Alien Arcana

By: Glynn Stewart

Narrated by: Jeffrey Kafer

Length: 8 hrs and 51 mins

Publisher's Summary

When a scientist is murdered after finding signs of alien magic in an archeological dig, Mage Damien Montgomery, Hand of the Mage-King of Mars, is sent to investigate both the murder and the alien runes.

His investigation is interrupted when a mysterious ship attacks the ruins with weapons only available to the Martian Navy. Despite saving the dig site, Montgomery is left with more questions than answers.

His investigations reveal questions about the origin of his magic and his nation - and lead him back to the one place that should be safe: the court of the Mage-King of Mars.

©2016 Glynn Stewart (P)2016 Tantor

An improvement over Book 3

Glynn mixed the characters up in this book which made the novel less predictable and more interesting. The introduction of several new first tier characters also improved the story; although, the new teenager seemed more like a literary device created merely to assist in his subterfuge rather than any other meaningful role, at least as far as this book used her.

The narration is still very good, however, I'm still not pleased with the tone and inflection of Damien's voice making him sound too self-important, all the time.

Even so, a nice addition to the series.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Behind the OODA Loop

I've been having loads of fun with this series. very original concepts, good prose, solid characters. That said, and I'll try to do this without spoilers, our protagonists spend much of this book suffering from a sudden case of plot-induced stupid.

Damien does have an endearing knack for finding problems by obliviously whacking his sad little face into the sticky bits, and yes, it's entertaining to see him creatively wizard everything into submission (or pieces) once he catches on, but I thought he'd picked up at least a little guile in his last few years. He issues several of his trademark ultimatums here, where he might have otherwise employed his wits and knowledge to make threats that would use the opponent's priorities to make compliance, negotiation, or further explanation of the opponents' opinion more attractive than the course they did choose. Our protagonists seriously need to quit reacting sometimes, and try to proactively screw with opponents' ye olde OODA loops.

I love a good conspiracy, but some of the secret plots and criminal organizations in this universe are just getting unreasonably competent for their size. Their funding and motives are plausible, but the scale of the things kept secret over this book and the last seem to imply a future that lacks Snowdens and Clintons. (Too soon?)

This is, nevertheless, absolutely worth a read, and the Starship Mageoverse continues to develop in interesting directions without a hint of staleness.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Better and Better

Each story in this series just gets more exciting and challenging.

Damien Montgomery is an epic character.

Bravo

Space Opera meets Magic!

The entire serise is a wonderful blend of colorful space opera and a new flavor magic.

Being selfish for the multitude, "Where's the next one?"

All of Glynn Stewart's audio books have been /are good listens!

loved it

This story gets better and better! I just listened for the third time before starting the new one

Excellent!

Couldn't stop reading or listening to the story. I can't wait to find out what happens next!

Moves at a good clip

The series is developing, gaining more complexity. Characters are are growing and changing. I look forward to the sequel.

Starship Mage

Riveting series. Can't wait to hear the next book. The audio addition is exceptionally done.

Was good, but...

Glynn has just made sure I can't turn this story over to my teenaged kids due to scene in this book. Sad really because I was starting to compare him to Jack Campbell until that moment.

no questions answered.

The writing was good, but it left me wanting to beat the author with a soft broom, since no questions were answered. I know he was leading on to more books and stories to come, but I left this one learning pretty much nothing beside the knowledge there is a secret..... he could have gotten the point across with several sentences yet spent the whole book building up suspense only to say "ha you learn nothing."

I loved all his books about Damian, but they at least were full and complete stories, while this one had good fights and stuff but you got pretty much nothing at the end.

another good story.

another conspiracy plot that gets found out and the poor main protagonist who gets involved in this. amazingly it needs to be continued so I have to wait for the next book to find out what happens next.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

finally some action

the past few books I've found a little tame but this one has finally found some action.

Highly recommended

The book was very well written and very engaging. I would definitely recommend. The series as a whole are interesting and I personally didn't stop until I had read all the books.

brilliant!!

loved them all so far...can't wait for the next installment...very cleverly conceived plot....it's not just all power magic...he uses his brain as well to solve problems.

Please change the narrator!

Once again a book is ruined by Jeffrey Kafer. Differentiating between characters is impossible based on voice - he uses the same one for everyone, even the women - and his downward infection on the final word of each sentence drives me mad. He is, without a doubt, the worst narrator around and having already made me give up listening to anything by C.T. Phipps, I'm close to doing the same with Glynn Stewart's books too.

0 of 2 people found this review helpful