Mass Effect

Ascension

By: Drew Karpyshyn

Narrated by: David Colacci

Length: 9 hrs

Publisher's summary

It's humankind versus a race of machines bent on harvesting organic life in this second official novel based on the BioWare video game.

©2008 Drew Karpyshyn (P)2008 Tantor

A definite for ME fans!

This book covers the the space of time from the end of ME1 and the Start of ME2. This is done from the inner workings of Cerberus and their machinations in respect to creating superior biotics. I won't go into anymore detail but to say this let's you see the Illusive Man from a different perspective.
I gave it 3*'s due to David Colacci I think this is better read than the last ME book. However I think it would have been better served if they divided up the feminine voices to a female, Mr. Colacci's female voice grates on me.

Incredible listen for Mass Effect fans

If you are a Mass Effect fan you are gonna love this book, it is best read after finishing the first ME game and book and before playing Mass Effect 2 (there are some references in the game to the events of the book)...

Even though the stories aren't very important to the main plot of the ME games it's still awesome and even better that way because it shows you how much the ME universe can be expanded on and makes you wish for entire series like this book...

10/10 for the writing, 9/10 for the narrating (it's kinda awkward when the guy imitates female or child voices)

Interesting idea, and concept

I don't know if I'd recommend this book. from my standpoint it adds very little that cannot be summeeized in ME2 by other characters. it's an entertaining story, but not much more. it does demonstrate Drew Karpryshyns growth as a writer from the first book, but still not as well written as Revan.

the voice preformance was particularly abysmal. I know it's hard for a man to do female voices, but he couldn't even decide if the female lead should have a southern accent or not. very distracting.

that said, this book did terrify me with it's horrifying thesis:
what if the most powerful human biotic to ever live
was an autistic 12 year old. the ethical and sociological implications were truly thought provoking, and he does well to put us in the mind of this little girl.

Pretty good

Fun intermediate story but not a lot of suspense. The performance wasn't my favorite but you can get used to it.

Adds richness to the game franchise.

Would you listen to another book narrated by David Colacci?

Yes, David Colacci's performance brought me into the story. His Illusive Man is perfect.

Any additional comments?

Got this book after enjoying Mass Effect: Retribution. Overall, I didn't enjoy it as much but is still worth it for fans of the games and the story does shed more light on the concept of biotic abilities. I haven't read the first book (revelation?) but this one ties in great with Retribution.

Narrative slip ups.

While I enjoyed David Colacci’s reading, it was impossible to get past the verbal mistakes as he read, the part where he pronounced “lived” with a long i as though he were saying “lively.” There were other parts where he substituted words or wasn’t consistent in the pronunciation of names and places.

Other than that, this was a fun read-along.

Mixed feelings.

It was Mass Effect but I had trouble staying interested in the story. Which is surprising considering I love other works by this author. The performance was good.

good story, poor delivery

The games defined canon for pronunciation of names, the audio books butchered them and it was hard to get past.

how is this 4.5 stars?

Even as a major mass effect I would rate book one as Okay and this one as just Mediocre. I never felt more than a passing interest in the book, the second half of the nook especially dragged. I doubt I'll ever listen to the third.

Mass Effect

Any additional comments?

Mass Effect - the game, is a mulch-layered universe - featuring multiple alien societies striving to co-exist. The book is somehow less deep than the game. While I enjoyed the story - it focused mostly on human characters and didn't delve too deeply into the alien races - though it did touch upon some (and at times seemed to be at odds with the information available in the game).

Also - one of the main characters in the book had a small part in the game, however her name was pronounced differently in the recording - which drove me crazy. The voice actors in-game were of such superb quality the narration of the book seems to suffer because I can "hear" how different characters "should" sound. Not that I expect one narrator to be capable of reproducing all those voices - it just felt a bit shallow