Psion Alpha (Psion series #4)

I just committed 14 days to 2420 pages of the five-book Psion Series.The series has 2564 five-star reviews on Goodreads, and about as many four-star reviews.  There are hardly any one or two starred reviews.Everyone who read these books loved them.  So, obviously, I loved them too.Obviously. Right?Sigh.It's complicated.Here's what I liked.I wonder when I'll get bored of stories about kids with unique talents being discovered and shipped off to special kid school so they can learn to use their talent to save the world?  Never, I suspect.What about stories about underdogs overthrowing oppressive governments?  Doesn’t get old.How about stories about unlikely heroes?  Troubled, imperfect good guys who have to overcome their personal demons before they can save the ones they love?  Sacrificing yourself for your friends? Young love?  Please—give me more! More, more, more!The Psion Series has it all.  No offensive language or sex either.I like it.Here's what's complicated:First, the writing is unpolished. I’m trying to be polite—I have tremendous respect for anyone that writes, so I hate calling out the writing. But I do call it as I see it.  The writing improves as the series goes on, but those first three books were really hard to get through. Even by the end though, it reads more like a middle-grade book than anything.  Which actually isn’t really that much of an issue……except for the other complication.The Psion series sees an Ender and raises a Rambo. These kids die violently. And kill violently. Really, really violently.For all of the chaste love and elementary-school expletives, there is an exponential elevation of violence.  I’m talking blood and guts, full descriptions, gore, smells, feels, emotions, no holding back. It’s the weirdest thing.  It’s a middle-grade story with grown-up violence.What do I do with that?I WANT to recommend The Psion Series—the story is a lot of fun and I cared about the characters.I can’t recommend it to my kids because of the strong, bloody, and frequent violence—even though the writing, language, and relationships are perfectly on their level.I can’t recommend it to my adult friends because the juvenile writing is lame. To be clear, I’m not talking about lack of swearing or sex as juvenile.  I’m talking about the actual writing.  It was just plain hard to read.You see?It’s complicated.So, I’ll just do my job. I liked The Psion Series, but I didn’t like the writing.  I liked the clean language and chaste love, but didn’t like the violence.If you can look past the complicated and appreciate the good, I think you’ll find a series worth investing in.  If you’re going to get hung up on complicated, you’d better not waste your time.Happy reading!

Wow, Jacob Gowans never ceases to amaze me! Like the other books in this riveting series, I was very appealed by Psion Alpha. I enjoyed seeing Byron's past and watching it connect to Sammy's present, although at times there were such long stretches with one person's story that at times I forgot what was happening in the other person's story. There were some bits with the Queen as well, which were intriguing (but of course at times a bit grotesque because, hey, she's a psychopath).Obviously there was violence in here, but I personally didn't really notice anything that was too in-depth as to make me sick. Sammy and Jeffie are still super adorable, so you'll have that to look forward to, and there's also some character development for Brickert (and Kawai a little bit), especially around the end. Finally!The one part of this book I struggled to get through was a chunk in the middle, specifically Sammy's story. It seemed too nonchalant and monotonous, which might seem okay since it's basically Sammy and a team tromping through the jungle forever, but I wish that Gowans had brought some more emotion into it, because exempting a few times of great emotion (usually coming with a lot of danger and action), it was pretty dull.Overall, this book didn't catch me quite as much as the others, but I still loved it and struggled to put it down. I would definitely recommend it!

I have read the previous books in the series and have enjoyed the series so far and this book was another enjoyable read. Gowans employs an interesting literary device bouncing from recollections in a back story of Commander Byron as a youth in his Elite Academy days and the present timeline of the story (which itself, splits into a couple stories with separate missions). It doesn't get confusing and its easy enough to follow and keep track of. Gowans ties it up nicely and each story line relates and augments the story. Overall and superficially, the story may appear to only be minimally advanced, but there is a lot of detail and action to keep the reader engaged and I suspect that the larger payoff for the reader may be in the next book. If you are impatient, that may be a bit of a drawback with this book.Other potential aspects of this book some may consider drawbacks:[***SPOILER***...A character experiences a near death experience - the scene is a bit drawn out. It entails a white light sequence that some may find cliche religious, but I had no issue with it.]* As is the case with many books that incorporate futuristic technologies (especially genetic technologies), you may have to suspend thinking a little (emphasis on "a little"). If you think too much, the plausibility can get in the way of the story.* I did find a few errors in the book (3-4), but I have found just as many in books from publishers with big time editing staffs. The errors were small (transposed characters in a character's name, a minor character's name misspelled in one of two instances (both spellings are correct spellings, but one character differs, so it depends on what the character's name actually was) and a missing word in the Afterword.Overall, none of the above were any showstoppers that merited any significant markdown. I omitted one star, but I won't fault anyone that gave it five, keeping in mind quotes from Teddy Roosevelt and Antoine Ego (Ratatouille) about critics.

A really interesting and well written series of books.

I've enjoyed the development of this series immensely. The character development is fascinating and adds great depth. I'm looking forward to the final book and birth of the parallel series to come. I hope to see the new projects continue to grow and mature engaging your readers further.

Excellent quality. On time delivery