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Nexus (Sontem Trilogy Book 1) by [Nicolas Wilson]

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Nicolas Wilson

Nexus (Sontem Trilogy Book 1) Kindle Edition

by Nicolas Wilson (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

33 ratings

Book 1 of 2: The Sontem Trilogy

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Captain Anderson Grant of the corporate starship Nexus boldly explores alien worlds (and occasionally the alien women, too). Grant and his crew struggle with the company’s version of manifest destiny, as well as its attempt to coerce them into military force. They begin to question whether the largest threat to their mission and their safety will come from outside the Nexus or from the company that respects them more for their genetic possibilities than their individuality.

Print length

316 pages
Language

English
Publication date

November 19, 2013
Reading age

18 years
File size

3947 KB
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Books In This Series (2 Books)

Complete Series

The Sontem Trilogy

Kindle Edition

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1
Nexus (Sontem Trilogy Book 1)
Nicolas Wilson

(33)

Kindle Edition

$1.21
2
Nexus 2: Sins of the Past (The Sontem Trilogy)
Nicolas Wilson

(2)

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$4.39

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Editorial Reviews

Review

Praise for Nicolas Wilson:

"The best comparison I can make is Douglas Adams onViagra with the Parental Guidance filter turned off. But that doesn'tquite do it justice."
MDG,Amazon review of Nexus
"He possesses a dry wit that one finds in anaccomplished satirist, and many of his stories dip into samplings ofhigh hyperbolae that only men such as Vonnegut tap into to exploitthe absurd and surreal."
PeterL. Ivey, Amazon review of Selected Short Stories FeaturingAnalog Memory
"...funny and sharp dialogue, very much like`Men Who Stare at Goats' by Jon Ronson."
CateAgosta, for The Book Nut's Hut, on Dag

About the Author

Nicolas Wilson is a published journalist, graphic novelist, and novelist. He lives in the rainy wastes of Portland, Oregon with his wife, four cats and a dog.

Nic's work spans a variety of genres, from political thriller to science fiction and urban fantasy. He has several novels currently available, and many more due for release in the next year. Nic's stories are characterized by his eye for the absurd, the off-color, and the bombastic.

For information on Nic's books, and behind-the-scenes looks at his writing, visit nicolaswilson.com.

Product details

ASIN : B00EN05Q3E
Publication date : November 19, 2013
Language : English
File size : 3947 KB
Simultaneous device usage : Unlimited
Text-to-Speech : Enabled
Screen Reader : Supported
Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
X-Ray : Not Enabled
Word Wise : Enabled
Print length : 316 pages
Page numbers source ISBN : 149129079X
Lending : Enabled

Best Sellers Rank: #2,133,122 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #4,011 in Technothrillers (Kindle Store)
- #5,921 in Colonization Science Fiction eBooks
- #6,722 in Space Fleet Science Fiction eBooks

Customer Reviews:
33 ratings

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Top reviews from the United States

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Fast-paced sci-fi that pulls no punches

Reviewed in the United States on October 18, 2013

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Captain Anderson Grant works for Sontem, a powerful corporation devoted to for-profit space exploration. As he and his crew are careening through space, he encounters a planet inhabited by a sentient alien race. He accompanies a small detachment to initiate diplomacy. The catch is that the alien race is telepathic, and their customs do not recognize formalizing agreements through paper. To seal the deal, the alien diplomat, a female nicknamed Sam, penetrates Grant's mind telepathically (and rather suggestively). Only, as an unexpected side effect of their mental link, Grant and Sam become romantically engaged, which is a heinous act for someone of Sam's caste. Sam stows away on Grant's shuttle back to the main ship. Now the two of them aren't fully themselves anymore. As a result of their union, Grant has acquired psychic parasites, while Sam is a fugitive from her home planet, where she will be put to death if ever she were to return.

That may sound like a whole lot, but that's just the beginning. The characters have the whole rest of the book to sort through their predicaments.

The characters were entertaining. Grant's crew consists of a bunch of hardened cynics. Sharp wit is in plentiful supply.

Grant himself is cynical and witty - and has a penchant for threatening to fire his subordinates out of an airlock into space - but ultimately cares for his crew.

There were plenty of pop culture references thrown in as "Easter eggs", which was an aspect I enjoyed. I particularly appreciated the reference to "the cake is a lie" and how that was turned on its head.

It's a great, enjoyable read, and you definitely shouldn't miss this one.

