A Galaxy Unknown [Paperback]

Thomas DePrima (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 10, 2010

June 6th, 2267 - A life-pod, missed by rescuers following the mysterious explosion of a Space Command vessel a decade earlier, is discovered by a passing freighter in deep space. A young officer, still cocooned in stasis sleep, is found inside. When revived, Ensign Jenetta Carver learns of the lawlessness that now suffuses interstellar space. Pirates and slavers seem able to attack and pillage with impunity. Space Command has committed its full resources to stopping the anarchy, but criminal groups have grown immensely powerful. Although determined to rejoin SC as soon as possible, Jenetta is captured by pirates before that can happen. At first she fears for her life, but when she's indelibly marked as a pleasure slave, she gets mad; fighting mad. And when they tamper with her DNA to make her appear sexier, she gets even madder; killing mad. Can a petite blonde, cut off from Space Command, create more mayhem among the criminal elements than a full decade of SC effort? You'd better believe it!

Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: lulu.com (August 10, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1435732774
• ISBN-13: 978-1435732773
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (297 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,688,704 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

112 of 142 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Fun to read but flawed, August 18, 2010

By 

Doc Johnny - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: A Galaxy Unknown (A Galaxy Unknown, Book 1) (Kindle Edition)

I struggled a bit in finding the right rating for this book.

Positives:

1) For the most part, fun to read.

Negatives:

1) At times chock-full of unnecessary exposition. The long aside explaining FTL travel added nothing to this space opera
2) The main character is a God-Mode-Sue.

-SPOILERS-
1) She doesn't age.
2) She heals like Wolverine
3) She is a better tactician/strategist than Sun-Tzu
4) She fights like Bruce Lee
5) She shoots like Bullseye
6) She literally can do no wrong
7) Everyone except clear strawmen characters love and respect her.
8) She is genetically re-engineered to be a supermodel sex-kitten who is feels pain as pleasure

EDIT=======
In fairness to the author who posted a detailed defense of his book in the comments, the above contain some elements of hyperbole.

I will also include one other criticism that I should have included originally. Suppose you came up with an immortality serum, how would you use it? How high on your list of uses is "make immortal sex slaves"?
===========

In a lot of ways the writing is dreadful. The superhuman main character combined with the dull exposition should have been horrible. Yet nevertheless I enjoyed the book. I even bought the sequel. This author has a lot of potential, and if the flaws can be overcome, this could be great.

209 of 269 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Poorly written, enormous holes in plot and science, but a glimmer emerges, October 28, 2010

By 

Larry in Lafayette (Lafayette, California) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: A Galaxy Unknown (A Galaxy Unknown, Book 1) (Kindle Edition)

I ordered A Galaxy Unknown based on good reviews without trying a sample first. I had a sinking feeling in the first paragraph. Here it is, in full:

"A dizzying montage of abrasive red and white splashes from the overhead light slathered the room and savagely doused her sleeping form without effect. But when the red alert horn's undulating shrieks stabbed mercilessly at her body and knifed their way to the marrow of her bones, consciousness aggressively irrupted into Jenetta Carver's sleep-anesthetized brain."

Where does one start critiquing that? If they are having no effect, why are the lights "dizzying," "abrasive," and "savage"? Why would sound knife to the marrow, which is not found in bones anywhere near the ears? Why is consciousness, not sound, aggressive? Is consciousness so different from the brain that it can intrude upon the brain in an unevenly increasing manner? (Got thesaurus?)

Sentences like "... it greatly increased an already heightened state of agitation." and "The gymnastic movement evinced a legerity that contrasted markedly ..." Irrupted? Legerity? The author should tattoo Stephen King's words to the inside of his forehead: "Any word you have to hunt for in a thesaurus is the wrong word. There are no exceptions to this rule." Then the author wouldn't use words like "immurement," "pertinacious," and "sedulous." To be fair, the writing gets a little less overwrought as the story progresses. Still bad, but better.

OK, enough about the writing. What about the science, the immersion in a different time? In a word, dismal. During this time they have zero gravity, faster than light travel, and faster than light communication. But picture frames are "black anodized aluminum", mirrors and viewing ports are polycarbonate, explosive bolts hold on a protective cover on "a small radio telemetry array" (necessary to compute basic nav data, for some reason) and after a training exercise in which a power unit's "circuit rods" are replaced by our heroine, it bursts into flames.

Inconsistencies abound. Jenetta's rescue pod is almost out of power, but has maintained an artificial gravity field for 10 years (which later on is said to require significant power.) Computers can bring an FTL space ship into normal space and not let it resume FTL travel, but torpedoes have to be guided manually. Jenetta is programmed to enjoy pain (don't ask) while unconscious and is later deprogrammed in a few hours, but it takes eight to ten years to completely rewrite her DNA. Generally the science has the feeling that it is made up on the spot to satisfy a plot requirement, then dragged, kicking and screaming, through the rest of the book, leaving implausability in its wake.

