Belly of the Beast - Scott Baron

   2021; 433 pages.  Book 2 (out of 5) in the “Warp Riders” series.  New Author? : No.  Genres : Space Opera; Science Fiction; Space Exploration.  Overall Rating: 7*/10.

 

    Thus far, the galactic reconnaissance mission has been an utter failure.  Just ask Captain Sadira Perez.

 

    They've been sent out on a mission to locate the homeworld of a spaceship that had the gall to fire preemptively at Sadira’s ship, and the first thing to happen was a warp malfunction that booted Sadira and her crew into a who-knows-where-we-are part of the galaxy.  Her star charts are useless, as is the AI that controls all the vital functions of the spaceship.  Finding those hostile aliens is now Priority #2; Sadira would settle for somehow finding her way back home.

 

    But look!  Out there, dead ahead!  There’s an alien spaceship headed right toward us!  It’s different from the one that fired at us earlier, but maybe they have some star charts that would help Captain Sadira figure out where in the Milky Way we're at.

 

    Man, that ship is huge!  I wonder how many miles long it is.  And now, what looks like a giant mouth is opening up.  Jeez, it's so big it could swallow our ship whole.  It’s getting dangerously close now, and we seem to be headed right for that entryway!

 

    GULP!

 

What’s To Like...

    Belly of the Beast is the “sequel-to-the-prequel” in Scott Baron’s Warp Riders Space Exploration series.  I read the first novella-sized book, Deep Space Boogie, a couple months ago; it is reviewed here.  Sadira’s entire crew from that book are back for more thrills-&-spills: Hellatz, Moose, Holly, Goonara, Hump, Ace, and of course, Turd.

 

    The book’s title alludes to the “swallowed by a whale” tales – both the biblical “Jonah” one and the Disney “Pinocchio” one.  Sadira and crew need to find a way out of a decidedly bigger whale which, they quickly discover, has gulped down lots of asteroids and other spaceships.  Exploring the interior of the behemoth is the first order of business, and since they didn’t die while being swallowed, there might be other survivors in the same situation, some of whom might have valuable information to share.  Of course, others may prefer to kill and eat them.

 

    Once again there are lots of alien species to meet and marvel at.  Some get developed more than others, but there’s a nice variety in their structural make-up, including being mechanized, microscopic, made of stone, and coming with various numbers of legs, arms, and eyes.

 

    I liked how the “communicating with aliens” technology was handled, and laughed to learn that, like me, Holly hates the expression “it is what it is”.  It was fun to learn about the “archer’s paradox” (arrows bend in flight in order to fly straight), and I liked seeing Cthulhu get a brief reference.  The writing was surprisingly sparse of typos, and I found the author’s practice putting teasers at the end of most of the chapters kept me turning the pages.

 

    The ending is what you’d expect: after an appropriate tension build-up, the good guys escape the belly of the beast (well, most of them do, anyway) and the bad guys don’t.  Things close with a nice epilogue, which is serves as a teaser for the next book in the series, Rise of the Forgotten.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Nut up (v., phrase) : to suffer in silence, without complaint or protest.

Others: Ghillie suit (n., phrase).

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.5*/5, based on 37 ratings and 9 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.16*/5, based on 37 ratings and 9 reviews

 

Excerpts...

    “You two go on ahead,” she told Hel and Moose.  “Clean up and get a decent meal in you.  And take a quick session in the med pod to up the oxygen content in your blood.  Both of you.”

    “But that thing’s in the med lab,” Moose said.

    “Yeah, and?  It’s strapped down and not going anywhere.”

    “It just creeps me out, is all.  Four legs?”

    “I have four arms, and yet you have no such issues with me,” Hellatz said.  “Or are you a secret limbist?”  (loc. 3562)

 

    “That’s his place,” the Pestri said, pointing to the marked domicile on Sadira’s tablet.  “Bestrus will probably be with a hunting party.  He will not be home.”

    “Are you sure of this?” Mahdus asked.

    “Sure?  Not at all.  I lost time in your ship.  I do not know which shift it is now.  But it is likely he is not there.  He only spends time in his home for two things.”

    “Sleeping and eating,” Hellatz said.

    “Sleeping, yes.  Eating, no.”

    “If not eating, then—”

    “Let it go, Hel.”  (loc. 6098)

 

Kindle Details…

    Belly of the Beast sells for $0.99 right now at Amazon, as does the prequel, Deep Space Boogie.  The other three books in the series each cost $3.99, and you have an additional option of picking up the first two books bundled together for just $0.99.  Scott Baron has several other series and short story anthologies to offer, with the books therein costing anywhere from $0.99 to $3.99.  Various bundles, containing anything from two to six books, range in price from $0.99 to $29.95.

 

“If that thing comes and sucks out my brains, it’s on you.”  (loc. 3579)

    There are some things to quibble about.

 

    After the initial ingestion, there’s lots of exploring but not much action over the first half of the book.  Even the “first contact” is rather bland, although the pace picks up when Varsu enters and then continues briskly through the end of the story.

 

    There are some telling/showing issues in the writing, although not to where it became off-putting. And if you don’t like a lot of cussing in your reading, be aware that I counted 26 instances in the first 5% of Belly of the Beast.  That extrapolates out to 560 cusswords total in the book.

 

     The timing of key events often felt a bit too convenient, particularly when it came to our mechanized heroes recharging or the AI entities rebooting.  The same “secret weapon” that carried the day in Deep Space Boogie once again gets used here.  And what ultimately enables Sadira and company to escape the belly of the beast is really just a deus ex machina.

 

    Finally, although the proofreaders did a great job here, I did chuckle at both a cameo appearance by Daisy, who's the protagonist in a different Scott Baron series, and something that gets put “through the ringer” instead of "through “the wringer”.

 

    7 Stars.  Despite the quibbles, I enjoyed Belly of the Beast.  Realistically, you probably would do a lot of exploring if caught in such a large area before crossing paths with a relatively small number of other survivors.  And realistically, if you were to escape by the hair on your chinny-chin-chin, lucky timing probably would be a factor.  So what if this is more of a beach-read than a work of hard science-fiction?  It was a fun read.