7 people found this helpful

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Colleen Bratley

A sci-fi tale of creative universal encounters

Reviewed in the United States on January 18, 2014

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This story was sometimes hard for me to follow. The characters were referred to by their division, rather than names. So who exactly and what type of person this was became confusing to me. After a time though, I could differentiate each one, just wish they would have had real names. Just sayin...
The dialogue was another nerve rattling part. Many adult books have sexual innuendos and even explicit scenes, but this book was rife with sex talk, scenes and innuendos, which wasn't my cup of tea at all.
The story itself was good and could have been done very well without all the added language. I actually think the baseline of the story could very well have been added to an episode of like a star trek series. Should the trilogy continue, I would like to see more of the story and less of the unneeded sexual explicit words.
The author writes well, and will undoubtedly have great success with his writing career. I would love to read another of his books, especially without the constant sexual language, because just the story in this one book alone was worth the read. It took you and quite an adventure with clever and creative alien encounters and expeditions.
I would only recommend this book to those who don't care about the added language and want to read a great sci-fi story. I would highly recommend reading Nic's books if you want to read a great story written by an accomplished author.

One person found this helpful

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joe-maryland

Could Not Finish

Reviewed in the United States on November 7, 2016

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I cannot finish this. The premise is quite good - a sublight starship sets out to explore the galaxy and make trade deals with various civilizations they find. This will be a generation ship, the original crew will not still be alive when or if they ever go home.
Those are the good points. The bad points are everything else. The story is told mainly in dialog and it is SO annoying. SecEng told SecNav they are about to get boned. It is all job titles, not names, and the sexual jokes are nonstop and 7th grade level. Their captain is like a junior high school male student's dream of being a horny space captain. It is all lame sexual innuendo all the time except when the captain gets angry and threatens to kill people that annoy him. The thought of spending my entire remaining life on a ship with a captain with the mental age of 13 telling masturbation jokes is not a pleasant one. Also first contact with aliens and working out mining deals is trivially easy. Really??????

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Tom Tinney

A speedy ride with clever writing

Reviewed in the United States on October 4, 2013

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As mankind journeys outward, we encounter other species and societies. The art of the deal is central to our long term planning and the crew of the Nexus has been prepped for their multi-generational journey.

This book reads at a fast pace. I finished it in two sittings. The dialogue is extensive, rapid fire and very clever. The main character telling the story is larger than life and provides an anchor point for the story. The other characters only show depth during storytelling diatribes, but they are entertaining and fill in the plot arcs nicely. I like that the book starts off with the realization that corporations and the need for raw materials will drive our exploration and colonization efforts, so capitalism is alive and well.

Overall, I like the concept, the quick moving style and the universe the author created for the novel. The plot twists and "revelations" come about rapid fire, with very few breaks or build up. I enjoyed the book for those aspects.

That said, there was a big downside with the constant obsessive sexual references, calling each other genitalia based nicknames and general "Smarminess" of the characters/aliens as they seemed transfixed on mating with each other no matter what the circumstance (or willingness of the other species/person/????). At one point I went to the cover to verify it did not read "National Lampoons Nexus One". What could have been a device to move the story occasionally, provide some humorous banter and spice it up at key points became a tedious, continual and obvious mechanism that detracted from an otherwise great effort. If I was fourteen I would have probably giggled about it, but I am not, so I won't. For that overused distraction, the book lost a star. I hope his next effort lets his brilliant and quick-witted writing hold our attention and reduces the distractions to a footnote.

5 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

Dragon63

Carry on Star Trek

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 3, 2014

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Nexus tells the tale of a starship carrying hundreds of crew that heads into the galaxy to seek out new life and new civilisations – and make mining treaties for the benefit of the corporation who sent them out. Their captain is a sex-obsessed smart-arse and the rest of the crew aren't much better. I found myself irresistably imagining Carry on Star Trek for the first half of the novel (for the non-Brits reading this, the Carry On films were a series of innuendo-laden comedies – Nexus has much the same feel, with vast numbers of sexual references, fleeting nudity and efforts at humour, but no actual sex scenes). The novel has no underlying narrative thrust and feels like a clutch of episodes run together. Despite the Star Trek vibes, the majority of the events are shipboard, with only four somewhat sketchily described alien worlds visited – the core of the story is the interaction between the characters stuck on a ship for the long haul. The captain's view is that the majority of that interaction involves sex. He also (in best Captain Kirk mode) gets involved with a sexy alien telepath – the consideration of the rest of the ship's response to her is one of the most interesting themes of the novel. As the book continues, the ethical and philosophical questions of the future of the crew and of their obligations to their parent corporation take centre stage, leading to a finale that heads onwards in the hopes of a sequel.
The writing is good and witty in places, and has a nice line in SF references. It loses a star for the lack of narrative drive, but the growing humanity of the characters as the ship travels on compensates for this to some extent. Not perfect by any means, and the obsession with sex can become a little wearing at times (even the aliens seem sex-obsessed in human ways), but still more original than most Star Trek lookalikes.

