species. Assault Captain Derek Straker is one such man among many.
Seventy years ago, the interstellar supercarrier Ark Royal was the pride of the Royal Navy. But now, her weapons are outdated and her solid-state armour nothing more than a burden on her colossal hull. She floats in permanent orbit near Earth, a dumping ground for the officers and crew the Royal Navy wishes to keep out of the public eye. But when a deadly alien threat appears, the modern starships built by humanity are no match for the powerful alien weapons.
The Galactic Empire is dying and chaos and anarchy are breaking out everywhere. After a disastrous mission against terrorists on Earth itself, Captain Edward Stalker of the Terran Marine Corps makes the mistake of speaking truth to power, telling one of the most powerful men in the Empire a few home truths. As a result, Captain Stalker and his men are unceremoniously exiled to Avalon, a world right on the Rim of the Empire. It should have been an easy posting...
Caitlyn Aguirre should have been a magician. Her family certainly expected her to be a magician. But by the time she reached her 12th birthday, Caitlyn hadn't even managed to cast a single spell! In desperation, her parents send her - and her magical sisters - to Jude's Sorcerous Academy, her last best chance to discover her powers. But as she struggles to survive her classes without a single spell to her name, Caitlyn starts to uncover an ancient mystery that may prove the key to her true powers....
Emily is a teenage girl pulled from our world into a world of magic and mystery by a necromancer who intends to sacrifice her to the dark gods. Rescued in the nick of time by an enigmatic sorcerer, she discovers that she possesses magical powers and must go to Whitehall School to learn how to master them. There, she learns that the locals believe she is a "Child of Destiny" - someone whose choices might save or damn their world, a title that earns her both friends and enemies.
Escaping wrongful imprisonment wasn't something Connor had in mind, but being put into stasis aboard Earth's first interstellar colony ship was something he couldn't have prepared for. For 300,000 colonists, the new colony brings the promise of a fresh start...a second chance. Connor might be the wrong man for the colony, but he's the right man to see that it survives what's coming.
The Hundred Worlds have withstood invasion by the relentless Hok for decades. The human worlds are strong, but the Hok have the resources of a thousand planets behind them, and their fleets attack in endless waves. The long war has transformed the Hundred Worlds into heavily fortified star systems. Their economies are geared for military output, and they raise specialized soldiers to save our species. Assault Captain Derek Straker is one such man among many.
Seventy years ago, the interstellar supercarrier Ark Royal was the pride of the Royal Navy. But now, her weapons are outdated and her solid-state armour nothing more than a burden on her colossal hull. She floats in permanent orbit near Earth, a dumping ground for the officers and crew the Royal Navy wishes to keep out of the public eye. But when a deadly alien threat appears, the modern starships built by humanity are no match for the powerful alien weapons.
The Galactic Empire is dying and chaos and anarchy are breaking out everywhere. After a disastrous mission against terrorists on Earth itself, Captain Edward Stalker of the Terran Marine Corps makes the mistake of speaking truth to power, telling one of the most powerful men in the Empire a few home truths. As a result, Captain Stalker and his men are unceremoniously exiled to Avalon, a world right on the Rim of the Empire. It should have been an easy posting...
Caitlyn Aguirre should have been a magician. Her family certainly expected her to be a magician. But by the time she reached her 12th birthday, Caitlyn hadn't even managed to cast a single spell! In desperation, her parents send her - and her magical sisters - to Jude's Sorcerous Academy, her last best chance to discover her powers. But as she struggles to survive her classes without a single spell to her name, Caitlyn starts to uncover an ancient mystery that may prove the key to her true powers....
Growing up, Travis Uriah Long yearned for order and discipline in his life...he two things his neglectful mother couldn’t or wouldn’t provide. So when Travis enlisted in the Royal Manticoran Navy, he thought he’d finally found the structure he’d always wanted so desperately. But life in the RMN isn’t exactly what he expected. Boot camp is rough and frustrating; his first ship assignment lax and disorderly; and with the Star Kingdom of Manticore still recovering from a devastating plague, the Navy is possibly on the edge of budgetary extinction.
Earth is conquered. Sol is lost. One ship is tasked to free them. One Captain to save them all. When an alien armada destroys the United Earth Space Force and takes control of the human homeworld, newly reinstated Captain Annette Bond must take her experimental hyperspace cruiser Tornado into exile as Terra's only interstellar privateer. She has inferior technology, crude maps, and no concept of her enemy, but the seedy underbelly of galactic society welcomes her so long as she has prizes to sell and money to spend.
