The Last Human is a very interesting take on a character who is the last human to exist in the galaxy.. Title pretty much nails it, right?

The world building, in terms of the city-scape and technology was interesting and well done. I think the themes explored in this were interesting, such as the idea of what constitutes as a person and how this related to the idea of artificial intelligence. I think the author also integrates common issues with technology into the story in a way that we can relate to in our current world and the ever growing influence of technology.

But one major messy thing: rapidly changing goals. This book all over the place. It does not have an overarching plot. This leads to a very fast pace and a sense of not knowing what will happen, which is good. This also leads to several issues that destroy The Last Human's overall quality. It felt like there was so much scrambling toward the second half. It’s worth noting that I did enjoy this. Even when plot twists were obvious, I found myself turning pages pretty quickly and enjoying the buildup to said plot twists. And wanting to find out what happened with these characters. Maybe there’s something to be said for being so fast-paced the reader doesn’t notice the crap?

I think this book is a unique, quick read that can present some interesting ideas to think about, but lacks coherence and organization.

A quirky, high-concept space opera, THE LAST HUMAN, by Zach Jordan, follows Sarya, a rather plain person in a galaxy of infinite diversity. Sarya's true identity as a human is a closely held secret by her and her adoptive mother, a violent species more apt to kill than love. When an assassin shows up to exterminate Sarya, she is quickly catapulted in a race to protect herself, all the while realizing she is really just a pawn in someone's galactic master plan and Sarya must decided who to trust and quickly, before an apocalyptic catastrophe unfolds.
Jordan creates a reality in space that so humongous that it is hard to even grasp. Throughout the book, I was constantly trying to keep up with the concept of his reality that I felt like I was missing some of the nuances and small details of the main characters, particularly Sarya, and therefore I couldn't fully connect with her. That being said, the story was unique, mindbending, and exciting. Jordan's ability to create and describe aliens was load of fun to read as well. The was a little Hitchhiker's Guide feel to the book.
I enjoyed read THE LAST HUMAN and would recommend it to sci-fi fans looking for a new take on space and how good and evil unfodd within it.

Sarya the daughter is the Last Human in the galaxy. She spends her days on Watertower Station with her adopted mother, think something akin to a Black Widow spider named Shenya the Widow. When she is recognized, Sarya's world begins to crumble, creating a chain of events that may vary well destroy the galaxy.

This is a well written book that falls short for me in the end. The writing, world building, and imagery are amazing. The author puts you in each scene he creates. However, at the midway point, things unravel some and the way the story moved became a little confusing for me. I would have to reread at times, wondering, "How did we get here?" I believe the philosophical points in the story could have benefited from a little more hashing out and that the ending was wrapped up just a bit too quickly.

My thanks to the author, Ballantine, Del Rey, and NetGalley for a gifted copy in exchange for my honest review.

This is science fiction set in the far future. The author works hard to create a unique world; however, it falls into the trap of placing those silly humans as the most disliked species in the universe. Perhaps in a world turned upside down by a worldwide pandemic I could not “ suspend my disbelief” and enter into Mr. Jordan’s universe. I appreciate NetGalley for the chance to read “ The Last Human” and hope the book does well.

The Last Human starts out really well. We meet a large intelligent Black Widow spider raising a human child in a vast Network of species. Shenya the Widow must however keep the real species of her adopted child Sarya the Daughter from everyone else on the space station on which they live, since humans were the most dangerous race in the Universe until they were destroyed. Sarya must pretend to be Spaal, a species with a low level of intelligence, when your intelligence Tier is everything in the world of the Network.

The culture of the Widow is fascinating and detailed. Pain without fear is a central proverb. If you don’t like it, you are free to borrow one of my blades. The standard Widow apology is Beware. Widows are incredibly dangerous, but they are “allowed to mingle with Network society because, like any other evolved complex individual, she is in control of her instincts.” (p. 63) Unlike humans.

There is no doubt this book is imaginative. There are nice twists of phrase, like “whatever plots your orbit” (p. 43). The relationship between Sarya and Shenya and the world building is great. Then – a shift. A shift to a lot of aimless philosophical wandering. Followed by a complete train wreck after going off the rails into a ruin of one star plotting and characterization.

