Thrilling, and Captivating End!!

Ara Lawrence (a.k.a. Lyra – who had to die to become Ara in book 2), has come to the startling discovery that the Q-Net, the thing that everyone uses on a daily basis to engage with just about everything, from the simple – such as an alarm clock, to the more complex – such as Math that would confound Stephen Hawking, is not the rather intricate, multifaceted, and rather interesting version of what we would consider the ‘Internet’ (just on a far greater and Galactic scale), it is in fact a Sentient Alien Construct.
Even more interesting to Ara, is that it seems to be helping her with problems, without her even having to ask, and, she doesn’t even have to connect via her entanglers anymore (little connectors you plug into your ears that connect to circuitry that has been added to your brain when you are younger so you can connect to the Q-Net).
Of course, all of this comes on the back of someone trying to kill her several times, who happened to once be her friend, and is now part of a vicious band of criminals, known as ‘The Looters’, who are breaking into the pits of the dig sites of numerous planets, and stealing things, and then smashing up the priceless Terracotta Warriors that are found there.
The same Terracotta Warriors that were once found on Earth, buried in China, same warriors, same clay, same design. Within these warriors is a black heart, (“The Heart of a Warrior”), that if you touch it, it is absorbed into you, and it not only gives you access to certain things, but, you can also then see these horrible Shadow creatures that kill humans.
Ara and her team have worked out that the Warriors are actually there to protect people from these ‘Shadowblobs’, but they are not really sure why yet.
Nor are they really sure why the Looters are attacking Colonies, or how they are getting around, without the time dilation issues that normally occur when travelling between planets.
There are just so many fascinating aspects to this book and this series, Snyder has created this amazing story, with an incredible multifaceted storyline, with Ara at the centre, because she first touched one of the ‘Warrior Hearts’ by accident, which allowed her to see the ‘Shadowblobs’, and from this, it has led her to several other different things in the story, finally to the point in which the ‘Q-Net’, or “Q” as she calls it, has chosen her to be its conduit, and she can now communicate with the Q-Net directly.
There is the overarching story of the Looters, what do they want? Why are they attacking the Colonies? How are they doing it without loosing time like everyone else does when they travel between planets? (as per Einstein’s theories of relativity).
But at the same time, this is the story of Ara, her transformation from the now dead Lyra, to her new personality of Ara, as she has to fight the Looters (Led by Jarren, her former friend, but they travelled to different colonies, so she aged 90days, but he has aged over 20yrs, and gone down a dark path, their other friends having either died or gone elsewhere) and the Shadowblobs, as well as the continuous disbelief of those around her. Her only allies seem to be her King Toad (Niall), and her partner in Security, Beau.
Ara’s journey in this story is absolutely fascinating, and utterly compelling, you find yourself just glued to the book, and unable to put it down, riveted as you have to find out what happens to not just her, Niall and Beau, but her Parents, Radcliff, and the entire Security team, not to mention all of Yulin, and multiple other colonies that come under threat.
It is just amazing how this story has evolved from this young girl putting together Terracotta Warriors, to these Warriors being a link to an alien race, Shadowblobs, and a sentient Alien Construct that speaks with her.
The Shadowblobs, or ‘Hostile Life Forms’ (HoLFs for short), are another unique concept within this story that are not only terrifying, but enthralling as well, their existence, how to defeat them, where do they come from, and what do they want?
The story has elements of being a ‘Hard Sci-fi’ story with regards to the time dilation and Einstein’s theories, which are used quite well to look at the differences in how people age differently and the affects it will have on them (especially their children) as they move around space. There is a real discussion to be had for banning parents from being allowed to travel once they have had children from a psychological level, in that you are not just uprooting them and moving them, and they can still talk to their friends over facebook/Instagram or whatever communication tool there is, they will be dead. This has to have a massive psychological impact when you move them multiple times. The fact the older kids were holding fake funerals for each other was really disturbing.
Apart from the Science aspects of the story, there is some rather fierce combat scenes, both with HoLFs and with Looters, and these are done remarkably well. There is some really interesting technology employed in these scenes (no spoilers), and again, the Author has made the effort to do some research to make these parts really compelling to read, not just because you want to know who makes it, but because the actual combat itself is utterly fascinating to read about.
The relationships in this story are rather interesting as well. Niall’s and Ara’s relationship develops at a rather glacial pace, but to be fair, there is a lot going on, and they have very little time. Ara’s relationship with her Parents is somewhat difficult to comprehend, as they are at times ridiculously heavy handed in how they smother her and try to keep her from being involved in anything, at the risk of endangering others, and the goals of Security and the overall Mission. But at other times, they seem almost blasé about her welfare, letting her do things that are incredibly dangerous. There is no consistency. And as with a lot of writing, the Mum is incredibly overbearing, controlling, and completely disregards the Fathers point of view – whilst the Dad just stands in the background watching it all happen, and then tries to be the ‘Voice of Reason’ later – as usual, bribing her with chocolate. It is not a great stereotype that is getting perpetuated (I am not suggesting it is this Author perpetuating this stereotype – just that it is out there)
One thing I did like, was that to a large degree, the Author closed off a large degree of her plotlines. There were a significant amount of storylines in this story, which made it a really captivating, thrilling story to read, but a lot of the time when you read a book like this, the Author leaves so many plotlines open, and you wonder what happened with this character, or that particular thing, but not in this case, Snyder has done a really wonderful job of cleverly wrapping up all of the storylines, so that this has a really nice ending. It leaves you feeling satisfied, and happy, as a good book and series should, like it all got covered, but there is the possibility that the Author could give us another series if they want!!
Once again, Alice Barrington provides a very clear and concise Narration of this story, and she has a really nice voice to listen to.
She does a fantastic version of the main character, in that she has a voice that sounds like a young woman, and she also has that teenage sarcasm to her voice when delivering Ara’s comments so well. She is able to create Male voices easily though, and does a great job of narrating all of the Male characters, so clearly and distinctly, that you can tell each of the characters apart, without having to be told who is talking, and that applies to not just the Male voices but the Female to. Barrington also did an exceptional job of capturing the emotional state of the characters, giving us a very clear understanding of how each of the characters was feeling at any given time whilst narrating, whether Sad, Angry, Happy, Scared, Excited, and a variety of other emotions such as those you would experience during exercise, Elation, Fatigue (You can seriously hear the exhaustion in Ara’s voice a few times), and I swear you can hear the Boredom in Ara’s voice as well (you will know when….)
Barrington does a Masterful job at Narrating, and this was a pleasure to listen to, I would much prefer to listen to than read!

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