All John wanted to do was get away for his life in Kluane National Park for a weekend. Hike, camp, and chill. Instead, the world comes to an end in a series of blue boxes, animals start evolving, and monsters start spawning. Now, he has to survive the apocalypse, get back to civilization, and not lose his mind. Life in the North is book one of the System Apocalypse, a litRPG apocalypse series that combines modern day life, science fiction, and fantasy elements along with game mechanics.
She didn't mean to use magic. She didn't even know she had magic. She just wanted to save her brother, who was dying in her arms. Accused of using illegal magic, and sentenced to a cruel death at the hands of the city's guards, Hannah has no choice but to trust in the aid of a strange old man who wields unimaginable power.
When a bunch of interstellar scavengers approach Earth intending to abduct a few dozen humans and sell them into slavery in the darkest, they make the mistake of picking on Steve Stuart and his friends, ex-military veterans all. Unprepared for humans who can actually fight, unaware of the true capabilities of their stolen starships, the scavengers rapidly lose control of the ship - and their lives.
The Phage War had been a devastating conflict for the Terran Confederacy. Even with the destruction of their terrifying, implacable foe, humanity is still reeling. Political alliances are crumbling, and their mighty fleet is in tatters. There is nothing to celebrate, even after such a complete victory. They soon learn that there are other stellar neighbors - and they've been watching the conflict with great interest. One species comes with an offer of friendship and alliance, but humanity is weary and distrustful.
In the year 2420, war looms between the galaxy's two most powerful empires: the tyrannical Theocracy and the protectionist Commonwealth. Caught in the middle sits the occupied outpost system Cadiz, where young officer and aristocrat Katherine "Kat" Falcone finds herself prematurely promoted at the behest of her powerful father. Against her own wishes, Kat is sent to command the Commonwealth navy's newest warship, Lightning.
Determined to prove she has value beyond her family name, Kat struggles to earn her crew's respect and find her footing as the youngest captain in naval history. She soon discovers the situation on Cadiz is even worse than anyone in power anticipated. War isn't just a possibility - it is imminent. Yet the admiral in position to bolster defenses refuses to prepare for a fight. Can Kat find a way to investigate the enemy, alert the Commonwealth, and whip an entire fleet into fighting shape before the Theocracy's war machine destroys everything she holds dear?
Good story. Couple of very annoying pronunciations (admiralty, Gibraltar and Cadiz) took away from an otherwise good performance.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
It still was a good listen. I felt the narration was sub par. it took some getting used to,
12 of 13 people found this review helpful
This is the first in a very promising series. Nuttall is a fine writer. Here the conflict is between a "normal" government and one of religious fanaticals. The religion looks like some we know, but is never specifically paralleled. And then there is a traitor among the good guys. There are terrific battles, and some minor philosophical discussion about whether one conqueror should be any better than another. I enjoyed the story and the promise of more to come.
However, here are my gripes. Katherine--Kat-- is promoted to the captaincy of the Lightning. She is too young and too inexperienced, but her aristocratic father managed it. This causes some tension between her and the much older second in command, the XO. He is not happy to have been overlooked for this position. However, this tension simply fizzles away as Capt. Kat proves to be capable. It seemed all too smooth and easy. But that is acceptable, we can shrug it off. The story is well developed, and engaging.
But then there is the narration. (Ark Royal's narrator drove me to quit the series.) I hate to diss people at their work, but this lady needs a new career. Her normal voice is light and breathy, probably suited for fairy tales, but then she couldn't do an ogre. Her hyper-correct pronunciation of the plosives (p,t,k especially) causes extra syllables such as "lookt uh down" that were distracting at best, and actually confusing at times. Her male voices are terrible, just scratchy low, and then they are inconsistent-- people's voices changed. The females sounded kittenish. The best voice was the enemy cleric, a simpering, snide snake of a person. I quite enjoyed him.
Other than that, editors should have caught things like:
A. non sequiturs:
1. "I'd bet that isn't a coincidence."
"Me neither."
2. Her father should have understood. Or perhaps he didn't.
B. grammar
1. Another explosion rung out.
C. wrong words
1. they should hide in uncharted asteroid habits.
D. pointing to the title
1. "the oncoming storm" is said at least 3 times in the book. Once would have been questionably acceptable. The contexts in which it was said are unnatural; this is not a typical phrase for military persons to be tossing around so liberally.
Nevertheless, this is a good story, with sequels to look forward to. It just needed a final editing.
23 of 26 people found this review helpful
Would you consider the audio edition of The Oncoming Storm to be better than the print version?
I don't have time to read the story, but it has got to be better than many of the vocalizations by the narrator.
What was one of the most memorable moments of The Oncoming Storm?
When the Captain goes with the XO to buy critical information from the XO's shady brother, he sees that the Captain, although part of the ruling family, is a capable officer who is not afraid to "get her hands dirty".
