Prelude to Ascension

The Assemblies of the Living, Book 1

By: Brent Clay

Narrated by: Samuel Peery

Length: 18 hrs and 34 mins

Publisher's summary

John Riley is a physicist who achieves his lifelong dream of unraveling the mysteries of anti-gravity, but along the way, also unwittingly discovers the secret of interstellar communication. When he and a small group of coworkers attempt to respond to an unexpected message, believing it to have originated from somewhere on Earth, they find more than they anticipate. The message is from deep space.

Once contact is made, the Remotes, as they are called, will not be dissuaded. Humanity becomes an unwilling newcomer to a staggeringly ancient galactic collective, which regards the Earth as an "emerging world" that is subject to its oversight. As humanity slips further into the grip of the enigmatic consortium, the mysteries become deeper; there is more to Earth’s history than meets the eye, and even the galaxy itself is not what it seems.

©2018 Brent Clay (P)2019 Brent Clay

Kept my interest

I enjoyed listening to this book but a couple things held me back on that last star. One was the dialogue. I find that really good dialogue is seldom found among science fiction writers, especially with personal banter. Don't know why. The main couple were so boring with each other. I appreciate that they were decent and conservative but still, they're young, who talks like that in this day and age, and I say that as a 64 year old.
Peery has a wonderful, smooth voice. He'd make a good therapist. He did accents well. He makes a great reader, but not an actor. Very little personality came through, the lines were merely read with just minor fluctuations in volume or speed depending on what was being read.

Interesting science but slow plot development

The best part of the book was “hard science”. It starts with the current understanding of communications technology and gravitation and provides interesting extrapolations. I also kind of liked the change of pace provided by socially conservative characters. No sex. No swearing. Two of the central characters get engaged but stay in separate hotel rooms!

The weakness was the very slow plot development. The other weakness was that the characters did not really capture my interest. They were ok but their personal issues never came alive for me.

Overall it was moderately entertaining and might be good for people who like hard science fiction.

Sad that the second book isn't available

If they bring the second book out on audible I would gladly listen to it.

Stay with it...if you can (*yawn*).

The summary description of this book made it sound right up my alley...lots of hard science mixed with plausible extra-terrestrial contact. I almost gave up on it quite a few times during the first third of it, however. The story is so slow to unravel that it made me wonder if I had perhaps purchased the wrong book. The author takes character development to a whole new level at such an excruciatingly slow pace that I began to suspect nothing would happen until the book's sequel. The narrator's monotone and at times hypnotic voice did not lend to the experience. I forced myself to keep listening, however, and sure enough my suffering was eventually rewarded with some interesting events. I honestly feel that the author could have left out about 5 or 6 hours worth of the tedious details without subtracting from the main story. The plot is intriguing, though, and despite the ridiculously abrupt ending I think it will be worth reading the sequel.

Slow To Build, But a Great Story

Because the characters are so important to the telling of the story, it takes a while for things to really get going. The story is fairly technical in nature, but the technical aspects don't drive thus take. I really enjoyed it.

Excellent and enjoyable First Contact

My only gripe is it’s a touch long-winded, especially in the beginning. However this does help connect the reader with characters. I’ve read/listened to a ton of sci-fi and first contact stories and enjoyed this more (forgive pun) down to earth tale. Looking forward to the next book in series.

Well imagined and thought provoking!!

This is an enjoyable book! The ideas about a gravitational communication medium were quite novel, and I enjoyed how there were additional facets to the story involving Trial and the ruins on the moon. I’m looking forward to book 2.

Great Book

A sci-fi story very well organized and very entertaining. This book is about scientific achievements, philosophy, human nature, and about possibilities. I really enjoyed it was better than expected. The narrator does a great job too. I fast forwarded the part about Sarah's drama but right after that was over the following chapters got better and better.

Exciting and Original Book and Story Line

This is an exciting book and story line. Very original. I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys a bit of hard-sci-fi in their stories. Some of the lead-up components seem a bit slow. Over all, a great read and a great story developed from the lead-in plot.

I have one true criticism however. I don't know whether I should assign blame for this to the narrator or to the author--or perhaps both! So, I rated the narration a star less as a result, not having any other choice. To explain:

Much of the dialogue, AJ's seems to stand out more than others, was stilted and unnatural. I'm sure it was written in a way, as I find many novels to be, where dialogue is in some odd formalized format where the use of contractions are inexplicably avoided. (Sometimes novels also will use the full first and last name of the character every time they are mentioned or cited in the book!).

Our mind's narrator tends to translate these formal forms as we read so we "hear" a contraction or just the first name of the character. In audio books, I want to hear natural interpretation of dialogue.Use of it's, can't or won't, shouldn't or wouldn't, is the way people naturally speak. Will not, can not, it is not, we are, should not, for example, aren't examples of how people talk in natural, mundane, daily dialogue and conversation.

So, I think this narrator is almost excellent. If the narrator will learn to use a little oral-interpretation, dramatization of dialogue, or take a bit of creative license, then his story telling and dialogue would flow and captivate--and never be cause for distraction from the performance.

A narrator should discuss this with the author ahead of time to gain their approval to interpret the text. If this is not done, then shame on the narrator. If, on the other hand, the author directed his narrator to read the text strictly verbatim or didn't prep the narrator to make the characters sound natural...? then shame on that author!

I can't wait for the sequel

Super good. I disagree with the other with the other reviewers about the lengthy character development. I think it was just perfect. I can't wait for the sequel