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A review by krysley
The Empress Capsule by R.K. Thorne
4.0
I received a free review copy of this book and am voluntarily leaving a review.
This audiobook took me longer to finish than I meant it to - mostly due to needing to get some library audiobooks finished before I had to return them. It's really unfortunate that I had to set it aside because this book was very entertaining.
The best part of The Empress Capsule, in my opinion, were the characters, especially Kael and Xi. Or, better yet, scenes between Kael and Xi. I don't know what it was about those scenes, but I enjoyed every moment of them. I just love sassy AIs, and Xi and Kael's relationship was just so entertaining.
I was a little torn on Ellen Ryu. Now, don't think that I'm saying she was a bad character. As a matter of fact, she was the kind of female character I've been looking for in all of my books recently (I've been on a kick for kickbutt, military-like heroines). Ryu was the exact kind of character I wanted in my books.
The author choosing to make Ellen young (22) just did not compute in my mind. Between the narrator's tone and Ellen's past and experience, I thought she came across better as a middle aged woman (and a bad@$$ one at that). Honestly, I didn't see why it was necessary to make Ellen so young.
It also seemed that Kael was a better developed character than Ellen was. Despite that, I did like the byplay between the two of them. However, if the author was pushing this as a sci-fi romance, I think R.K. Thorne could have built more on the intimacy of their relationship because it often didn't feel like a romance.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book, but I thought the author could have pushed the envelope a little more. It could have had a little more action, a little more harshness, a little deeper romance. It just needed the small extra boost to make it really good.
As for the narrator, I was extremely torn on Susan Ericksen's performance. I really liked Ericksen's tone and cadence, and I think she could become a great narrator. However, it's her character voices that are holding her back. There was a scene specifically between Ellen and Simmons where I couldn't keep track of who was speaking or what was being said versus thought. The same thing happened in the scene where Ellen and Kael are in the bar. Ironically, Ericksen did accents for some of the crew and it's clear who was talking. I don't know why she didn't have more variety for the main characters, but it was incredibly hard to follow.
I'm eagerly waiting to start the next book in the series, but I will be doing it with an ebook version rather than the audiobook.
This audiobook took me longer to finish than I meant it to - mostly due to needing to get some library audiobooks finished before I had to return them. It's really unfortunate that I had to set it aside because this book was very entertaining.
The best part of The Empress Capsule, in my opinion, were the characters, especially Kael and Xi. Or, better yet, scenes between Kael and Xi. I don't know what it was about those scenes, but I enjoyed every moment of them. I just love sassy AIs, and Xi and Kael's relationship was just so entertaining.
I was a little torn on Ellen Ryu. Now, don't think that I'm saying she was a bad character. As a matter of fact, she was the kind of female character I've been looking for in all of my books recently (I've been on a kick for kickbutt, military-like heroines). Ryu was the exact kind of character I wanted in my books.
The author choosing to make Ellen young (22) just did not compute in my mind. Between the narrator's tone and Ellen's past and experience, I thought she came across better as a middle aged woman (and a bad@$$ one at that). Honestly, I didn't see why it was necessary to make Ellen so young.
It also seemed that Kael was a better developed character than Ellen was. Despite that, I did like the byplay between the two of them. However, if the author was pushing this as a sci-fi romance, I think R.K. Thorne could have built more on the intimacy of their relationship because it often didn't feel like a romance.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book, but I thought the author could have pushed the envelope a little more. It could have had a little more action, a little more harshness, a little deeper romance. It just needed the small extra boost to make it really good.
As for the narrator, I was extremely torn on Susan Ericksen's performance. I really liked Ericksen's tone and cadence, and I think she could become a great narrator. However, it's her character voices that are holding her back. There was a scene specifically between Ellen and Simmons where I couldn't keep track of who was speaking or what was being said versus thought. The same thing happened in the scene where Ellen and Kael are in the bar. Ironically, Ericksen did accents for some of the crew and it's clear who was talking. I don't know why she didn't have more variety for the main characters, but it was incredibly hard to follow.
I'm eagerly waiting to start the next book in the series, but I will be doing it with an ebook version rather than the audiobook.