OK, enough about the science. How about the plot? Here is where the glimmer of hope emerges. Not because it is anything but preposterous. But because after despairing at the ambiguity and obscurity of much modern science fiction, there is something refreshing in the naivete of a plot like the one in "A Galaxy Unknown." (Spoiler alert!) The more hopeless her situation, the more Jenetta triumphs in the end. Tattooed, trapped, brainwashed, and abused in a detention center in an enemy's hollow asteroid surrounded by 18,000 enemy? Of course she is going to escape in command of not one but two of the most most powerful ships in the known universe and blow the base up behind her. The greater her triumph, the larger the challenge that comes next. Returning Space Command's two lost ships? Of course Space Command is going to shackle her and put her up on charges for desertion, murder, impersonating an officer, etc.

I did end up reading the whole thing. But I really have some trouble understanding how anyone could say A Galaxy Unknown was well written in any way. How about a button like the "Prime Eligible" one that filters out anyone who gave this book four or five stars from affecting the reviews I see? I might start to trust reviews again. Still, I'm envious of anyone who has rated this book highly because they have obviously never read any good science fiction. What I would give to be able to have all of William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, Robert A. Heinlein, Larry Niven, Vernor Vinge, Greg Bear, Orson Scott Card, Daniel Keys Moran, etc., in front of me? A lot.

If, after what I wrote, you still want to get A Galaxy Unknown, you should. And if I'm wrong anywhere, please comment. I haven't forgotten that Thomas DePrima has written and completed books that people enjoy. That is a significant accomplishment in itself, and one that I admire.

25 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Almost like Plan Nine From Outer Space, in book form, January 11, 2011

By 

Andrew R. Thaler (Brecksville, OH United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: A Galaxy Unknown (A Galaxy Unknown, Book 1) (Kindle Edition)

There's no way to put this gently: This is not good writing, let alone good science fiction. However, if you either don't notice or don't mind all the badness, or if you can suffer through and skip over the worst parts, it can get mildly entertaining at points.

I originally purchased this book via a Kindle suggestion. It had a high star rating (really, guys?), and I saw that there was a whole series. So it seemed like it might be popular enough. And hey -- I actually enjoy reading the occasional trashy sci-fi series every so often. Cheesy military SF is my secret vice. But after getting about hundred pages in, I literally gave up in disgust, stopped reading, and deleted it. (Eventually I realized that I could never again let myself impulsively buy Amazon recommendations from authors I don't recognize without getting a sample first.)

Fast-forward six months. I've forgotten all about it, and I'm looking through my suggestions again. Hm, it keeps recommending the second book in some science fiction series. That sounds like it might be fun, but I can't start a series there. Let's go sample the first one. Wait, I already bought it? That's funny. Maybe I should give it another chance. And so I recover it from the archives and sit down to try to read it again.

Wow. So yeah, my first impression was spot on. It's not good.

Here's a partial list of the abuses this book delivers. There are mild spoilers in here, I suppose, but in a way I think the spoilers are what might possibly entice you to buy the book.

- Template: "An unlikely hero overcomes all odds." Like every book L.E. Modesitt Jr has ever written, but even more ham-handed and clumsy. Right down to the hero constantly overhearing people talking about her amazing achievements.
- Hero Perfection: Strikingly beautiful 21-year old ensign with a heart of gold leaves everyone she meets in awe of her. She defeats legions of enemies through her natural talent for both hand-to-hand combat and space battle, and saves planets as an afterthought. Halfway through the book she is genetically modified by the bad guys so that she will grow six inches, have bigger breasts, never need makeup, heal almost instantly, experience pain as sexual pleasure, and live to be 5000 years old. And she poops gold too. OK, actually, I made up the pooping part but the rest is all straight from the book.
- Slow Start: I honestly had to skim the beginning because it led off with chapters and chapters of nothing happening. Hopelessly dry political background, a few pages of the heroine's family life, etc. The book didn't really begin until chapter five.
- Military tactics: 19th century clipper ships. Straight up. And I quote: "Contact off the larboard fo'c'sle, Captain!"
- Science: Only used for plot points, and consistently invented and described about five pages prior to the point where it's needed.
- Futurism: Computers might as well not exist.
- Language: Did the marine pull out his gun and blast the bad guy into dust? No, the space marine pulled out his space gun and blasted the bad guy into space dust!
- Dialogue: Sometimes OK, often bad. When it's bad it's stilted and formal - utilizing word choices, constructions, and dare I say turns of phrase that would astonish if ever you heard an individual of your acquaintance actually speak like that. Which you won't.
- Character descriptions: Every character is described exactly once, including a few random details and, amusingly, almost always a height. "Looking at Dommler with piercing steel-grey eyes, the five-foot eleven-inch officer said"....
- Rambling: The book frequently goes off in odd directions for pages at a time, going down some rathole that's not really in service to the plot or anything in particular. It eventually comes back to the action, but always left me with a kind of vaguely puzzled feeling.
- Predictability: No surprises. Zero. When the heroine visits the giant enemy base in a tiny lowly space tug and happens to see two enormous stolen battleships that the bad guys captured from the good guys, can you guess how she leaves in the end? Exactly.

The one redeeming aspect of this book is that, if you can manage to fight past its many (oh so many) flaws, there's the kernel of ... something. A fantasy adventure of pure escapism. One where the good guys always win, the bad guys always lose, the hero is always perfect, the bureaucrats are always bumbling, and the just-plain-folks are the best people ever. It's a Saturday morning cartoon or a 1930's pulp serial. The kid in me still secretly likes it a little bit no matter how bad it is. And hey, maybe there's even a little bit of hipster in me that likes it ironically. Two stars.