Overload Flux

Central Galactic Concordance, Book 1

By: Carol Van Natta

Narrated by: Nicole Poole

Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins

Publisher's Summary

Brilliant Investigator Luka Foxe must act fast if he's going to save the civilized planets of the Central Galactic Concordance. For as a pandemic sweeps across the galaxy, someone is stealing the vaccine. 

To make matters worse, Luka's hidden mental talents are out of control, leaving him barely able to function in the midst of violence and a rising body count. The convoluted trail leads to a corrupt pharma industry and the possibility of an illegal, planet-sized laboratory. In the face of increasing threats, he must rely on an enigmatic, lethal woman who has secrets of her own.  

Mairwen Morganthur hides extraordinary skills under the guise of a dull night-shift guard. The last thing she wants is to provide personal security for a nova-hot investigator or to be plunged into a murky case involving sabotage, treachery, and the military covert operations division that would love to discover she's still alive. Worse, she knows that two more deaths won't bother their enemies one bit. 

Their only hope for survival is to share their darkest secrets. With everything in their universe at stake, can they learn to trust one another?  

Contains mature themes.

©2014 Carol Van Natta (P)2018 Tantor

I had to DNF

this book was just way too wordy for me, I do like sci-fi but it was just too much to fully appreciate any sort of plot.

OVERLOAD FLUX

Loved this book I gave it 5 stars across the board it hit a high-five!

Far Future Sci-Fi Murder Mystery and Romance

After being utterly riveted to the prequel, I was revved to dive into Overload Flux for more of the CGC world of suspense and intrigue in the future among the stars along with the sensational narration work of Nicole Poole.

Overload Flux introduced its main characters over a grisly murder scene. Neither are exactly what they seem with their psychic abilities that must be hidden particularly Mairwen Morganthur's. She can't be discovered, but the longer she acts as the clever and tenacious Luka Foxe's security, she is in danger of him figuring out her secrets long before he figures out who is behind the killing of his friends and what they knew that got them killed.
Luka's minder talent is a wild thing that he can barely control, but he has to if he is to function and figure out the truth. With Mairwen at his back and helping him control his psychic talent, even the dangers of a deadly conspiracy, won't get him off the trail.
Slowly, the pair make discoveries about the case and about each other even as someone races to stop them from discovering the truth.

This couldn't have been any more up my alley than it was. Psychic gifts, a futuristic setting, murder mysteries, actions and a slow burn romance. I was so into the story that I barely shut it off to go about my needed business.

Luka and Mairwen were amazing characters. He is vulnerable because his minder gift is messed up, but he is dedicated and intelligent. He's focused, but also kind. He is struck by Mairwen from the beginning when others overlook her. Once he knows the truth, he is not intimidated and completely respects her along with desperately hoping he can find a way to keep her with him. On the other side, Mairwen is keeping a dreadful secret. She is an augmented human with lethal abilities that are off the charts. She was taken and forced to become a secret government trained killer (or hunter as they are called). She got herself out of that by faking her death and taking on a new personal. She's hidden in the background terrified to draw attention to herself. Luka is like a colorful and bright star in her life and she can't resist him even though she fears he'll find out about her. Protecting him as he does his work tracking down the truth becomes more than a duty to her. He's showing her how to live and she never wants to lose him.

There were some wonderful action scenes and I loved those tight spots moments. There were some good twists. The futuristic setting and world were well drawn. All the elements of the book really worked for me and I love how it ended and the way the rest of the series seems to be laid out for the future stories.

As I said, Nicole Poole did the narration work and I loved her fabulous talent bringing not just the main characters to life, but giving the secondary characters their own sparkle so that I felt no disengagement from the story. Pacing, tone, emotions, accents, genders- all were amazing.

All in all, this was a sci-fi romance winner that I can whole-heartedly push at anyone who loves the genre particularly if you like a mystery and intrigue tossed in for good measure.

I can't finish the book.

i love the Author, but the audio reading of the story is not working for me at all!

Boring

I finished this book because I was bored and it was better than extraneous noise in the office I work in. However, the MC and her live interest have as much passion as a wet rag. I mean I got nothing at all from a romantic perspective. The longer the story went on the more ennui it inspired. If I could have found a more interesting replacement already I would not have continued but the world building is one solid and enjoyable aspect of the story.

Good performance of a bad book

This seems to have been a big hit with a lot of readers, but it wasn't for me.

I am a fan of good sci fi, romance and mysteries, so I thought this would be an excellent match. Unfortunately it fell short on all fronts.

This is equal parts romance and mystery set in the future. The main protagonist is a genetically modified killing machine with no personality of her own. She meets up with a smoking hot detective while working as a security guard and they quickly fall desperately in love with each other.

Despite being a hard-trained warrior and assassin, she is a wide-eyed milquetoast ingenue and comes off as boring. Good thing this amazing hunky man came along to show her the world, blah blah blah.

As a sci-fi book, it is super light on the "sci" part. As a mystery, it is uninteresting and hard to follow. As a romance, it is just a boring mash of overused metaphors without any steam to even make it mildly interesting. It doesn't even have good examples of strong female characters, as the main character can't even select her own food without assistance and minor female characters are mocked for not being as virtuous as her.

