I admit my life took me away from reading for quite a stint but when I got a message from someone publishing her first novel, I figured this was as good of a time as any to start this blog up again. Full disclosure I was asked to read and review this book before its release, but I do not know the author, and this was a bit of a cold call which I usually turn down (more so because I don’t want to be FLOODED with requests than any other reason.) Still, it’s good to get my feet wet again.
And Entheophage did not disappoint! It’s the best first novel I have read from any of the indie authors I have reviewed in a long while! Entheophage is an imaginative and unique sci-fi with a lot of heart. It winds through a complicated but easy to grasp plotline with multiple characters all responding to the events in the book in a different way. It reminded me very much of something Michael Crichton would have written back in the day.
Initially I was expecting this book to be just another plague scenario that got into the nitty gritty details of how nations would deal with a spreading threat but this was merely the backdrop for a story that asked a lot of questions and left the readers to decide for themselves.
The main question was what would happen if Nature could talk directly to people? Would we listen? What if it’s talking through our children? What then? Would we allow for that to happen or would we fight it tooth and nail? And what if some of those children died in the process and got ‘infected’ with this strange new sentience in the same way they might catch a cold? The book is a slow and ever evolving trek through the lives of the individuals trying to answer these questions. It’s got science, mystery, psychology, and philosophy, but it isn’t dense and remained approachable by laymen.
All and all it was a refreshing read both scientific and moral and it couldn’t have come out at a better time when we should perhaps be returning to these old ways of framing a story – a bit like the Twilight Zone – a story with heart as much as sense. I would highly recommend it to anyone who loves sci-fi, moral dramas, or even just a story with a complex cast of characters. Entheophage can now be bought on Amazon (and hey, if you buy it from this link I’ll get a small commission too… so technically you’ll be supporting TWO indie authors.)
