Human Element

By: AJ Powers

Narrated by: Andrew B. Wehrlen

Length: 6 hrs and 45 mins

Publisher's Summary

Humanity volunteered for its own demise.  

The Neuroweb began as the greatest invention since written language. A simple brain implant allowed the user to access information, entertainment, and even pain relief. The Neuroweb was the beginning of a golden age for mankind....

Until it was compromised. Everyone with the implant lost his or her most important commodity: free will. The collective human consciousness was hacked and is now directed by artificial intelligence. Only those without the Neuroweb have a chance of resisting...if they dare.  

Aaran has legitimate reason to believe he's the last free-thinking human alive. After his family was killed in the purge, he fled for his life. Now, he aimlessly wanders through the suburbs of Cincinnati alone, desperate to find a reason to live.  

When he meets a girl like him - another free thinker - they search together for a cause worth fighting for. Worth dying for.

©2017 AJ Powers (P)2018 AJ Powers

Everybody loves tech until it’s too late

Everybody lives technology, the advances and how easy it makes society until it’s too late. The next step is here, brain implants, they will allow you to interface with all of your tech with hit a thought how great is that...until the AI running it goes all skynet on humanity and uses the implant to take over humans and use them as drones to carry out its plans for world domination. The few left scavenge through the world hiding trying to eke our a living in the ruins while evading the drones. This is the story of two survivors and how they met and what they try and do. Great story that is well written and well narrated. I was voluntarily provided this free review copy audiobook by the author, narrator or publisher

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

So darn good!

I was given this free review copy audio book at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

Wow, this was a great take on the dystopian genre focusing on AI and human/computer interfaces being used against humanity. Such a cool premise. I thought it was very well executed, too. I would have liked it to be a little longer for the first book, but it is long enough that I still think it is worth a credit. I really do think it is that good. Anyway, the narration is VERY good too. Andrew Wehrlen really brings the story to life. I felt their struggle and was riveted the whole time.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Totally Enjoyed This Story

This was one of those stories that had me captured from the first moment. Excellent story and the backstory was well thought out.
AJ Powers obviously performed an abundance of research for Human Element and Andrew Wehrlen did a fantastic job performing this story. Can's wait for the next bopk in the series.
I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Good Dystopian/Thriller

I absolutely enjoyed listening to this book and hope this is only the start of a series. Liked the characters of Aaran and Hadas, full of action it is a different dystopian/sci-fi as does not have zombies but has Sentinels and highly recommend if you enjoy dystopian. I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review. THANK YOU

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Excellent Post Apocalyptic Novel

Human Element is an excellent post apocalyptic novel. The two main characters are sympathetic and engaging.. Their backstories are interesting, as is the story of the collapse.. Their struggles keep you interested throughout the story.. The narrator does a great job: he makes you feel their emotions, but is not intrusive. Plenty of story is left for sequels.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Excellent Listen!

Post-apocalyptic stories are a thing of beauty when well-done. This listen was the Mona Lisa.

I loved the two main characters, Aaron and Hadas. They weren't anything special. Just two humans, alone, in a world determined to kill them. I appreciated that the author chose not to make them romantic partners. Their pairing was special. The struggle was real.

The narration was equally special. I'm a Wehrlen fan but he still has to deliver. I loved his portrayal of Aaron and Hadas. They were just basic humans but they had depth and determination. That came across.

That ending was completely unexpected. It was a thing of beauty but it came out of nowhere. Loved it.

I can't tell if this is the first book in a series. I would be great if it was.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Excellent.

I scored a free copy of this audiobook yesterday! I basically could not stop once I started.

I really enjoyed this original scifi/survival premise, the character development, setting, tone, and story. Mr. Powers avoided tropes that usually ruin this kind of story for me. The protagonists are regular people in a horrible apocalypse.

I would love to see a movie or TV series made of this.

My only complaint is that I wanted more. As soon as I submit this review I will be going back to see if there is a sequel.

I will also be shopping for a Suppressed Scorpian. Just in case... Well done.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Surviving the Robot Apocalypse Aint Easy

When we meet our protagonist, Aaran, he has spent approximately a year surviving on his own in a post-apocalyptic landscape, avoiding the Zombie-like webbers and the homicidal sentinels controlled by the Neuroweb. His life has been reduced to pillaging everything and anything to survive in a world where humanity has been reduced to small pockets of people who had not connected themselves physically to the world wide web.

This gives a whole new twist to the Zombie Apocalypse . The "Zombies" are being controlled by an artificial intelligence whose goal and motivations are never made clear, and woe be to the human who isn't with the program. When Aaran meets a young girl also trying to survive, the two of them team up to...

