One Too by Sherrie Cronin (Spotlight, excerpt, review, and GIVEAWAY) GFT

One Too

by Sherrie Cronin

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

GENRE: Sci-fi/Fantasy

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

BLURB:

Telepathy creates as many problems as it solves, as most of the members of the secret organization x0 would admit. When new member Lola discovers another group of telepaths with a completely 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 with whom she is close has a special gift of their own. That’s good, because it’s going to take every power they possess to keep this other group from succeeding with their plan to eradicate x0.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

EXCERPT

  

As Alex stepped inside, he wondered why escape hadn’t occurred to him on the way to the courtyard. To be fair, he was accustomed to concern about causing harm to Zane or Xuha, or of messing up other plans. But now, as he looked at the door down the end of the long hall behind him, he realized that he was capable of making it down that hall and out that door before anyone could stop him. With the telepaths gone, there would be no point in their retaliating against the others after he fled. And there were no more plans of anyone else’s for him to mess up.

Then what? Hell, he had two telepaths who could find his thoughts and three traveling souls or whatever they were called who could see him, so somebody would surely help get him to safety, somehow, once he was out. Then, instead of being a problem, he could help rescue the others. That sounded positive. He was tired of doing nothing. And Ariel had said to run. She’d hadn’t said when, but this seemed as good a time as any.

He looked at the door one more time and saw Xuha doing the same. Of course. That was even better. They could make a run for it together. No time for discussion.

He nodded. Xuha nodded back. The steps of the two guards and three other prisoners began to slow as if the air were becoming an increasingly thick syrup, while Xuha and Alex sprinted down the hall toward the doors, with Alex in the lead.

Please be unlocked, Alex thought, as he slowed a little and raised his arm up for the impact. The door swung open wide, and he passed through it, scarcely missing another barely moving shape just outside of the door. He turned to see Xuha clip the side of Warren’s body as both Xuha and Warren sprawled to the pavement.

“Stop!” One guard yelled, picking up speed as he moved toward them. Alex heard Ariel’s words in his head.

Do not stop. Run.

He couldn’t leave Xuha like this. Surely they’d punish him somehow. It wasn’t right.

Do not stop. Run.

He had to trust Ariel. The guard was almost up to half-speed. Alex knew his window was closing.

Damn, Xuha, find a way out of this, he thought, as he willed his body back to movement and the rest of time back into a viscous liquid as he headed down the path, hoping to make it out of the compound before exhaustion overtook him.

 Amazon

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Sherrie grew up in Western Kansas thinking that 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 long ago, and then waited a lot of tables while she looked for inspiration for the next story. When it finally came,  it declared to her that it had to be 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 and  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 that she had found it at least mildly entertaining and ridiculously well-paying  The bad news was that 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 that 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 apparently had 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 sternly that it had now grown into a six book collection. Sherrie decided that she better start writing it before it got any longer. She's been wide awake ever since, and writing away.

Author Social Media Links

Twitter

Facebook

Goodreads

Amazon  author page

Blog


***************************


GIVEAWAY

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The tour dates can be found here



***************************



My review:

4.25 out of 5 stars

One Too by Sherrie Cronin follows the Zeitman family and their colleagues as they engage in a struggle that will have long-lasting repercussions on both telepaths and non-psychic individuals. The conflict is global in scope and will require not only using resources from all over the world but a great deal of soul-searching and courage and moral fortitude to do what is right rather than what is easy.

First, it will probably require perseverance to get through the introduction and initial chapters. There is a list of the main characters in the back to help one if the onslaught of names gets overwhelming. Second, there are a lot of perspectives and locations to deal with in this third person omniscient style of writing and one almost needs a diagram to figure out who is where and how each person is linked to the overall conflict. Since this is the end of a series, although it is possible to read this as a stand-alone tale it’s probably not the best way to meet all of these folks. Some of the science gets pretty esoteric (I should have been warned by the mathematical formulae including the inclusion of a variation of Euler’s formula, and the unique titles for each of the previous books, lol) and I was afraid that I was going to have to cope with dull philosophical treatises, but the action and the creativity started to pull me in.

Despite some of these drawbacks I still enjoyed the story immensely, once I started figuring out who was on which side and learned some of the backstory. Some of the story felt like a heavy-handed syllogism, particularly with its parallels to current events, but the individuality of the characters and their abilities and the chess match of moves and countermoves was fun to follow, particularly as I am fascinated by the concept of psychic powers. I like that the story is both an exciting adventure story but also a wake-up call as it explores the dangers of a monopoly as well as the conflict between those who would exploit a power and those who see it as a resource to be used for the greater good of all humanity.

It would have been nice to have a deeper connection with some of the characters, but perhaps each of them had their time in the spotlight in previous books and fans of the series are already well-acquainted with them. I think this is a tale that can be enjoyed on several levels and it also provides an enjoyable way to armchair travel, and I choose to not make my head hurt by analyzing physics, philosophy, and trigonometric formulas but instead to savor the adventures of a very unique group of folks. The varied endings were overkill for me, but I definitely agree that “It is always better to fail in doing something than to excel in doing nothing.”

 A copy of this title was provided to me for review