Colony Mars: The Complete Trilogy Audiobook By Gerald M. Kilby cover art

Colony Mars: The Complete Trilogy

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Colony Mars: The Complete Trilogy

By: Gerald M. Kilby
Narrated by: Nicol Zanzarella
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How can a colony on Mars survive when the greatest danger on the planet is humanity itself?

All contact is lost with the first privately funded colony on Mars during a long and destructive sandstorm. Satellite imagery of the aftermath shows extensive damage to the facility. The 54 colonists who called it home are presumed dead.

Sometime later, a new mission sets down on the planet surface to investigate what remains of the derelict site, and crew biologist Dr. Jann Malbec soon discovers that the facility had developed into to a full-blown human DNA editing experiment - with unsuspecting colonists as the guinea pigs.

However, now that the truth of what was going on in the colony is revealed, powerful Earth-based corporations begin to fight for control of this extraordinary genetic research. But Dr. Malbec begins to realize that returning this technology to Earth could doom humanity to a worldwide pandemic of apocalyptic proportions. She must do everything she can to prevent that from happening - even if it means that she might never see her home planet again.

©2017 Gerald M. Kilby (P)2019 Gerald M. Kilby Fiction Hard Science Fiction Science Fiction Solar System Mars
Intriguing Premise • Surprising Plot Twists • Distinct Character Voices • Entertaining Storyline • Fast-paced Action
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performer does not do a good job of differentiating the characters. all of the characters with accents sound alike.

so much fun!

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I was definitely entertained by this series and hope that the billionaire class driving much of space exploration ambition could benefit by this story.

As we think about going to Mars, I hope that the explorers can control their worst instincts.

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I feel like it was too fast paced, considering that there’s at least 6 books total it could’ve been spread out a bit more. Also the amount of times the author used to word “nevertheless” got a bit annoying. Probably just a me thing but it was almost like they couldn’t come up with another word. I agree with a lot of other people who reviewed the book, could’ve done well with a good editor.

It was ok, but i probably won’t read the other 3 books

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As a severe adhd person, I have a bad habit of unintentionally skipping over parts of books.
Not this one though. Although, my broken brain did force me to reread pages multiple times.
I loved the entire series! Start to finish! Devastated that it's over, but pleased with the ending.

Great series!

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Cool and realistic perspective on if Mars would become occupied. The narrator did a great job on accents and emotions!

Ohhhh Gizmo

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Nicol performed awesome , kept my attention throughout the book. Looking forward to the next book.

Intriguing

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I was expecting maybe something like The Martian, a storyline filled with explaining how to theoretically live on Mars, or a world much closer to the one in which we live. That was NOT the case. As soon as the scene is set you’re thrown into a whirlwind of surprises. I was pleasantly surprised by the creative events. I didn’t want to take breaks listening. Three books was a perfect ending to the entire storyline and closed out in a satisfying way. I recommend. Especially when you get all of that for 1 credit. If you’re interested and thinking maybe… do it.

Also, the three books were written in a way that when read back-to-back the story was still seamless. You weren’t stuck listening to a 30 min recap of what happened just so you can understand book 2 or 3 in the event you didn’t read the previous book.

Engrossing and Unexpected!

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I ordered this trilogy with great anticipation and have ended up being so disappointed that I have stopped listening partway into book two. Character development is flimsy and full of clichés, and while the storyline was initially quite interesting, it devolved from the fantastical into the absurd. I fully support the notion of suspension of disbelief, but I wasn’t able to employ it here. Morphing a tank full of biological goop into a fully formed adult human? Yes, I am aware that humans have developed the ability to clone beings, including mammals, but the technology to do so the way it’s portrayed in this story is so ridiculous that it would take centuries to develop from where we are now. Even if we do accept the existence of such capability in the story, the rest of the technology in the book would be so antiquated that it’s nonsensical to put them in the same timeline.

The narrator did create characters voices dissimilar enough that it was fairly easy to interpret who was who, although the “bad” characters in this story all seemed to have been given a predictable eastern European accent, aside from the monotone hybrid human clones. The main antagonist, Dr. “Vongi” (sp?) fulfilled every stereotype that one might find in a poorly conceived James Bond villain, so much so that I imagined the character to be akin to Mike Myers’ portrayal of Dr. Evil in the Austin Powers movies.

It bothers me that our protagonist and hero, Dr. Jann Malbec, was initially portrayed as approaching incompetent at the beginning of the story. This is despite the fact that this character has a PhD and has been through extensive training to be an interplanetary traveler, even if she is a backup crew member. There are myriad examples where this story takes predictable turns and presents ridiculously implausible scenarios, but it would take a much longer essay to share them all. Unfortunately, what began as a very intriguing storyline became a bit of a mess, as did the writing in general, which deteriorated in quality over the course of the trilogy. My sense is that the author himself became bored with the story and just mailed it in to meet a publisher deadline. If you are looking for literary work that compels the reader such as the works of Arthur C Clark or Isaac Asimov, I submit that you’ll be sorely disappointed, just as I am of myself for wasting a credit on this.

At least the narration was passable

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Some of the foreign accents blurred, but it was otherwise very relaxing to listen to. The drama and emotion projected well.

Relaxing Listen.

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Went through the first three books in about a week - loved the narrator. Plot was good and flowed very well.

Great narrator, fun plot

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