Well, that's just it. The book is really about surviving an impossible situation. So what we get is a series of near misses and a whole lot of wandering from place to place looking for food and supplies. I kept expecting there to be more to the story, like some sort of resistance cell or maybe a plan to overthrow the robotic overlords. But that never came.

What I got was an interesting character study of a young man who is just barely getting by, who lives just on this side of sanity and who ultimately seems doomed to either be destroyed by the unfeeling sentinels or slip into madness and destroy himself. That, and a whole lot of going through people's belongings looking for useful things.

And while I was enjoying that story, I really wanted a sense of hope that, if things could not go back to what they once were, at least humanity could at least return to the dominant life on the planet. It's not clear if there is a sequel forthcoming but I really felt that this book ended just as the real story was getting started.

The story is interesting and Wherlen's narration is spot on (I've come to expect good things from him), but ultimately, I was left wanting more.

I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

Sci/Fi Post Apocalyptic Story

As more and more devices become connected to the internet, it becomes easier to control everything from a single point. In this story, that single point comes from an implant called the Neuroweb. Just like with our Internet of thing devices that can be hacked, the Neuroweb is taken over from an unknown entity. All humans that had the implant are now drones and all of the devices connected to the Neuroweb may act like little spies for whoever is controlling them. Our protagonist, Aaron has been wandering around for almost a year after the event and hasn't seen another uncontrolled human, until he meets Hadas. The story is well written and you can feel the emotion and toll that this event has taken on them. The loneliness, lost sense of hope and struggle to survive. With the world forever changed, they must decide will they just survive or will they live. Narration was great and he conveyed their emotions very well. He changed their voices enough that you understood who was talking. I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review. #SCIFI #IT #TECHNOLOGY #GREATNARRATION #UNIQUEVOICES

Gripping post apoc

Human Element:- Gripping,entertainment and fun to read from beginning to end.
I hope A.J Powers continues this series, and uses the Andrew as the narrator, they made an awesome team.
I was given a free copy of this audiobook at my own request, and voluntarily leave this review.

Good story, great start to a series

I really enjoyed this end of the world story. I have read some zombie apocalypse stories and this was satisfyingly different.

The story moved along at a good pace, gradually telling the reader about the backstory so we finally understand the situation and how it came to be. The characters and relationship was believable and the author manages to draw you in and carry you along making this an exciting story.

The narrator was excellent as usual, I have listened to him before and continue to be impressed

This audiobook was given by the author, narrator, or publisher at no cost in exchange for an unbiased review via Audiobook Boom.

Wow this is cool

This is an incredible story. We are thrown into a changed world. I love the fact that its not a virus or vampires. Instead we have AI. This is a very different story. There's no piles of dead bodies. There's no loss of power or facilities. We have a lonely survivor who is really easy to connect with. I love the rules that our main characters applies to staying and moving on as he moves through his single existence. Then on this we introduce our other characters. Absolutely brilliant. I'm not going to give any spoilers other than to say this book drops us into this warped world and then runs with it. Very good from start to finish.

The narration is quite simply excellent. It builds pace, gives us good characters and is a joy to listen to.

This book was given to me for free at my request and I provided this voluntary review.

Given along enough timeline 10 out of 10 people...

...will die.

First it was very expensive, then it was free, then it took over: the Neuronet, connecting and controlling almost eveyone. And it was determined to find and convert, or kill, all the rest. The Nebula take over Thad been just before Christmas, almost a year ago. Now it was Halloween, Aaron's birthday, and he hadn't seen anyone since July. He kept on the move, avoiding the Sentinels, eating food from abandoned houses that didn't look to be online, just staying alive was the point. Then he met Hadas, another free person, and each now had someone else to help watch their backs.

This is a post apocalyptic story with a difference: no piles of dead bodies everywhere, just a few here and there, long gone mostly. No power loss, so many fridges and freezers continued to chill food, and stores were not ransacked, empty of food even if some had already been partially scavenged. No people. Just an occassional, terrifying glimpse of the ever vigilant Sentinels the military, controlled humans searching for the rare, still unconnected soul. The world hadn't changed; only people had.

In many ways the story is bleak. Ultimately, there can be no hope for our main protagonists, but for now they will try to survive. Full of action, this is a tale of what being human really is. With excellent characterisation from the author, it is easy for the reader to relate to, and fear for, the two main protagonists who struggle to find meaning in just staying alive. And the whole is further enhanced by the excellent performance by narrator, Andrew Wehrlen. His well intoned fast paced delivery makes the action more exciting, his voicing of the characters makes them even more real and their situation the more terrifying.

There is a sameness to most apocalyptic books which isn't present here and it is a book I would recommend to anyone fond of the genre. I have to thank the rights holder of Human Element who, at my request, generously freely gifted me a complimentary copy, via Audiobook Boom. Thank you. It was an absorbing read.