Lost Kingdom

By: Terry Maggert

Narrated by: Zachary Johnson

One world, two cultures, and a mystery - four thousand years in the making.

When Nolan Hayes crashes his borrowed (don’t say stolen) ship on Janusia, he finds a planet split by a river of epic proportions. Fast, deep, and deadly, the river is home to three kingdoms and a cable system left behind by people from the stars, who left no clues as to its intentions. Now, the river and all it’s connecting ports are controlled by a single guild.

Night after night, ships fall from the sky, breaking apart and scattering bodies across the wide plains, the empty southern ocean, and the warring kingdoms. Some of these ships have survivors, and some of those survivors aren’t victims at all, for their arrival on Janusia is anything but an accident. As Nolan unravels the intrigue of a world at war, he’ll gather powerful allies on his march to the river and to a meeting with destiny - Corra, the woman chosen to lead her people in a fight for justice.

It’s a fight against greed, evil, and a hidden truth that will change history itself on a world at the end of the galaxy - a place where ships die, the river rages, and war is never-ending.

©2021 Terry Maggert (P)2021 Terry Maggert

Nolan helps Korra the queen

As Nolan crashes on this new world to him. Nolan and Cherry, an ai try to understand the planet which they crashed.
Finding out what is going on they try to help. A lot of twists and turns throughout the book. Awesome ending.

Very intricate world building!

Nolan, a not-so-good guy in a stolen spaceship, gets sucked into a planet’s pull and crash lands among the oddest cows you’ve ever seen. With the help of his AI, Cherry, he manages to survive and finds himself in the midst of a planetary power struggle. Nolan is still rough and tough, but he aims the nasty at the nasties and unveils a surprising heroic side to those in need, picking up sidekicks along the way.

I’m amazed at the in-depth world building in this book! So many details, so many cultures, and an incredible ability to knit what appears to be unrelated events into the same story, This world is dangerous and harboring really big secrets that the majority of the characters are unaware of, except for those few who do know. Nolan navigates these societies and their cultures with the awareness of a guy who hasn’t always been on the up and up, a good trait for this world, with an ability to sniff out who to trust and who to just shoot.

The story is great fun and humorous at times. I dropped a star because the switching viewpoints made it hard to keep up with the story at times. You catch on soon enough, but I preferred the story when in Nolan’s point of view, the other viewpoints are necessary but a bit harder to follow. Overall, the story is entertaining, and that’s my goal when I read or listen to a book.

Amazing!

Lost Kingdom by Terry Maggert was a great audio book! I really loved how the narrator brought the characters to life before my very ears.
Nolan Hayes quickly became my favorite character with his ability to survive such unpredictable situations. Overall this book quickly became a Science fiction favorite of mine!!

Terry's back with a new world to explore

Terry Maggert is back with another world you can get lost in and visualize from the very beginning. The first line of the blurb "One World. Two cultures. And a mystery four thousand years in the making." pulled me right in to the need to want more. Then I saw Terry's name. This was right up there with what I needed. There was something new and different around each corner. Nolan Hayes finds that he may have just gone a little too far or maybe he needs to go a bit further. Janusia had much to share and even more that was hidden. I want to share more but I think that would give away something. Not doing that. I would say that Corra is not the only interesting character along the way. Nolan becomes part of the world that he crash landed on. Along the way he finds a band of intriguing friends/foes/allies to help in the fight to the secrets of a world not his.

Zachary Johnson did not disappoint. I find that his voice suits very well to the science fiction, paranormal, fantasy, genres. I felt right at home with to familiar artist (author Terry Maggert and narrator Zachary Johnson). The blend it very much a complement to the work produced. I feel as it there is more to come.

Typical Lost World Sci Fi Trope

An entertaining take on the Lost World (Not terribly surprising given the title right). The Hero stumbles into a lost world that represents some ‘undeveloped’ past in human history … in this case, something about the planet is causing tech to eventually fail, so you have an interesting mix of failing tech and primitive civilization where the new comer (Our Hero) has certain advantages (like an embedded AI and smart surveillance drones). Most of the humor is provided by the interaction between Nathan (Hero) and Cora (AI) and is fairly fun without being too over the top. There are s few mysteries to work out as you learn more about the world and the mysteries ‘cable’ that runs along the big river around which all civilization is dependent. Throw in an alien race or two (along with an apparent indigenous aquatic race) and there is plenty to pull you through the rather predictable story with a few twists and turns to keep it interesting. There are only a few plot lines; but they take so long to converge that switching between them actually distracts instead of advances the plot (the secondary story of the northern kingdom seems more about world building until the end). Some of these could use more attention to building up context to make them more interesting earlier.

The narration was pretty good; the only caveat would be female and child voices were not as differentiated as others I have listened to, but he makes up for that with excellent cadence and delivery. Over all I think it improved the story and made it worth a listen.

I was given this free advance listener copy (ALC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

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