The second half of the book is so different from the first it’s almost like it was written by someone else. However, 50% of the Goodreads ratings (as of 5/17/2020) are four or five stars. If you are at all intrigued by The Last Human you’ll have to read it for yourself and decide what you think of it. The Last Human has touches of Men in Black, the Borg from Star Trek, and my least favorite parts of Douglas Adams.

I read an advance reader copy of The Last Human from Netgalley.

This was a fun read. Sarya is the only human left in the universe and is being raised by a gigantic spider-like alien, Shenya. The way society is structured by "intelligence" among different castes was interesting and provocative. All together, a good example of how sci-fi can provide a framework to explore moral and ethical situations and ideas – all while keeping things light and funny.

Set in a galaxy, far, far, away, humans have been driven to the brink of extinction and are one of the most despised species in the universe due to the havoc and destruction they've caused. Sarya believes she the last human in the in existence but must use disguises to protect herself. However, this all changes with the arrival of a bounty hunter leading to a strange and action-packed adventure.

Fell in love with the concept, not so impressed by the execution. The plot tried so hard to be quirky and humorous akin to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but it was confusing and often went off on random tangents. New characters are constantly introduced and a lot of things happened in between but I really couldn't get into the plot The two stars are given for the worldbuilding because that aspect was absolutely phenomenal and so well developed.

*Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for providing a free ARC

Review: Whew! I thought this was just going to be fun and silly - and don't get me wrong, parts of it are very much fun and silly - but it was actually brilliant. There's a whole lot going on that makes me award it this adjective and I'm not sure where to start. The writing is funny. The structure works really, really well, using the ranked intelligence system in the book's universe as a parallel for the way the narrative draws upward and outward. There's a whole lore/fairytale-but-make-it-sci-fi vibe going on that I really like (I think it works even better than Marissa Meyer's Cinder series). And the plot is one of the most original I've ever come across. As I read it, it just kept getting better and better. 100% on board for the next book and hoping it focuses on the sub-legal intelligences, who had all the best lines in this one.

I have such mixed feelings on this one!

OVERALL, I enjoyed the book. The author has big ideas mostly well done (I'll get back to that), great characters, and an interesting plot. The writing was warm and humorous, and it makes you think about the involvement of tech in our lives (and our dependence on it, whether we want to admit it or not.)

The characters were my favorite part of the book. Sarya is the last human (that she knows of) in the universe, but since her race was so dangerous, she has to hide her identity. Part of hiding it means that she has been assigned a level 1 intellect. She's much smarter than what people expect of her, and there was a lot in this that made her very relatable. Her adoptive mother is Shenya the Widow, a fierce warrior (I kept picturing a black widow spider with blades for legs, but honestly, I'm still not sure what she was), and despite being completely alien in looks, her protective nature made her one of the most relatable (if you've ever woken a tired mom up from a nap, you'll get a laugh here.) The other characters - a rogue sentient bodysuit named Eleven, the AI that lives in her head has the best personality, the fuzzball alien with a massive IQ, and even The Observer - reminiscent of The Borg, only in a friendlier body that I imagined looked more like Mr. Magoo - which makes them just as confusingly scary.

The plot had a great premise and there were some great twists. I definitely didn't know who should be trusted - the Observer, or the Network, and in the end, I can honestly say I still don't know. And that's part of my struggle with the story. I loved the first third of the story - it was fast-paced, I was quickly drawn in. Then came a plot point where I pretty much had to suspend disbelief and push through - and that's where my struggles started. I really wanted to put it down, but the characters were interesting, and I wanted to see where it was going. The story nipped along, but Sarya's personality changed. I don't know if it was the change in her agency or a shift soon after where the writing got a lot more... philosophical, maybe?

But it was the last third that I really had to push through. There was another major plot point that required me to suspend disbelief. (Actually, I don't know if it was suspending disbelief or pretending I knew what was supposed to have happened in order to make the next bit of plot work.) And I feel like it all kind of went totally off the rails at the end.

This book had a lot of humor and heart, some big ideas on intelligence and technology, interesting reflections on technology, our place in the universe - but in the end, it didn't quite do it for me. I loved what the author was trying to do - and maybe a better explanation of the science, with the multiple universes, and a clearer picture of the world he has built would help.

