The First Omega

De: Megan O'Keefe

Narrado por: Jessica Marchbank

Mad Max meets X-Men in this razor-sharp new dystopian novella by the Philip K Dick award-nominated author of Velocity Weapon.

It doesn't matter what you call her. Riley. Burner. She forgot her name long ago. But if you steal from the supply lines crossing the wasteland, her face is the last one you'll see. She is the force of nature that keeps the balance in the hot arid desert. Keep to yourself and she'll leave you well enough alone. But it's when you try to take more than you can chew that her employers notice and send her off to restore the balance. Then she gets the latest call. A supply truck knocked over too cleanly. Too precise. And the bodies scattering the wreckage weren't killed by her normal prey of scavengers. These bodies are already rotting hours after the attack. Cowering in the corner of the wreckage is a young girl. A girl that shouldn't be there. A girl with violently blue eyes. Just like hers.

©2021 Megan E. O’Keefe (P)2022 Tantor

Wish this was a full story, but loved it

A really cool short story set in a post-apocolyptic future. The narration was great and the writing was excellent (I really like this author). It's the kind of fiction that could easliy be expanded into a full story, but is still very satisfying in its world building, characters and conclusion.

Fun short story

Great short story, worth a listen, builds a world and fills it with a few great twists! If you’re on a long drive it’s a great one and worth your time.

Salted earth dystopia gives a bloody good time

The mood of this one was everything: gritty, broody, and ruthless. I like that the story earned its way without relying on F bombs or the tired scene of men abusing women. The narrator’s voice was perhaps too clean and feminine for the tale, but it meshed with the writing soon enough.

Mad Max in Texas

This is one of those books that you enjoy, although you find almost everything wrong with it. Sort of like the Mad Max movies, you enjoy them, but you’re not sure why. The writing leaves much to imagination, the plot has many holes, and there is pretty much no character development. In spite of these seemingly major issues it’s still a fun listen and well worth the time. Sometimes it’s hard to figure out who’s who and what the motivation is for doing what they’re doing but don’t let that stop you, you’ll pick it up as you go along. All of that could’ve been handled better, but with a little work you can overcome it. I put the fault of this on both the writer and the narrator, more about this later. This is a book that feels very familiar you feel like you’ve covered this ground before, because you have, it’s nothing new but it would’ve been nice to have it fleshed out a bit more and taken into some new territory.

As to the narration, having heard some of the other work by this narrator, for some reason this book had a softer more lilting sound to it. That is fine, but of all the books I would feel that is the best tone, a book dealing with a dystopian bounty hunter does not seem like the best fit. This is a personal taste issue. Otherwise the narration seemed fine although a little flat.

All and all this was a fun listen definitely worth the money and the time!