Nicole Poole did a great job narrating, though.

Overload Flux

This review is for the audiobook edition of Overload Flux and at the same time is my re-read review for this book as I read the book version earlier this year before re-reading it in audiobook.

I don’t think I could’ve picked a better book for my first audiobook. Not only did I love Overload Flux when I first read it earlier this year, but the narrator did such a good job with the narration. I think I actually loved it even more than the first time I read it.

Overload Flux is the first book in this series and probably my favorite book in the series so far, so I was happy to be able to re-read it an experience the story in a whole different way with the audiobook version. As I already knew the big lines of the story I was able to slip easily into the story and focus in the narration and what it added to the book. I am happy I picked a re-read for my first audiobook as it made it easier to get used to the audiobook format.

I just love this book, the story of Mairwen and Luka is just awesome. It’s full of adventure, mystery and a great romance. I was again impressed by how well the author blended the different elements together, the romance is a strong part of the book, but the story is just a strong and they don’t overshadow each other. I enjoyed the story and I seeing Luka and Mariwen get to know each other and how Luka struggles with his talent. I love reading about these characters.

I love Luka and Mairwan together and I fell in love with their story all over again. There were scenes earlier on that help even more significance knowing what would happen next and I also enjoyed seeing side characters that I already knew who they were and being able to see some early hints to their personality. And I was all anew surprised by how well one of the characters kept their true motivations hidden. Even knowing how things turned out I wans’t able to see many hints the other characters could’ve picked up.

With the re-read I was also able to follow the story and mystery part a lot better. Or maybe that’s because of the audio format, who knows. I remember with the ebook version I lost track of some threads a bit and wasn’t able to connect them as good. While now with the re-read I easily kept everything in my head and noticed how things connected and found the resolution a lot stronger because of that. I also like being able to see the set-up and hints to the bigger storyline that runs throughout the story.

I do think the few chapters of one of the evil guys (if you can really call her that) didn’t add as much as we never really see her actions on what happens. The chapter from Eve and Gheer’s point of view were great tough and added information.

The narration was so well done. I obviously have nothing to compare it to as this is the first audiobook I listened too, but I listened to quite some samples of other audiobooks before deciding to listen to this one. I found the narration easy to follow, I rarely had to rewind because I missed anything. And I find the narrator’s voice pleasant to listen to. I am impressed by the way she gives each character a different voice and she does the accents really well too. I never could’ve imaged how a narration could add to a character, but it does. And I found that Nicole Poole manages to let the characters personality shine through in their voice. I liked Mairwen’s voice immediately as it suited her. I had it get used to Luka’s voice for a bit, but quickly found it really fit him.

Once strange thing I noticed was how the Icelandic words are a lot harder to interpret now that I heard them and not saw them. The spelling made it easy to determine what he said most of the times, but in the audio version his accent sounds way more foreign and I needed the context to figure out what he said, which the author always provides so that was no issue. I liked hearing how the Icelandic words sounded, so that was a definite benefit of the audio version. Another strange thing I noticed is that I have no clue what anyone’s names look like, which sounds weird, but hearing and seeing them is different enough that if not for having read the book first I would have no clue how to write any of their names at all.

When reading a book I don’t really image the character’s voices as well if at all, I found that the audiobook really adds a different dimension to the story by being able to hear the voices of the characters. And how they emotions and thoughts shine through in the way they say things. Like when Luka spoke to Miarwen in endearments, you could hear his feelings shine through in his voice, which was great.

To summarize: I loved re-reading this book and listening to the audiobook edition. I think I enjoyed it even more than my first read and this already is one of my favorite books of this year. The audio really added an extra dimension to the story and as I had already read the book once I was able to see more of the foreshadowing and importance of some of the events, which was fun. I fell in love all over again with this story and plan to listen to the rest of the series next. The narrator did an awesome job with the narration. I liked how she did the voices for the characters and how being able to hear their voices added something to the story. I also thought she did the accents really well. All in all I count my first audiobook a big success. I not only got to experience one of my favorite reads of the year another time, but also am convinced that I enjoy audiobooks and plan to listen to more of them.

A satisfying space tale

A solid, steady story with interesting characters and an intriguing plot. The narrator is excellent.

Just what I was looking for!

I spent some time this weekend searching through Audible's library. I was in the mood for some sci-fi with a side of romance. I wasn't sure if Overload Flux would fit the bill, but it definitely did! I realized within the first 5-10 minutes of listening that I was hooked. I liked the story, really enjoyed the main characters, and the narrator was an excellent choice for the book. I normally listen to books at 2x speed, but I had to back up to 1.5x for this book so that I could catch all the details (a good thing!). I doubt it will be long before I listen again.

In short: I recommend!

Love the Story.

Nice character, love the concept of the story. the action is great, nice paste I hope the offer book will be audible.

Enjoyable

Pure fantasy very enjoyable to listen to whilst pottering in the garden - would certainly listen to the follow ups