This story did have a lot going for it and might be the perfect book for other sci-fi fans.

The Last Human is a difficult-to-classify work of speculative fiction by Zack Jordan. Released 24th March 2020 by Penguin Random House on their Del Rey imprint, it's 448 pages and available in hardcover, audio, and ebook formats.

This is a difficult book for me to review. It starts out like a coming of age adventure quest novel with alien life-forms, rebellious teenager, spaceships, quirky sidekicks and all, and then it shifts major gears a couple of times and left me scratching my head by the end. One thing through all the tiers/cycles of the book though, this author can write very very well. There are a number of technically demanding constructions in the book including what is, effectively, telepathic communication on a huge scale, and the author handles it deftly and understandably.

There was a moderate amount of humor included in the dialogue and plot and a majority of it fell flat for me. Some of it was situational (the last human, an angsty teenager whose mother is a giant vicious spider alien called appropriately enough, The Widow, having typical mother daughter issues), some of it was just too vague to strike me as funny/humorous. I do understand that humor is darned difficult under the best of circumstances and this book had so much going on that it's no wonder it didn't always work.

I left this review for more than a week and it has grown on me, but it wasn't a book which grabbed me by the face and wouldn't let go. The author is quite devastatingly capable however, and I will definitely be keeping an eye out for future works.

Three and a half stars (rounded up for quality writing).

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

Sometimes I pick up books on NetGalley because they sound interesting, then I forget about them for a while in the middle of grad school and teaching, and when I open them up I have no idea what I'm going to be reading. The Last Human was like opening a present- suddenly I went from my everyday life of routine and was completely drawn in to this world of weird cyber spider-like beings, intelligences with ratings, and humans are the worst part of galactic... humanity. I absolutely loved this, especially since it felt fresh and funny and crazy and the main character is deeply flawed but also totally bad ass.

Super fun sci-fi, and the more cerebral it gets, the more it's balanced by action and adventure. Five faster than lightspeed stars.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for my unbiased opinion.

I finished The Last Human, Zack Jordan's debut novel and had to stop to wonder what the hell it was I just read. What started out as a clever, interesting story about what appears to be the last human in the universe and her relatively miserable existence devolves into an utter mess with twist after twist meant to prove certain characters' superior intelligence over everyone/thing else. It gets into some weird shit, folks.

I hate when good books go bad like this. I mean, Sarya's adopted mother is some sort of gigantic, evolved black widow spider, and I LIKED that character. This is me - someone who could barely get past any scene with Aragog in the Harry Potter books and still cannot watch those scenes in the movies, and I believe Senya the Widow is one of the book's strongest and most enjoyable characters. Such promise!

The problem lies in the fact that in Mr. Jordan's universe, each species has an intelligence level assigned to it. Most creatures hover around tier two. Tier threes are rare, and tier fours are almost nonexistent, but they exist. Mr. Jordan tries to play with these intelligence levels by showing how a rare tier three creature manipulates the lower tiers with ease - because they think of cause and effect and plan things so much farther in advance. Then we meet not one but two tier fours, and the story essentially dies. From what I can understand, the tier fours spent hundreds of thousands of years plotting and planning against each other, using Sarya as their conduit in order to control the universe. Basically, no one has free will because someone or something else already plotted out their life for them. No, thank you.

What makes it worse is that Mr. Jordan uses descriptors that make no sense given his world. In a novel where there are multiple universes, billions of species, and the technology that makes faster than light travel possible, to have Sarya compare something to cancer eating cells is mystifying. One would imagine that there is no such thing as cancer, or any illness, given the technology that allows all species to cohabitate on space centers together. And yet, she compares something to a body riddled with cancer, and that is just one example.

I admire what Mr. Jordan attempts to do in The Last Human. It really does start out so well. The opening chapter with Sarya and her mother had me stifling my laughter so that I didn't wake up my husband (I started reading it around midnight). Unfortunately, the story becomes a victim of its own cleverness. In attempting to create characters that are 144 times more intelligent than humans, Mr. Jordan loses the plot. Making things worse, his world-building is extremely weak, and he forgets things like science that would help readers understand his world a little more. Instead, we are thrust into Sarya's world with no clear picture of what that world is. There is no doubt that The Last Human is an ambitious debut. Sadly, it is not a good one.

