Three Days in April

De: Edward Ashton

Narrado por: John Pirhalla, Barrie Kreinik, Katharine Chin, Daniel Henning

The debut standalone novel from author Edward Ashton, author of Mickey7, THREE DAYS IN APRIL is a near-future speculative thriller that marks the entry of a bright new voice into the genre.

Anders Jensen is having a bad month. His roommate is a data thief, his girlfriend picks fights in bars, and his best friend is a cyborg…and a lousy tipper. When everything is spiraling out of control, though, maybe those are exactly the kind of friends you need.

In a world divided between the genetically engineered elite and the unmodified masses, Anders is an anomaly: engineered, but still broke and living next to a crack house. All he wants is to land a tenure-track faculty position, and maybe meet someone who’s not technically a criminal-but when a nightmare plague rips through Hagerstown, Anders finds himself dodging kinetic energy weapons and government assassins as Baltimore slips into chaos. His friends aren’t as helpless as they seem, though, and his girlfriend’s street-magician brother-in-law might be a pretentious hipster - or might hold the secret to saving them all.

Frenetic and audacious, Three Days in April is a a blend of science fiction and psychological thriller that raises an important question: once humanity goes down the rabbit hole, can we ever find our way back?

WTF was that ending?

Where to start? So I like the universe Ashton is building here, and I enjoyed this entry into it far more than the previous, The End of Ordinary. Three of the four narrators were great, the guy doing Gary being the weak link though I can see what he was going for, he just didn’t pull it off. The first two acts were enjoyable but just as things are starting to build into something great in the middle of the 3rd, he just kind of sharts the bed and the ending hits like a brick wall of “…..”. What even was that, Ed? Did you just get bored with your own book and move on, or did any of that feel satisfying in your mind? Spoiler: it wasn’t. That ending sucked. Really sucked. Sucked so badly I’m contemplating requesting a refund because I feel dirty having used a credit on this title. I’m starting to notice Ashton has a real blind spot when it comes to wrapping up the stories he tells. Mal Goes to War and The Fourth Consort were good but Antimatter Blues and End of All Things were kind of trash. Mickey 17 is in the middle, in that I don’t love the ending but at least most of the threads were tied up by the end so it felt satisfying if not a bit rushed and Deux Ex Machina. This book, thought? I really want to like it, but that ending makes me hate it and regret the time wasted on it. Not cool, man, not cool. Finally: ok what is up with your Neanderthal lady fetish? This is now the second book in which one of the main characters is a cave lady. Weird, brother, very weird.