Disclaimer: Review originally posted at www.audiobookreviewer.com
Zagarat works as a technician in a big corporation called DEUS Syndicate. His mother is terribly ill and the only medical treatment that can give them hope is very expensive. Zagarat is always neurotic, and usually cautious, but desperate about his mother’s health he decides to “borrow” the money from the DEUS Syndicate. The next day a big executive calls Zagarat to his office, and he fears the worst, but this will just be the beginning of Zagarat’s adventures and his transformation into a new person.
This humoristic science fiction novel deserves a place beside ‘A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’ and ‘Gateway’ by Frederik Pohl. It made me laugh hard several times and I really enjoyed Zagarat and Fletcher’s personalities. This book is aimed at the techy nerd many of us carry inside, and we could very well have reacted in the same way as Zagarat did, who suffered the collateral effects of Fletcher’s wild plans. We have here a characteristic duo: Fletcher, the charming and full of confidence, but with poor ideas, privateer; and Zagarat, socially awkward, and much more resourceful than he wants to believe. Apart from being a humoristic novel, this book has a decent amount of geeky mentions, but it is not really overloaded with them so I think it could be enjoyed by a vast public.
Even though the characters are not fully developed they have a personality of their own and Nicholas Tecosky really succeeds in bringing them to life. Anytime he exclaimed the ‘What now!’ from Zagarat I couldn’t help but laughing and seeing Zagarat desperate about the current events. He became Zagarat, Fletcher, and the other characters in a seeming effortless way. This audiobook would not have been the same without him.
But not all was perfect about this book. The event happening at the beginning, where Zagarat steals the money from DEUS has little impact on the story, and I somehow expected some consequences from it. Also, the book feels a bit long to be able to keep the humoristic tone, and after a while it is easy to get a bit tired of the cutaway stories.
This is meant to be a series, and I am sure we will know more about Fletcher’s procedence and his story with Aurore. I am really looking forward to listen more about it, and I hope Edward Zajac does not keep us waiting for too long.
My name is Elena. Since I was a little child I loved science fiction and fantasy, and I can’t resist a good novel. In 2015, while wait I started to listen to audiobooks and I discovered the pleasure in being able to read while doing my daily tasks, so there’s always an audiobook playing on my phone. If you see me with my Bluetooth headphones on, please be gentle, I get easily startled.
I live with my boyfriend, which I met during my six-year stay in Belgium, four cockatiels, eight lovebirds, and a hamster in Madrid, Spain; and I like to spend my free time knitting and sewing while listening to audiobooks.
