3 out of 4 stars
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30th Century: Escape by Mark Kingston Levin, is a science and erotic fiction novel. At 464 pages I’d say it makes for a very memorable read as it is not too long that you get tired or lose the story in the end. Self-published in June 2015, it is the first in a trilogy. The cover of the book depicts a woman and in the background, I get the sense she is in outer space. I got the vibe of her floating while looking at it and it’s very easy to get lost or entranced with this image.
The book tells the story of how fifty members of the secret service in the 30th century, who happen to be natural, go back in time to the 27th century. The mission is to infect the Syndos, who are genetically modified humans with a virus that will give them compassion and prevent them from wiping the naturals in the 30th century. All seems to go well, but the commander of the SS team, named Jennifer Hero changes course and rather than joining her team she goes back to 2015.
Jennifer Hero had a partner name Zexton Ho, who was brilliant and thus responsible for creating the time-travel machine. They also had a love affair and after his death, Jennifer continued his work and was able to transport her team back to the 27th century to carry out their mission. While in 2015, Jennifer has to navigate surviving and fitting in without blowing her cover. I was immediately curious about why Jennifer didn’t join her SS team to the 27th century, readers will have to stick around to find out.
I commend the author for using the opportunity of studying for his Ph.D. to write a book of fiction surrounded by dark matter. In certain areas of the book, I noticed how much research must have gone in and it almost felt like the author was defending his thesis to me. However, I did find a lot of typographical errors. For example, Table of contents: Chapter 29 should be aligned, “though” instead of “through”, there were some writings saying “3 highlighters”, do not know if it is only in my copy, some missing words and letters as well.
What I also didn’t like while reading the book especially getting to the end was that I felt that Jennifer and her love interest developed too abruptly. For a moment I thought I had missed a scene, even the erotic part didn’t feel authentic and passionate or desperate but more like being forced. I got the sense that I was reading a fast-forward version and the author couldn’t wait to get to another point.
Notwithstanding, what I really loved while reading 30th Century: Escape is the fact that it opened my mind to a lot of questions I have been having about sexuality, my sexuality. It seemed so easy here, but I know in real life, it’s not as easy but surely, I can see the possibilities and I am encouraged. Several times I struggled as I had decided to take away only one star then I would encounter the errors like the ones mentioned above and want to take two or three stars away, but with the personal lessons learnt and the questions it generated in my mind I will rate this book a 3 out of 4 stars because I can see the intelligence of the author and with a little more editing the errors wouldn't be present.
I would recommend this book firstly to those who can take an extremely erotic book as it contains graphic multi-partner sex, I would recommend it to those who can allow their mind run wild with imaginations regarding sex, not advisable for young readers. I would also recommend this book to those who are interested in time travel, cosmology and even history of Polynesia.
Mo
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30th century:escape
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