Stray

Touchstone, Part 1

By: Andrea K. Höst

Narrated by: Stephanie Macfie

Length: 9 hrs and 50 mins

Publisher's summary

On her last day of high school, Cassandra Devlin walks out of exams and into a forest. Surrounded by the wrong sort of trees and animals never featured in any nature documentary, Cass is only sure of one thing: Alone, she will be lucky to survive. 

The sprawl of abandoned, blockish buildings Cass discovers offers her only more puzzles. Where are the people? What is the intoxicating mist that drifts off the buildings in the moonlight? And why does she feel like she's being watched? 

Increasingly unnerved, Cass is overjoyed at the arrival of the formidable Setari. Whisked into a world as technologically advanced as the first is primitive, where nanotech computers are grown inside people's skulls, and few have any interest in venturing outside the enormous white stone cities, Cass finds herself processed as a "stray", a refugee displaced by the gates torn between worlds. Struggling with an unfamiliar language and culture, she must adapt to virtual classrooms, friends who can teleport, and the ingrained attitude that strays are backward and slow. 

Can Cass ever find her way back home? And after the people of her new world discover her unexpected value, will they be willing to let her leave?

©2011 Andrea K. Höst (P)2019 Andrea K. Höst

Glad they had an Australian reading it.

Loved it! Except for the production slip that put the end matter 2/3s through the book instead of the end. Narrator is Australian, which can make it hard to adjust for an American English speaker, but it adds realism to the book and I like it better for it. Sometimes the narrative is rushed, and sometimes too chipper for the situation the main character finds herself in, but overall a good listen.

I read the print book for the first time years ago and was happy to pick this up in Audio.

I really like this audio book

I have read all 5 books in this series and was thrilled to find the audio book of the first book. I’m looking forward to Lab Rat One in audio.

This book is written in the form of diary entries. I really enjoyed the narration of the book, I think it added depth to the story. Stephanie did a good job of interpreting the story, which would be difficult seeing as it is written in diary entries of the main character, but she was able to give it added depth by representing the other characters with their own “voices.”

The story is about a young woman, Cassandra Devlin who was transported by a wormhole to another world. The world she initially encounters is filled with the ruins of a culture from thousands of years ago. There shevus found by the remnants of the survivors of the original inhabitants of the world that she had been transferred to. The first book describes her introduction into this new culture, with different beliefs and language. It follows her successes and failures as she attempts to navigate this weird world that is so different from her own.

The writing is well done in the manuscript and the audio book follows the book as it was written. It’s nice to hear the voice of “Cass” telling her own story and I like how I’m able to get a firmer grasp of her character through the audio presentation.

I have read this entire series several times and I look forward to the remaining audio books releases. I also hope that the author isn’t finished writing about this world and the people in it. There was a hint about Aunt Sue in In Arcadia that I hope that the author follows up on. I hope that she isn’t finished with the series yet. So I’m a nutshell, I’m waiting anxiously for the next book in audio to be released.

Good story, grating narration

I enjoyed reading all of the books in the touchstone trilogy, but I am disappointed in the narration. I found the narration grating on my nerves, it was too fast, too loud, and the accent and pitch was a bit extreme. Don’t get me wrong, I like the Australian accent generally. I lived in Australia for several years and am quite used to it, and have enjoyed many audio books narrated by an Australian. However, this voice bothered me so much that I simply couldn’t finish it. I switched to listening to it using Alexa. I found a few mispronounced words more bearable than the voice of the narrator. I’m not sorry I bought the kindle books in this series, but I am sorry I bought the audio books.

Listen to the sample, if you can get past the accent, the story is very interesting

I will be downloading the next book as there is more to the story that is finally getting good. Overall I would give this book a 4 as the last quarter was quite interesting, there was just a lot of world building to get through. You can tell it was written to be a series and I’m sure the next book will continue to be as fast paced and interesting as the last bit.

The narrator conveys excitement at every new journal entry/ chapter start even when it was not a particularly positive chapter. You can hear her smile but if I’m writing something serious in my journal, I would not be smiling like it was a happy memory I was about to write.

About halfway through the book I became accustomed to the accent and was able to just enjoy the story without cringing.

What an awful narration!

I could hardly make sense of the book. the narrator is worse than the text-to-speech artificial voices!
Every single sentence is read with the exact same inflection and a combination of rushed words and prolonged pauses between them - she sounds like a caricature of a robot. It's one of the absolute worst narrations I have encountered so far on Audible.

The story itself is interesting in its world building aspects, but very much unfinished - it ends in the equivalent of "mid sentence" and it's very clear that the different books in the series are not intended as separate books, but more like chapters of the same book. I would dearly hope that the second book picks up right where this one left off. Personally, I hate when authors do that, so I will not be reading any more books in this series or by this author.

I very much regret purchasing this audiobook. The book doesn't deserve any support in either of its forms.

Flippin love the series

I keep listening to this series over and over again, I can’t wait for the final book to come out! I can’t describe how this book is I’m trying to figure it out so I could put it down in words but it is not happening. The characters are well written the story has a lots of twists and turns, the authors imagination is amazing

More than I could hope for.

It's worth a listen whether you're an old fan or not. Audio version is fantastic!

In love with this book!

No spoilers here. I so love following Cassandra's adventures on her way home from school, I have read the whole series and listened to the first 2 Audibles multiple times! I listen to them on my daily commute as the radio gives me mostly commercials for the short 15 minutes. Andrea K Host is an engaging author whose stories never get old.

So glad this is available on audio!

I've been waiting for this series to come to audio. Love the storyline, and can't wait for the rest of the books.

Where is book 3?

Please make the final part of the trilogy “Caszandra” available in the UK. It’s ridiculous to make only the first two parts of a trilogy available for purchase

Enjoyable escapism

A detailed adventure in several new worlds with psychic space ninjas and a ghost cat.
I have the printed versions and love them. Was very hesitant to get the audio versions just in case ruined books. They didn’t, thankfully Aussie narrator. Slight warning she does go at a pace so I ended up listening at 0.8 speed.
Found the summary of the novel at the beginning unnecessary.
Could we please have the Gratuitous Epilogue too?