Starfall

By: Drew Harrison

Narrated by: John Pirhalla

Length: 22 hrs and 50 mins

Publisher's summary

Fantasy. Sci-fi. The world was brought back from the brink of annihilation, but its still-new institutions are rattled once again as heroes and criminals clash in a neon-drenched cyberpunk metropolis.

©2020 Drew Harrison Kurzman (P)2022 Drew Harrison Kurzman

This Book Carries A Payload

This is not your average cyberpunk romp. Par for the course usually includes crazy drone weapons, super powers, flying cars, metaverse junkies, megacorporations, digital espionage. Sure, this book has them too but each is a fiber that weaves itself into a quite exquisite tapestry as it bobs and weaves through the city of New Phoenix in this noir tinged mystery thriller. This book carries a payload. It asks big questions about the fate of future AI, the power of the mega rich, wealth distribution gaps, personal autonomy, human rights. I also haven't hated an antagonist this much since I reread Dune. The pacing is wonderful, it didn't feel like any part of the story was out of place and every page of this book was vital in achieving one of the most satisfying conclusions to a novel I've read in the last year.
The narration is very clear and well paced throughout the novel. A good audiobook reader can make a novel better than the printed word and this one did a great job.
For fans of cyberpunk, noir-fiction, near future sci fi, this is a brilliant and complex story with wholly cathartic finale. Fans of titles like Snow Crash, Blade Runner, The Expanse, and Neuromancer cannot miss this read.

Gritty SciFi with Suspense and Mystery

Great writing and narration! Story-telling is excellent with dark, rainy, ominous tones. The book gave me Blade Runner and cyberpunk vibes while maintaining its own identity and charm. The action sequences are vivid and the mysteries keep you wanting more. Overall, it was a great listen!

Great new story

I am always looking for something different in a story. It seems so many are just a template of wash, rinse, repeat. Luckily perseverance pays off here. There are plenty of new ideas, great, good, and bad characters, and moments tense enough to keep you listening.
No story is perfect but this one certainly tries to be. One only issue I found was confusion on how a characters story related to the over all narrative. After a few chapters it ties in nicely so keep listening. It all comes together with a wonderful new hero emerging.

Starfall by Drew Harrison Blows your socks off

“We don’t win today, but there’s always tomorrow”

Starfall is placed in New Phoenix a city struggling to rise from the ashes as Vitacorp’s ‘light benders’ draw from taken souls and the cities power grid to boost superhuman powers to do their bidding. Braxton Graves ‘the hunter’ who was saved from the dead by Vitacorps captures souls that increases his powers and satisfies Vitacorps need for control over New Phoenix.

There are many memorable characters, but my favorite is Hanna Preacher who is trying to find out more about the death of her lover Quaine O’Connor. Drew Harrison’s tale is full of suspense and makes the reader look at the motives of Hanna, Braxton, police and Vitacorp and keeps you waiting for the next shoe to drop.

There are many well developed characters like police agents Rob Boardsmith and Sam Pollock who try to aid Hanna while Vitacorp’s light benders do their killing and soul collection. The light benders are indebted to Vitacorp many with lifetime debts they paid by killing enemies of Vitacorp and collecting their ‘spark’ or soul.

Starfall is a suspense story, and Cyberpunk LIT with science and fantasy, the book will keep you waiting to read the next chapter while biting your nails to the nub. Starfall is full of surprises but a bit on the violent side as New Phoenix rises from the ashes of Drew Harrison’s cyberpunk dystopian world.

I’m looking forward to seeing what Drew Harrison brings us next! He leaves little to your imagination and does a fantastic job explaining the background information that’s needed to tell an understandable and entertaining story. Well explained LIT science and fantasy combined with good narration truly make Starfall an Audible treasure.

Brilliant

Drew Harrison's electric energy transmitted through a spellbinding narrator galvanizes the reader to captivated enjoyment.

A great listen!

Loving this book! Drew Harrison will be one to watch! I'm already looking forward to his next one!

Strong Debut Novel, Amazing Narration

This book is big. And I'm not talking the length...23 hours. It tackles big philosophical issues. There are several storylines that play out. Two cops begin to dig into a crime which slowly grows into something much larger. A brilliant programmer, Beverly, and her oedipal relationship with Michelangelo, the A.I. that she designed. And, of course, the corporate elite that control everything. At times this book reminded me of Bladerunner. At times Minority Report. At times The Expanse. The narrator is phenomenally good with voices. This book had A LOT of characters. His street accents are much like the "belters" from The Expanse TV series. Really enjoyable listen!
The epigraphs were odd at first then they started to make sense as the book moved on. You can skip over the ones that read computer code, but many of the others are clever.

Definitely worth a listen!

This book was a great take on cyberpunk dystopian fiction, with some novel concepts thrown into the mix. Drew Harrison does a fine job of creating memorable characters and world building, and I can favorably compare this novel's world building depth to Sanderson's Stormlight Archives series. At times the pace slows down a bit too much as Harrison goes into great detail on the ins and outs of Starfall's intricate details, and I believe these sections could benefit from more "showing" and less "telling". However, overall it was a great book with exquisitely described combat and believable character motivations.

John Pirhalla was absolutely amazing, bringing distinct life to each character through excellent acting and accent work. You truly believed each character was a separate person voicing the role.

Do yourself a favor, and give it a listen!

interesting concept, setting, tech.

Amazon recommended this as a "gem", so I bought it after extensively stalking the author's social media accounts, which demonstrated high intelligence, verbal ability, and no annoying culture-war mind infections.

It's too light on the hard sci-fi for me. That's more noticeable because there's an attempt to retain some grounding in fundamental physics, then it deviates from conservation of energy and force balancing. Not a big deal. The writing isn't outstanding from a technical perspective. The editor could have been a bit more aggressive at limiting repetitions and explications.

I hope there will be a sequel.

An excellent debut novel

Drew Harrison handles a gigantic setting for Starfall with a deft hand. Characters are flawed. The setting is the disquieting and unscrupulous near future. He breathes life into all the characters by giving them a story, not wordy, but he lets you inside their world for a few pages to see what makes them tick. At the same time, he keeps the story pacing moving nicely. There are no two dimensional wooden NPCs.
The author writes with confidence and authority over the narrative. I’m willing to suspend disbelief if the author believes it. This author very much believes in New Phoenix. Writing with expertise along the different character arcs he achieves, plausibility. As well as a very unique setting complete with a killer storyline mechanic. No spoilers.
As I listened to the this, I was continually astonished that this was a debut novel. Production and narration were stellar, John Pirhalla did really great with character voicing. The text editing by the author was tight and clean.
This is a great book and a pretty wild ride.