Honeycomb: Boljelam

By: Junior Sokolov

Narrated by: Richard Hercher

Length: 2 hrs and 2 mins

Publisher's summary

After a life lived for parties, sex, and drugs spiraled into grief, she went to selling herself  and fighting for survival.

Now one of Boljelam's angry rebels, she leads a cheapened life on one of the most unjust space station in the universe. Then, she finds an unexpected way out.

An escape from a life of abuse and hardship in the form of a ticket on a ship set for Honeycomb. Taken from a dead woman's purse, it's a one-way ticket to a new, pristine planet, to heaven.
Will she be able to pull it off and get out alive?

Or will two rabid cops, a zombie AI, and a level full of monsters in her way keep her escaping?
And what about that bioengineered murder dogging her steps? He wants out as bad as she does!

©2019 daniela morescalchi (P)2019 daniela morescalchi

Top class entertainment

Honeycomb. Boljelam.
1st class narration coupled with a great storyline combined to make this a novella you can't put down.
I received a free copy of this audio book at my own request and voluntarily leave this honest review. .

Over Produced

I received this audiobook for free in exchange for an honest review.

I really hate to be negative, but...

When the story began there seemed to be some irritating background hiss. After a few minutes it became clear that the noise was intentional, and was actually the buzz of background chatter. The background noise later changed to rain, and then to diner noises, complete with clattering plates. In a word: annoying!
Richard Hercher clearly has the intention to create a full audio performance, akin to Battlefield Earth and the Aliens stories. In that regard, his commitment to that vision and the amount of time he must have devoted to the production is commendable, though misguided.
In cases such as the aforementioned stories, the sounds are secondary to the vocal performances. They are brief, and never overshadow the narration. In this story, there were times when I missed words due to the sound effects, which definitely took away from my understanding of the story.
Another issue was the pace. Hercher read way too quickly. It was almost as if he was trying to get the story done as quickly as possible so he wouldn’t have to add in so many sound effects later.
Hercher’s voice is good. With some coaching from esteemed narrators like Johnny Heller or Jeffrey Kafer, and a move to abandon the noises, he may deliver quality work in the future. For now, his performance will appeal to a niche audience.
It is difficult to say much about Junior Sokolov’s writing because it was so overshadowed by the narration woes. For that reason, the fairest thing to do is provide a neutral rating of 3 stars.

Is this how whales feel?

This book deserves a better rating than the three stars given but production is so poor as to be an irritating distraction which interferes with the reader's enjoyment. In fact, it makes comprehension of the entire book difficult. Briefly, a woman whose life has become into!erable finds a way out, a fresh start, in the form of a ticket for the Phoenix, a ship leaving the station on a one way trip to Honeycomb, a clean, New world. But another creature, a Fail, also wants that ticket. Both intend to be on that ship and both will fight through cops, AIs, and a monster creature invasion to be the one to board.

Very fuuristic, the images produced should have been intriguing and exciting but the sound track behind the narration was intrusive as well as annoying, sometimes making interpretation of what was said difficult. And in section six, the volume also drops, the background is very noisy and overall sounds like a gigantic technical fault. Coupled with the speed at which Richard Hercher reads (fast), this becomes a difficult book to hear, let alone enjoy, and setting the playback speed to .75 distorts the sound too much to be viable. A pity since Mr.Hercher's voice is pleasant, with good intonation and expression.

My thanks to the rights holder of Honeycomb: Boljelam, who, at my request via Audiobook Boom, freely gifted me with a complimentary copy. The story, I think, is exciting and original, the narrator has promise but the production badly let it down. Better to read the book in visual text form as I now intend to do.