The Legion and the Lioness

By: Robert D. Armstrong

Narrated by: Therese Plummer

Length: 8 hrs and 18 mins

Publisher's summary

They said I would never finish flight school. Never rank at the top of my class. Never fly with the top aces. Never return from combat against the Kelton androids. Never survive emergency surgery.

Here I am.

The year is 2151. Earth is gone. A hellscape. I've been unfrozen after 72 years of cryosleep on a medical facility on Saturn's moon, Titan. I have nothing - no home, no friends, no concept of this new world, these Titans.

All that remains is the old conflict that has blackened my veins and memories of the ones I loved still fresh in my heart. Forgotten for decades.

But it seems war hasn't forgotten me, no, even in my slumber. My name is Captain Victoria Ann Belic. I was a wife and an ace fighter pilot and have been revived for one reason - to die again.

©2017 Robert D. Armstrong (P)2018 Audible, Inc.

This is my Headline

Therese Plummer is an excellent narrator, but her performance was not enough to save this book for me. Not that I found the book to be bad. I just found it to be mediocre. I might have enjoyed it more if I liked the main character, but she was too angry and emotionally unstable for my taste.

meh

bad science coupled with characters whose emotional levels are about even with 9 year olds with problems. I couldn't finish it. half way through and I couldn't take it anymore.

A Capt wakes 72yrs in the future & fights for it

The start of this book moves around a fair bit, covering several different short stories, over several different time frames, all relating to Captain Victoria Belic, her past, and some relating to her husband Luther.
We learn about how the world has started to succumb to an Android uprising, and the slow decline of humanity.
The Captain is married to a man named Luther, who suffers from severe anxiety, that has limited his life a bit.
After several bits of her life, and the war, we get to a part of the story in which Victoria is offered the role of lead pilot aboard a carrier ship out to Titan. The mission will have a huge ship, with over 5000 people, and she can take Luther. It will be the first of possibly many ships, but she is welcome to stay, or bring people back, and once back on Earth, make a return trip.
Then we reach the pivotal part of the story, where Victoria wakes up 72yrs into the future, having been frozen to save her life. She received a fatal head wound that no one could treat at the time, so she was put into a coma on ice, until she could be treated.
There are elements of Ripley’s story here from Aliens, were she awoke so far into the future to find everything that she held dear lost to her. Armstrong does a brilliant job of getting inside Victoria’s head, and describing the impact of waking up so far into the future, you really feel like you are the one who has woken up in the future.
There is an extraordinary depth to the world building that has gone into this story, both at the start, with the previous iteration of Victoria’s world, and now, this new iteration of it that she has awoken into.
However, she has not woken up on Earth. Earth has been lost to the Androids, and she is on Titan. Again, there is some incredible back story here that I don’t want to give too much away.
She is offered the chance to return to Earth to help in a mission to try and take out the Androids, as the remnants of humanity fear that the Androids will come for them on Titan. Even more important to her, Luther may still be on Earth.
And thus begins the second part of this story, and what is the beginning of the core part of this book, that leads into the next book. I don’t want to give too much away, but this is an outstanding piece of writing, and you will be totally enthralled by Victoria’s story.
There are some exceptional characters in this book, Victoria, as mentioned, is just such a fascinating and powerful person. Armstrong has given her so much depth, that you feel that you know her, you understand her motivations, her pain, and the will that drives her. Accompanying her are Drake, one of the people from Titan, who believes in her, and her mission. One of the best characters in the book is Xena, an AI Robot that is sent to watch over Victoria and make sure that she doesn’t do anything inappropriate. Xena has some of the best lines in the book, and at times, reminds me of K2SO from Rogue One, in that ‘I’m just stating a fact, it’s just coming across like sarcasm’ way of speaking.
Xena lightens the mood in what is some incredibly powerful, gritty and intense moments in this story.
Whilst I have mentioned characters and story, I would be remiss to not cover the writing of the action, which is just stunning. Armstrong gives such incredible detail in his battle scenes, whether it be hand-to-hand or spaceship, the descriptive work is just exceptional. It is not that he goes into gruesome detail, but he describes the physical scene, as well as the emotional impact of those in and around the scene, and his style of writing really creates such an all encompassing view of the combat, you really feel so involved in it.
Overall, this is a brilliant first book to the series, and I am already over halfway through the next book, which is just as good, if not better. This is a series that any sci-fi fan shouldn’t miss, but it will interest others to, action/adventure or anyone who likes a good character driven story.
Therese Plummer does an outstanding job with the Narration. She has such a beautiful voice, it is lovely to listen to, and you could easily sit and listen to it for hours on end with no problem at all. Her pronunciation is flawless, so she is wonderfully clear when she speaks, making it very easy to understand everything she says, even if you are one of those that likes to listen at a faster rate.
The Narrator does a brilliant job with creating a range of different voices as well, giving us both a clear set of Male and Female characters, each with their own distinctive voices. It is great listening to someone who is able to do this, and you know who is speaking without them having to actually tell you.
Plummer is just extraordinary, and I will be looking for other titles that she has done the Narration on as she is just so wonderful doing the Narration of this book. I would rather listen to this book than read it, the Narration is so good.

very interesting

the story is very intriguing from the start and the story just kept me hooked. now I am looking forward to the next book

Great story with some strange choices

I liked this book. If there were a few minor changes I'd love this book. There are some strange choices that make this a bit of a confusing read to me. Let me say, though, that this definitely deserves a credit if you like sci-fi books.

The choices that confound me can be summed up into three groups.
1. The performance is good except for the fact that the reader chooses a very old-school monotoned robotic voice for any computer or android. This makes for some weird situations in which there is clearly an intent for human-like interaction between an android and human but the vocal distinctions are that one talks like a Dalek and the other speaks normally. It's a confusing choice for much of the book but then becomes utterly baffling when an android is supposedly fooling humans into thinking it's human while speaking so ridiculously. It's a choice made for just a few characters but it effectively and consistently brings you out of the story and becomes a distraction.
2. There are some word choices that also brings you out of the story. These happen every few chapters and can probably go unnoticed if you choose not to listen for them.
3. Finally, there's an underlying suspicious behavior by many characters that goes unresolved. For a while I thought it was just a conclusion that I had jumped to by myself, but the protagonist also asks similar questions of these characters. I was a little disappointed to find that these suspicions aren't satisfactorily addressed by the end of the book. It may be resolved in future books.

Overall, this is a good book that deserves a chance for fans of the genre. I look forward to the next installments.

excellent post-apocalyptic story

Excellent post-apocalyptic story!


narrator is great! one of the best.
I look forward to book 2.

Solid underlying story, but bizarre & awkward

First, it needs to be said that the underlying plot is solid with enjoyable sci-fi elements in it.

Having said that, the author has made some really bizarre choices around what to focus on. As a listener I found this to be a deeply distracting and unsatisfying experience. Foreshadowing needs to be used in a manner that is consistent, and proportinate to the significance of the event and how far away it will occur in the plot. The author has misused this technique to the point that items with heavy foreshadowing are left unresolved and items that are probably meant to be plot twists, or that could use foreshadowing, hit you from left field and lose all impact as they just appear to be disjointed.

After listening to this I have no desire to listen to anything else in this series, and unless you're really forgiving I would recommend not spending a credit on this book.