First things first: that cover tho.
The Stars Like Gods has a quieter opening than previous books, centering on all the characters we’ve gotten to know throughout Exin Ex Machina and Of a Darker Void as they begin the process of regaining some measure of composure and organization after the disasters they dealt with at the conclusion of OADV. But it doesn’t take long for the action to pick up—after all, the characters can’t afford to let their guard down for long, because something sinister is on its way.
While OADV had a little more of a space opera feel, TSLG taps back into Asterion Noir’s cyberpunk roots as Nika, Dashiel, and the rest of the cast desperately search for some way to combat the seemingly-unstoppable Rasu. With assistance from some new allies—including my personal favorite, cavalier military man Lance Palmer—and some crucial information from a couple of unexpected, enigmatic sources, they may just concoct a crazy plan to stop the Rasu from wiping out more if not all of the Asterion race…that is, if they can survive the treacherous actions of dissidents among their own people.
You would expect the third installment in an epic sci-fi series like this to conclude with some sort of grand space battle where the heroes band together to defeat the enemy and come away victorious. While there’s nothing wrong with that, we already saw it—several times, in fact—throughout the more space-opera-oriented Aurora Rhapsody saga. What we get instead here in TSLG is a real treat, something I’d certainly never seen before in anything I’d read. It’s executed flawlessly, both in the way it’s written and in relation to the tone of the story. I won’t say any more than that, but you’ll know it when you read it.
And for anyone who has followed the Aurora Rhapsody and Asterion Noir series in their entirety, there are some fun, familiar elements that should keep you turning pages and making one or both of the following faces. They certainly did for me.
And as this particular book draws to a close, it becomes obvious that there’s much more to come. If you thought this was going to be the end of this series, you were kidding yourself. This is G.S. Jennsen we’re talking about.
The Stars Like Gods is now available in ebook and paperback formats, with audio soon to come. Grab the first two Asterion Noir installments, Exin Ex Machina and Of a Darker Void, in paperback, audio, and wherever ebooks are sold.
ABOUT G.S. JENNSEN
G. S. Jennsen lives in Colorado with her husband and two dogs. She has written ten novels, all published by her imprint, Hypernova Publishing. She has become an internationally bestselling author since her first novel, Starshine, was published in March 2014. She has chosen to continue writing under an independent publishing model to ensure the integrity of the Aurora Rhapsody series and her ability to execute on the vision she’s had for it since its genesis.
While she has been a lawyer, a software engineer and an editor, she’s found the life of a full-time author preferable by several orders of magnitude. When she isn’t writing, she’s gaming or working out or getting lost in the Colorado mountains that loom large outside the windows in her home. Or she’s dealing with a flooded basement, or standing in a line at Walmart reading the tabloid headlines and wondering who all of those people are. Or sitting on her back porch with a glass of wine, looking up at the stars, trying to figure out what could be up there.
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