Monday, December 2, 2024

Linden A. Lewis - The First Sister / The Second Rebel / The Last Hero

Audiobook Review

Linden A. Lewis proves that you should be careful how you title your book. Searching for 'The First Sister' on Goodreads gives more than ten pages of results 😅

After that little aside we get back to the core question: how's the book?


The Verdict

Let's start there. All three books are good reads, and move along at a decent clip, and have sufficient twists onboard to keep you intrigued as a reader. Some of the them / they references threw me off-balance, but I find genderless pronouns in general very confusing.

But the story is great, the twists and turns stay interesting, and it's a more than decent read. Those that dislike first person present tense might skip it though. (I don't mind FPPT, but YMMV.)

So? Definitely a good read.


Woke

I understand that the author is trying to make a point, wants to support non-binary people, same gender relations and so forth, and that's fine. I don't mind. I had some worries after the first book (where the 'woke' push was too close to the surface, threatening to outdo the plot) but in the second and third book all these aspects became essential parts of the story, but did not become the story itself. A more cynical person (like me) might suggest that -- after completing book one -- the author realized that the overall story shouldn't suffer from a specific agenda, but that the two can empower one another.

I'm not totally sold on the Synthetics, nor how one part of humanity would be sufficiently 'less violent' to deserve the universe (yeah, a subset of humanity is genetically modified, but I found it hard to consider them more deserving). I did like the 'confine humanity' concept though. It helps to control the arena.


Synopsis

The solar system is split up between regular (but religious fanatic) humans, a more technological (but just as bad) club of clans on Venus, and modded humans on the asteroids. This whole kettle is left to stew in the inner parts of the solar system, as the Synthethics (superhuman machine minds, way past the singularity) have locked them out from the rest of the universe.

In this setting faithful slave (and prostitute) has suffered some brain damage from an illegal implant, and yet becomes one of the most powerful (religious) leaders. She (involuntarily) teams up with the malcontent son of the most powerful technological clan, and battles ensure. There's some love involved, some genetics, some super intelligent robots. And greed. Lots of greed. And something which I can only describe as 'egomania'.

I think that pretty much covers it.


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