Dirty Job

A Cauldron of Stars, Book 2

By: Felix R. Savage

Narrated by: Chris Ciulla

Length: 12 hrs and 24 mins

Publisher's summary

One more dirty job for the St. Clare's crew. This time it's all or nothing.

In search of Pippa, an exiled teenage heiress, independent space freighter captain Mike Starrunner accepts a cargo for the Hurtworlds, the most hellish planets in the Cluster. The cargo is dirty, and could land the crew in jail...but that's never stopped Mike before. This time, the prize is not just money, but the truth about the Traveller plot that's turned Mike's life upside-down.

But the job is a deadly trap for the Shifters.

On a ravaged prison planet, Mike and the crew tangle again with the predatory Sophia and her Traveller allies. Pippa is the bait in a trap to destroy Mike...and potentially wipe the Shifters off the face of the galaxy. Sophia and the Travellers stand on the brink of grasping unimaginable power, and now Mike is the only man standing in their way.

This ancient secret could shatter the uneasy peace of the Cluster.

To defeat the criminal conspiracy, Mike must evade the long arm of the law, while untangling an intrigue that stretches across light years and centuries. If he fails, Sophia's murderous plot will succeed, and Mike's name will go down in history as a detested traitor.

Join the crew of the St. Clare as they struggle to put the clues together, battle murderous criminals, and above all, hang onto their humanity. If you’re a fan of Firefly or The Expanse, you’ll love this interstellar adventure set in a cluster of stars far, far away, in a future where we’ve colonized the stars and even altered our own DNA, but remain all too human.

Warning: Contains swearing, sex, spaceships, unapologetic badassery, shapeshifting wolves, tigers, bears, lions, and one very large snake.

©2019 Felix R. Savage (P)2019 Podium Publishing

Scifi: A+, Coherent Story: F-

I didn't want to hate this one, but it just didn't live up to the previous one in the series. Let me start by saying Felix does a great job on the scifi as I have come to expect from his work. Where he seems to consistently fail is in real world concepts outside of his immediate agenda. Some of it is minor, like saying a .22 calibur gun is all you need for self defense, which anyone remotely familiar with firearms will call BS on, but less ignorable is the grudges and some really lazy writing. The main character holds pointless and frankly illogical grudges against friends that give a very mean-spirited feel to parts of the book, and don't serve the plot. The lazy writing is the worst though, writing himself out of corners or furthering the plot through last minute additions or previously unknown facts. Characters will do inexplicable things that are either impossible, or make no sense whatsoever, all to drive the plot forward to the utterly stupid reveal of the big question throughout the book. I won't be wasting my time and money on the sequel, and neither should you. Felix is not a bad author, but this is by far the worst of his books I've listened to.