Geoff Nelder

Coruscating read in sexed up Nexus

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 13, 2014

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Nexus is a huge spaceship sent from Earth to further explore the universe, and subdue aliens, Standard scifi then? Far from it. The narrator is the arrogant, bullying, sex-obsessed captain, who gets away with his behaviour because of his sense of humour and intelligence. His value as the captain becomes evident not so much when he is pistol-wielding his attacks on bear-like or other weird aliens but when he instigates a momentous decision cusp in the plot about three-quarters way through. The need for that change and its consequences lift the erstwhile misogynistic captain to a new level. Until that point we don’t even know his name even though he is the narrator.

I am as interested in sex as the next deviant but to see it as innuendo or described three times a page for over 300 pages when I’m relaxing into a scifi novel. There, I’m sure that comment will sell copies!

Besides the sex, the other main feature of the writing style is the captain’s wry sense of humour. I like it though his puns can be cringe-worthy. Better examples are:
'I missed the bed by a foot, but the floor was surprisingly comfortable.' I imagine the constant use of abbreviations, admittedly often used in military institutions, is also meant humorously. I will let readers work these out (as the writer does) NavDiv, EngDiv, SecDiv, SecOff, BacFarm and SecDet. Easy, and sometimes fun to work out but it can lift the reader out of the fiction dream especially when placed close together as in “...PsychDiv would ask MedDiv to castrate me if I traumatized one of your SecOffs...”

Nicolas Wilson also goes a little OTT with his quasi-scientific and engineering explanations. Don’t get me wrong, I know plenty of scifi readers who love knowing the nitty-gritty details but sometimes, as Santiago says to our captain, “It’s a little insulting getting a chemistry lesson in baby-talk, but ... is how your mind operates.” Haha, yes and we readers agree! That’s not meant to be negative. I’m having fun, and there are keen moments worth quoting too. Eg “I’ve often found that men who want power least, exercise it best.” And, “Telepathy’s a known unknown.” Both I might quote on Twitter. The latter quote is an example of the narrator’s penchant for echoing his own words but there’s plenty of names and incidents that nerdy readers will recognize as possible homage to classic Sci Fi. Eg Santiago from Mike Resnick’s best selling novel, Haley as the ship’s AI.

I like the approach to first contact in this book. Drop a Commbox onto the planet and wait for the locals to learn English or for the box’s translator to successfully do its job, before landing with guns. Trouble is the latter always seemed to happen, bringing me to an issue I have with most scifi novels. The aliens are not alien enough. They have the same kind of hierarchical structure as on Earth down to Kings, nobles and captains. Yes, they are single-celled, or weird-looking but within minutes of contact they are speaking and acting like Americans even down to idioms and references to American TV shows and history. In Nexus we have an alien captain saying “They’re not going to nickel and dime us to death.” What? And they use pistols that our captain can just pick up and use with a trigger and “it’s safety is off”. Haha, groan.

Overall, Nexus is full of ideas, sex, fights and intelligence that should appeal to most scifi readers.

Sophia Gampton

Something a little different!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 3, 2013

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I really had no idea what to expect when I began reading this novel and I don't think anything could have prepared me for what I found.
I have never read anything quite like this and so it is difficult to pigeon-hole it if that is why you are reading this review.
Set in space aboard a human spacecraft, this story is amusing as well as full of sci-fi interest. The humour comes from the amount of sexual innuendo which permeates throughout the pages. This is very tongue in cheek as the characters are able to read the minds of their colleagues so no secret or desire is safe.
The sci-fi element comes from the journey this spacecraft takes as they travel through the galaxy coming into contact with a variety of aliens, some friendly and some not so friendly.
If you like a light-hearted read and have an interest in the space age then this book is recommended to you.

RayD

Interstellar Romcom

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 9, 2018

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I missed out on some of the American humour. How to describe it?

In keeping with the books style...

Insurrection, Wacky Races, "Invasion of the sex crazed telepathic alien"

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