RRS Roundup: Lizard Brains and Terminal Viscosity

This week on Read it! Review it! Share it! I’m highlighting a couple of Indie eBooks I’m pretty dang sure you haven’t read but that you should enjoy.

The Reality War Book1: The Slough of Despond

Some of you may recognize the “slough of despond” from the classic tale, “Pilgrim’s Progress.” The connection is just one way this time-travel, science fiction novel sets its self apart from the pack. I’m one of those sorts who loves history as well as science fiction. So Taylor’s use of Elstow Abbey as one of the time traveling stations scores points with me.

The main character, Radlan, has been stationed upstream of time (the 1970’s through 90’s) longer than anyone else in the history of the service created to protect the timeline. Possibly too long. Thus begins the tension in the story from page one.

A love interest from the past complicates his assignment to not only protect the timeline but also protect witnesses the future government places in the past for protection. Tension in the 1990’s, tension in the 2900’s. You get the idea. Well, before it’s all done time starts to go sideways and the result is a wild ride well worth reading.

Terse, tense and emotional, the Slough of Despond generates a cool balance between science, history and human relationship. Read it! Review it! Share it!

Terminal Departure: A Cleo Matts Novel

Terminal Departure is a conspiracy-thriller with a sense of humor. Reading it reminds me of Orson Scott Card’s Empire mixed with Men in Black. The lead character, Cleo Matts, works for a government agency so secret that secret agencies don’t know about it. Which is important since most of the planet has been duped by aliens.

The dialogue includes gems like this (between Matts and the starlet sitting beside him on a plane he’s trying to keep from blowing up):

“That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever hear.” She close her magazine and slid it into the pocket ahead of her. “Joking aside, what do you really do?”

“When I’m not mushing?”

“Yes,” she smiled, wearily. “When you’re not…mushing.”

“I’m a shepherd,” he said. “And, sometimes, I’m a topless waitress.”

She glanced lower. “You don’t have the chest for it.”

“I only moonlight as a topless waitress.”

“Lots of tips?”

“You’d be surprised,” he said.

It made me laugh. Humor is hard to come by, especially in any sort of book other than one that is only funny when it isn’t supposed to be. Now, I will provide one warning. The president of the United States is depicted as seeking solace in the shower via a little one-hand mambo. So if that goes too far off the cheeky end for you, consider yourself warned. Read it! Review it! Share it!