One of Two Review Tour

Blurb:

Telepathy creates as many problems as it solves, as everyone in the secret organization x0 would admit. When new member Lola discovers another group of telepaths with a totally different approach, those problems multiply at the speed of thought.

Soon, Lola’s family and friends are in danger. Lucky for her, she’s not your average budding psychic. Each person she is close to has a special gift of their own. That’s good, because it’s going to take every power they possess to stop these others from tearing apart x0.

Excerpt:

Maurice woke up in the trunk of a car. He’d always been a positive sort of guy, so he made himself focus on what was good about the situation. Well, it was a large trunk. It was probably a luxury car. Could have been worse. And, he was the only person in it. Plenty of space and no unpleasant dead bodies lying next to him. He’d seen this sort of thing in movies, and no dead bodies was always good.

His hands were bound loosely behind his back, but he could wiggle his legs around for comfort and there was no duct tape over his mouth, so breathing was easier. Better yet, it felt like he’d been drugged, presumably in his sleep. The lingering effects were effusing him with such a nice sense of serenity.

On the down side, the wall that x0 was holding around him was as impermeable as ever. And he was in the trunk of a car. That was definitely a minus. He drifted back to sleep.

My Review:

4 stars

First, some backstory. This is my second time reviewing this book. Back when I  first reviewed this book, I hadn’t read the other books in the series, and the series hadn’t undergone its facelift/rebranding. I’ve now read and reviewed books 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 and so I decided to revisit my original review to see how my opinions have changed, specifically in regards to my biggest complaint when I first read this book.

My biggest complaint originally was the pacing being off due to info dumps of information, science mumbo jumbo, and different side tangents/timelines, which led to details being told rather than shown. Having now read the entire series, while I think the pacing was still a bit off at times, it made much more sense to me.

I better tracked the side tangents, having gotten used to the author’s writing style in previous books, and I enjoyed the scientific discussion and theory (regarding the science behind the characters’ abilities, multiverses, and thermodynamics) since it made much more sense to me this time around. In addition, some of the info dumps served as recaps from earlier books, so while the info was “told” rather than “shown,” I didn’t mind because I could remember when the information had been shown in previous books in more detail.

However, I feel like the pacing issues here also showed the downside to writing these books as interrelated stand-alone novels. While this worked for the earlier books, it didn’t work well here. As someone who’d read the earlier books, I appreciated the info dumps and in-depth science aspects, but still felt like some of these info dumps were redundant or unnecessary and hurt the story. This is a complex world the author created, and with the characters all coming together in this book, it just didn’t quite click.

It reminded me of the Harry Potter books. Technically, books 1-5 can work as interrelated stand-alones. But if you decided to start the series on book 7, you would miss out on a lot of the necessary background info and get lost in the story, because so many events that play out in book 7 had the seeds planted in earlier books (which is why that series is marketed as a series that should be read in order).

All in all, I enjoyed One of Two a heck of a lot more this time around. I greatly enjoyed this series, and recommend it to anyone looking for an exciting new adventure. And even though this is marketed as a series of interrelated novels and while I don’t think the reading order of the first five books matters as much, I highly, highly recommend reading the other 5 books before One of Two. There are so many intricacies and knowledge sewn throughout the first 5 books that made One of Two so much more enjoyable and satisfying as a series ending.

*I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.*

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Author Bio and Links:

Sherrie Roth grew up in Western Kansas thinking there was no place in the universe more fascinating than outer space. After her mother vetoed astronaut as a career ambition, she went on to study journalism and physics in hopes of becoming a science writer.

She published her first science fiction short story and then waited a lot of tables while she looked for inspiration for the next tale. When it finally came, it declared to her it had to be a whole book, nothing less. One night, while digesting this disturbing piece of news, she drank way too many shots of ouzo with her boyfriend. She woke up thirty-one years later demanding to know what was going on.

The boyfriend, who she had apparently long since married, asked her to calm down. He explained that, in a fit of practicality, she had gone back to school and gotten a degree in geophysics and had spent the last 28 years interpreting seismic data in the oil industry. The good news, according to Mr. Cronin, was she found it at least mildly entertaining and ridiculously well-paying. The bad news was the two of them had still managed to spend almost all of the money.

Apparently she was now Mrs. Cronin, and the further good news was they had produced three wonderful children whom they loved dearly, even though to be honest that is where a lot of the money had gone. Even better news was that Mr. Cronin turned out to be a warm-hearted, encouraging sort who was happy to see her awake and ready to write. "It's about time," were his exact words.

Sherrie Cronin discovered that over the ensuing decades Sally Ride had already managed to become the first woman in space and done a fine job of it. No one, however, had written the book that had been in Sherrie's head for decades. The only problem was the book informed her it had grown into a six book collection. Sherrie decided she better start writing before it got any longer. She's been wide awake ever since, and writing away.

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Blogs:

46 Ascending

Face Painting for World Peace

Fire Dancing for Fun and Profit

Treasure Hunting for a Good Time

Leaving the Nest to Touch the Sky 

Touching the Sky to Save the World

Email me at lola.zeitman@gmail.com