How could the performance have been better?
Bring in a male for the male voices. Narrator sounds like she uses various amounts of nose pinching for many male voices. Female voices for other than the Captain can get pretty squeaky. My poor ears.
Any additional comments?
Please replace the narrator or at lease get a male to help with moices.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful
What would have made The Oncoming Storm better?
A disappointment, as a fan of his space novels, as this time Nuttall attempts half-heartedly to blend different dimensions that don't fit well together into one novel. An intriguing premise if not for the absolute flawed execution, and that's where the story line takes a fall. You follow a female protege, ashamed of her parents wealth and ambitious political power, as a space captain (plausible) at the age of 26 (okay..), with neural enhancements (bio-engineering added to the theme only confuses the story), and autonomous from the Theocracy or Non-Theocracy aligned Independents (which picking a side will inevitably become an issue, not too much plot twist here yet). All of those elements by themselves can be used to create a fascinating story, but Nuttall falls shy of fascinating with all of the confusing plot lines going in different directions and yet somehow merging. It's really a confusing read, and having tried the audio books in hopes of a more refined understanding, the narrator (L. Ezzo) makes it worse with her single-tone by-play of seemingly important events, personality and emotional qualities of characters that should have some variance in pitch or vocal tone. It was very disappointing, as I'd hoped for not even a stellar story but more of a decent read (which became a read of descent as it seemed, at some point, to be an effort in madness trying to follow the plot).
Would you ever listen to anything by Christopher G. Nuttall again?
I certainly will, I like his stories (not too canned space hero or over-techy reaching except this novel) and will try the next in the series as it develops.
Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Lauren Ezzo?
Just about anyone. I'm not picky about narrators, but she didn't seem to have a good grasp on emotional cues for characters or events. There seemed to be no real urgency, just the obvious amateur antics of a narrator trying to sound like a man by deepening her tone (which is somewhat insulting to hear) or the constant single pitch of a character set (whether under fire, in negotiations, sad, depressed, happy...it all sounded the same).
You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?
Not many. I tend to follow authors for their stories, and the right narrator can go a long way as well, but mainly this book lacked a single point of focus. I know good authors who are very capable of managing multiple main characters or various background plots (like Sanderson or Jack Campbell) but these are not Nuttall's strong suit. And in this novel, there's just too much noise to follow the idea of where you are going, heading, or if there is a real point.
Any additional comments?
Recommend the Arc Royal series by Nuttall, good narrator and simple yet certainly enjoyable series. Very little to disappoint there.
6 of 7 people found this review helpful
Good story but the voice acting of secondary characters is poor. Great start to what should be an interesting series.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful
First: Lauren Ezzo did a fantastic job. Her delivery strong and I felt she added to the overall experience. She has a tendency to pronounce everything exactly which I got used to very quickly.
Nuttall delivers with his novels, which is what originally drew me into his stories with Ark Royal. We've got a far future corporate aristocracy vs. a "theocracy" or religious oligarchy at a high state of tension and ideological conflict.
I liked the main character. She's intelligent, brave, dutiful, and humble. Nuttall didn't fall into the same trap as some other novels where he made here a tactical or strategic genius as well. She's resourceful and interesting to follow.
This is solid and entertaining military sci fi and I think it's worth a read. :)
5 of 6 people found this review helpful
Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Lauren Ezzo?
I would have cast almost anyone else!
Any additional comments?
I have a very hard time reconciling the fact that this was written by the same author that wrote the Empire Corps series. The story is riddled with mind jarring errors and less than mature story and character development. I could believe this being an early work before the author had hit his stride but the publication date belies that idea.There is little that I can add to earlier comments about the poor choice in narrator.Her voices and choices of tone and word emphasis completely changed the tone and focus of the scenes.I am disappointed. Perhaps the Empire Corps series spoiled me...
4 of 5 people found this review helpful
This was a poor rip off of the Honor Harrington series by David Weber.
4 of 5 people found this review helpful
My enjoyment of The Oncoming Storm was hampered by two issues: an incredibly miscast Audio book narrator and a plot that somehow managed to not bring anything new to the genre of military sci fi. As such, the story is serviceable and packs enough adventure to keep readers/listeners invested. But at the same time, this is a somewhat unsatisfying snack, leaving one hungry for more substantial fare at the end.
Story: Cat Falcone enlists in the military fleet in order to make her own life independent of her noble and extremely powerful father. But that same father will pull strings, get her a premature ascendancy to captain, and a mission to investigate problems at the Cadiz world outpost. With a former lover leading her marines, a highly experienced but overlooked non-noble executive officer under her, and a fanatical religious government set to declare war, she will get far more than she bargained for at Cadiz.
