Friday, January 13, 2023

Daisy's Run - Scott Baron

   2018; 366 pages.  Full Title: Book 1 (out of 5) in the series “The Clockwork Chimera”.  New Author? : No.  Genre : Space Opera; Science-Fiction.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

 

    It's always a bummer to wake up early, even if it's only a few minutes ahead of schedule.

 

    So you can’t blame Daisy Swarthmore and the rest of the crew on the spaceship Váli for being a bit testy when it happens to them.

 

    Especially when they’re roused six months early.  Especially when it’s the ship’s AI, nicknamed “Mal”, who’s waking them up.  Especially when it means being disturbed from a cryogenic sleep during their interstellar return home to planet Earth.  There had better be a very good reason for this.

 

    There is.  Something crashed into the Váli and the ship’s now on fire.

 

What’s To Like...

    Daisy’s Run is the first book in Scott Baron’s 5-volume Space Opera “The Clockwork Chimera”.  The storyline takes place across three settings: Outer Space (mostly on board the Váli), Earth, and the Moon.

 

    The overarching storyline involves Daisy learning about her past history, her present crewmates, and her inner abilities.  Nothing is as it seems, and although there is a steady trickle of hints as to the answers, most of them just lead to more questions.  I had fun tagging along with Daisy, trying to figure out what was going on, and enjoyed musing on the philosophical conundrums of “how do you know for sure you’re a human?” and “is eating rabbit venison bad for your karma?”

 

    I liked the nods to other sci-fi classics: 2001: A Space Odyssey (“Mal” is eerily similar to “Hal”), Alien, Planet of the Apes, Star Wars, and PKD’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?  I chuckled at the name-choice of the Los Angeles-based "Schwarzenegger Space Port", and had to look up what the Qi Gong meditation routine was.  The Neuro-Stims were a nice detail, as was the fascinating sport of Chess-Boxing.  I’m pretty sure that last one really exists; I vaguely recall reading about it many years ago.

 

    There aren’t a lot of characters to keep track of, but Scott Baron does a good job of making them an interesting and varied cast.  Daisy encounters a bunch of different critters, including humans, AIs, cyborgs, robots, and aliens, and sometimes it’s hard to discern exactly which species they are.  The writing style is storyline-driven, with a bunch of Daisy’s snarky banter with those around her mixed in.

 

    The ending is not particularly exciting, but does provide answers to most of the plot threads.  Daisy finds out who she is, what the Váli’s mission really entails, what the cosmic situation is, and what the rest of the crew have planned for her next.  The Epilogue is a catchy teaser for Book 2 in the series, Pushing Daisy, presumably chronicling how she reacts to all those revelations.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.3/5 based on 731 ratings and 139 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.99/5 based on 830 ratings and 143 reviews.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Horking (v.) : vomiting; coughing up.

 

Excerpts...

    “Okay, listen to this one.  They wrote, ‘Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong.  No matter how fast light travels, it finds the darkness has already got there first, and is waiting for it.’

    Sarah was silent a moment.  “That’s kind of messed up, Daisy.”

    “Yeah, but that doesn’t mean it’s not true.”

    She stopped crawling.

    “Hey!”

   “Hang on a minute,” Daisy said, the pulled a fresh pen from her pocket and scratched out a message of her own, then started crawling again.  “’Without a little darkness from time to time, man would forget that he dwells in the light,’” Sarah read.  "Who said that one, Daze?"

    Daisy continued her crawl for the exit.

    "I did."  (loc. 715)

 

    “What’s the next step in our evolution?  In theirs?  Are they trying to bastardize mankind until we are as much machinery as they are?  And why do humans have exposed metal, while full-on robots are covered with flesh?”

    “They’re probably just trying to make us feel comfortable around them, is all.  Familiar faces and all that.”

    “But why cyborgs?  I mean, take Barry for instance.  He’s basically a sentient toaster covered in steak—”

    “I think he might take issue with that description.”  (loc. 2083)

 

Kindle Details…

    Daisy’s Run goes for $0.99 at Amazon right now.  The other four books in the series are all in the $2.99-$3.99 range; or you can buy the entire series in a bundle for $7.99. Scott Baron has several other Sci-Fi series for your Kindle, and they seem to follow the same pricing strategy: $0.99 for the first book in the series, $2.99-$3.99 for the others, and bundles appropriately discounted.

 

“Yet here you are, a chatty ghost in my head.”  (loc. 2891)

    I couldn’t find much to quibble about in Daisy’s Run.  The pacing seemed a bit slow at first, and the text felt overly-descriptive at first, but that was inevitable since Scott Baron has world-building to do, plus characters and enigmatic plot threads to introduce.  Once that’s done, the action speeds up nicely.

 

    There’s a fair amount of cussing (27 instances in the first 10% of the book) and a couple of rolls-in-the-hay, but nothing lewd and lurid.  Some reviewers were put off by the sex passages, but hey, that’s a common occurrence in Space Opera novels.

 

    Other reviewers felt Daisy was an unlikeable protagonist, one going so far as to accuse her of being a bigot.  Well, it’s true she gets called that at one point in the story, but the alleged bigotry is against robotic entities, and is ultimately proved false.  Methinks someone had a grudge against the author.

 

    My only big gripe has to do with the Amazon blurb for the Kindle edition, where one of the genres is listed as “Humorous Science Fiction”.  Amazon lies.  If you pick up this book for the LOL’s, you’re going to be sorely disappointed.  In fairness though, neither of the other two formats – Audiobook and Paperback, label this as a humorous sci-fi novel.

 

    8 Stars.  Overall, Daisy’s Run kept me interested and fully lived up to my expectations for a Space Opera.  Now that the main characters have been established and the requisite world-building is done, it’s time to get kicking some Chithiid ass in the sequel.

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