When I read the synopsis for this book, I was excited. The concept sounded really interesting and I was hopeful. Unfortunately, the book didn't meet my expectations. Nearly the entire book is spent in preparing the extraterrestrial beings for what life is like on Earth and, perhaps unsurprisingly, Earth is kind of boring. The book seemed like a weird manual for how to think and act like a human, albeit a more mentally aware human, which wasn't very interesting.
The book also works really hard to blame all the bad things about human society--war, racism, sexism, anger, poverty--on "negative" energy aliens, or literally The Dark Side. There is straight up almost a direct quote from Star Wars in this book: "Fear, as the tool of the dark side, is the root of all evil. Fear leads to hate, and hate to anger, and anger to revenge." True, it's not exactly what Yoda says ("fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering") but come on. It's so close. When I got to that quote, I pretty much gave up on this book, which is unfortunate since it comes so early.
All that to say the writing style isn't bad, but the overall tone is one of mysticism (hello chakras) and it just wasn't for me.
Overall, I'm sorry that I'm giving such a negative review but I just didn't like this book.

4.5
I really enjoyed this as a lover of all things mystical & with an interest in spirituality, specifically the kind that is represented in this book.

I feel like it can be enjoyed as a spiritualist & also as a cynic who can read it as a form of sci-fi or fantasy.

I felt like parts could be repetitive and in some ways it was basic but overall, very enjoyable & I can’t wait to read the rest of the series.

A call goes out across the universe....volunteers are needed for a mission to Earth. Seven times it has been tried to liberate humanity from the dark lords that keep the planet from progressing. And every time the effort has failed. Many respond to the call, eager to free Earth from its dark lords and help humankind venture into the fourth dimension and beyond. Volunteers will be transported to Earth, stripped of their memories, and mingled into society. Before the battle against the evil forces holding the planet, the Venutians will have to remember who they are and bring forth their multi-dimensional strengths for the war to free earth. But it will be difficult. The dark lords use many vices to hold humanity prisoner....drugs, power, money....it will be a hard fight.

The world building in this book is an interesting concept, but nothing really new. The rest of the universe has evolved past selfishness and more base emotions to a higher class of emotions....love, peace, acceptance for all, etc. While humans on Earth are held back by their more base emotions and behaviors. While based on truth, I have to be honest and say I found the obvious social commentary difficult to read. I understand the intent, but the story really isn't sci-fi. It's a 344 page tale about the evils of current political, social and acceptance issues....with multi-dimensional aliens thrown in. While I applaud the effort to weave a intergalactic mission around current problems, this sort of story has been done to death in the past few years in one way or another, and the plot of this book just wasn't strong enough to carry it out in a good way.

I stopped reading at about 75% and DNF'd this book. This story is just clearly not for me. I did not like the writing style and found the obviously contrived plot just too much to slog through for 300+ pages. I agree with the basic underlying idea -- we need to evolve past petty hatred and violence. But, I'm not going to make it through a tale of peace-loving aliens coming to save us from our backwards ways. The writing and plot are just not strong enough to carry the concept. That is only my opinion as a reviewer. Others might like this story and offer a differing viewpoint. But, I have to always be honest in my reviews.....and I just could not finish this book.

**I voluntarily read an advanced readers copy of this book from John Hunt Publishing via NetGalley. All opinions expressed are entirely my own.**