The premise is fairly simple and rather topical - aristocratic government versus religious fanatics in space. Nuttal smartly steers clear of making the zealots related to any particular current religion - they are an amalgamation of several monotheistic fundamentalists including tight control over citizens, lack of women's rights, and the usual 'God is on our side' rhetoric. Subthemes on the power of the aristrocracy over those born outside of nobility (think ancient Rome and citizenship) as well as military ineptitude and corporate greed are also covered. Perhaps because all the topics are timely that this book feels almost dated - contemporary religious fundamentalist struggles but with a heroine reminiscent of Honor Harrington or Kris Longknife (especially). I can't help but feel Jack Campbell did it all a bit better - and tighter.
That aside, the story flows smoothly enough though hampered a bit by characters making the same obvious conclusions over and over again. In that regard, I wish the editor had been a bit tighter and sharpened the focus more. Some observations were made so many times, I would have started counting them for a future drinking game if reading on Kindle (e.g., "take a drink every time the XO notes that Kat makes a non-self serving command that impresses him she's not like the other captains). The book feels overly long in that regard.
The Audible narration was truly bad and I had a hard time getting into the book because of the bland, staccato, over enunciated, narration. The narrator seems much better suited to a YA book like Twilight than military science fiction, to be honest. At one point, it was difficult to continue because I'd cringe every time I had to start Audible and listen to the dull reading.
6 of 8 people found this review helpful
Good story that is clearly Nuttall's work. The character-focused military story is well-executed, and I am looking forward to the next volume. The only flaw in the performance is a few pronunciation errors (e.g. "Corpsman" as "corpse man" instead of the proper "core man", and spelling HUD instead of just saying "hud" as a word as it is properly said). If I had no military background, I might not notice the errors, but they do grate after a bit.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
While it does read a bit like 'Harrington Light', and there are a number of clear similarities,it stand up very well to comparison with Nuttall's other series,
Sadly, what lets it down, is the narration. Lauren Ezzo isn't a bad narrator, just totally wrong for this book. Her voice is far too light to cope with all the male voices (they range from growly to squeaky) and the delivery is very wooden. I can see that she is supposed to represent a very young woman, but she needs much more gravitas, not to mention an ability to convey different emotions. Someone such as Elizabeth Flett or Allyson Johnson, both of whom have narrated space opera very successfully, would have made a much better choice of narrator.
I am looking forward to book 2, but I hope for better narration.
2 of 3 people found this review helpful
The comparison to "On Basilisk Station" is unavoidable but that's not a bad thing. The premise of expansionist star nation, an inexperienced first time star captain with a XO who has been passed over for promotion, is a good one. With this starting block the author crafts his own solid story, even poking fun at the similarities between Kat and Honor. The depth of world building isn't on the level of Weber but who's is?(and at times who wants to) Nuttell has made a fun enjoyable world and clearly made the effort to having a interesting main character and not have her as overly perfect as Harrington can come across as. Overall It's not at the level of "Basilisk Station" but it's a good attempt well worth a read/listen.
2 of 3 people found this review helpful
This is a kind of amalgamation of Star Trek: Deep Space 9 and put current affairs world situation. It makes for a low key, interesting read. Not over the top or too political and equally not too battle technical. I was hesitant about reading it to begin with, I’m venturing into it because it's within my Kindle Unlimited subscription. But now that I've completed it, I’m intrigued to see how the story develops.
As I say, it's all very low key. No detailed character background, no real knowledge of the religious struggle or the political structure, so it may not appeal to many, but for me, it was a non taxing, light read.
Would you consider the audio edition of The Oncoming Storm to be better than the print version?
I like both, but the audio edition allows me to enjoy while I do more.
What did you like best about this story?
I like a good space opera, and this makes a good start.
What three words best describe Lauren Ezzo’s voice?
Pleasant, calm and clear. But please just narrate the story, some character voices sound like malfunctioning robots.
Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?
No really, the characters haven't grown on me that much. Some of Christopher's other books are better.
Any additional comments?
I will be listening to book 2 soon.
What made the experience of listening to The Oncoming Storm the most enjoyable?
I found from the start of the book it would be a great tale, it did not disappoint. Already looking forward to the next instalment
The book reads like amateur fan fiction, written a committee of fans of the Kris Longknife or Honor Harrington series. If you are a fan yourself then you may like the book as you will probably enjoy the Easter eggs, such as recycled names from the other books, provided you can shake the feeling of Deja Vu. I personally did not enjoy the book as the plot was slow and predictable and I had to force myself to listen to the end.
The Narration was OK and and neither enhanced nor detracted from my enjoyment of the book and would not discourage me from listening to other books read by Lauren Ezzo.
1 of 2 people found this review helpful