The First Imperium

Crimson Worlds, Book 4

By: Jay Allan

Narrated by: Jeff Bower

The Alliance and its colonies have called a truce and signed the Confederation Agreement, providing the frontier worlds with guarantees of self-government. No one expects the deal to last, and both sides are preparing for the next showdown.

But from the depths of space another challenge is coming, one that will endanger the very survival of mankind and force not just the Alliance and its colonies, but all of the Superpowers, to join forces or face annihilation.

The dusty ruins the Alliance discovered on Epsilon Eridani IV were built by an ancient race, eons dead. But their guardians remain, and the disturbance of the long silent caves triggered an automated alert, one which has been heard.

Erik Cain and his Marines grimly take to the field once again, for what may be their final battle, against the robotic legions of the First Imperium.

But facing a ruthless and technologically superior enemy may be easier than learning to fight alongside old enemies.

This is Book 4 of the Crimson World Series

©2013 Jay Allan Books (P)2013 Jay Allan Books

Everyone that likes science fiction should read his books

Great everything that jay Allan writes is great science fiction I have read or heard or both sometimes thank you for writing and audible the narrator did a great job also

Good story. Performance? Not so much

Story line and character development shows the care taken by the author to build
A solid product.
Narration: not
So much. The range of Character Voices used by the narrator are poor At best. All the characters voices are poor variations oil ladies.
Most of rest if the narration is questionable.

Great Story Butchered By Narrator

Would you try another book from Jay Allan and/or Jeff Bower?

Jay Allen - Yes. Jeff Bower - No, or at least not until he realizes that narrating a book like First Imperium requires a modicum of professionalism and tact. After a few chapters I honestly started to think, "this guy can't be serious..... he is making these characters into a c rated parody of serious people doing serious things in a serious environment."

Who was your favorite character and why?

The guy who jammed those explosives down the freshly torn open chest cavity of that bastard who tried to sabotage one of the fleet's cruisers. I could almost feel the gooey, still warm visceral organs thwacking against my face after the timing mechanism went ding. That guy deserved some sort of leave package or at least one of those shiny things to expand his uniform's salad bar.

Would you be willing to try another one of Jeff Bower’s performances?

No. Refer to answer to question 1. Why does every person in this book at or below the rank of lieutenant sound like a 54 pound 11 year old kid who is still waiting for his sack to drop? At some point the narrator had to realize that this story is somewhat serious in nature. You know, that struggle to save whole planet populations thing and intense firefights with entire squads and even platoons being torn apart by direct hits from pulse cannons? After the fourth book I just don't know if the narrator really cares that almost every character's voice doesn't match what, in my humble opinion, it should be. Where is this production's producer? If there is one, why on earth hasn't he / she sat the guy down and told him to knock off the nitrous oxide bit and get serious?I don't know...maybe it's me and I am taking it all wrong. All I can say is that when I fork out my dough for an audiobook, I expect at least a modicum of narrator attention to how real people talk in various situations. Sadly, I just did not get it here. The book is a damn good piece of military science fiction with tons of action and all the things I like in a book from this genre. I could pick basically any narrator from the 800 or so books I have purchased from Audible and have them narrate this book. Not one of them would come even close to the falsetto or crappy jive smack voices Bower perpetrated on my ears. 3/4's of the way through, after I started to get pissed off for the various characters who, if they were actually real and heard how they sounded in this guy's narration, would probably drop whatever they were doing, hunt him down and snap his neck like a balsa wood chopstick, I gave up on the whole effort and pressed delete.

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

Yes. As long as Jeff Bower had nothing to do with any voices or narration. As the last movie I saw was March of the Penguins, I wouldn't exactly save a seat for me.

Any additional comments?

Jay Allen can write an intergalactic zorchfest of a novel with the best of them. I just wish the audio part of this audiobook was narrated by someone who actually cared about what he was doing. A well written book just got torpedoed by its narration, and that's a shame.

The Worst Narrator I've ever heard

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

The Narrator made it nearly impossible to listen to and I am a VERY patient person who does not easily let a bad narrator bother him.

What other book might you compare The First Imperium to and why?

Any well written Space Opera

Would you be willing to try another one of Jeff Bower’s performances?

No

Was The First Imperium worth the listening time?

You should read this book do not listen to it

Any additional comments?

The only way to describe the way this book was narrated was that it most resembled the way an adult would read a book aloud to a class room of 6 year olds. It was just horrible. To make it worse the narrator tried from time to time to act out the voices and that was just a tragedy.

While Jeff Bower may grow to be a good narrator he has a long long way to go. I cannot recommend this book based on the narration alone.