THE LAST HUMAN is the debut sci-fi novel from Zack Norman, and I must say it is an ambitious and entertaining read!
*MILD SPOILERS AHEAD* As might be guessed by the title, Jordan makes humans the most hated species in the galaxy, which in itself is an idea that only a few authors have seriously try to toy with. But this debut novel has a lot of elements to keep in line: Insectoid aliens that serve as the main source of the vocabulary and mindset of the main character; a vastly superior artificial intelligence that basically runs the entire galaxy of sentient beings - both organic and synthetic; shared consciousness and a vast hive mind being that is virtually omnipotent but also pretty seriously crazy. Throw in some well-rounded characters and humorous dialogue as the participants in the story face challenges and intellignences that are both awesome and dangerous. A most noteworthy debut and recommended for fans of mind-bending yet relatable sagas set in the farflung future!

Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for this early copy!

Did not finish - I did not connect with the plot and writing and decided to put it down.

Zack Jordan grew up reading the golden age authors, such as Asimov and Clarke. His education reflected his many interests, art, music, and philosophy. Entering to world of 'work', he was involved with projects for FEMA, the US Army, and the DOD. All this served as excellent training for his behind the scenes work with USKillbotics. Now he has released a stand alone novel. The last human.

In a short video posted by his publisher, Jordan says "every book explores what it is to be human."
The Last Human also explores what it is to be a Sentient Alien Arachnid. Jordan turns the meme of the 'evil spider alien' on it's head. Creating a being that is fascinating and dare I say more compassionate than some humans. The human counterpart to the 'spider' is Sarya. A rebellious teenager who knows without a doubt she is the last of her species. From here the plot unfolds in unexpected directions that leave us questioning yet satisfied. All this and funny as well.

A must read for those who hate spiders. Suitable for the sophisticated Young Adult through all fans of speculative fiction

Recommended

Full disclosure: I received this ARC from netgalley and Penguin Random House in exchange for an unbiased review. Thank you for the opportunity.

As soon as I saw this comped to Douglas Adams, I knew I had to read this. That blurb really just sealed the deal.

The Last Human is a wonderful galactic romp filled with humor, action, and philosophy. Where humans are a villain (not necessarily THE villain) and the universe is so much bigger than you ever imagined.

This book has a little bit of everything. I was expecting it to be more humor, but I’d say it’s more space opera, even though it was fore sure still funny. Zack Jordan will definitely be an author I watch out for from now on.

My Thoughts:

- I knew, from the very first page, that I was going to fall head-over-heels in love with the humor in this. Despite being comped to Douglas Adams, the humor in this feels more subtle. More tongue-in-cheek and less absurd, but not any less funny. The writing style was another benefit to this. I really enjoyed how it just pulled me in. I sometimes struggle with present tense, but it worked really well here. There was a sense of immediacy that just dragged me straight into the action and made me feel engaged with what was happening in the story.

- There are so many different species in this book, and they were all so unique and fun to meet. Perhaps the most interesting part of this was the idea that different creatures had varying intelligences, on a tier scale where tier one was considered sub-citizen, going up to at least tier four, where every tier is 12 times more intelligent than the last. This leads to an interesting problem: anything with intelligence tier 1.7 and lower is considered sub-citizen, as it’s too “dumb.” But are these intelligences really less entities than any other? Are they not also deserving to be citizens? It really gave me pause and made me think. And the absolute best thing about tiers of intelligence: one-upmanship! There’s a subtle battle of the minds played on different levels across this book and I loved it.

- Sarya is a splendid main character, and her arc is just stunning. Little by little, she becomes something greater. Something more. One of my favorite things about this is there’s a thread of free will versus someone in the background pulling the strings and that luck, such as we think of it, is really determined by a higher intelligence and we’re just too dumb to see that. It’s a concept that Sarya really struggles with.

- There are a lot of side characters in this, but they all have such personality, and we do briefly get to see their perspectives. Normally, I’m a bit picky about head-hopping, but I didn’t mind it so much here. The writing style really suited that sort of free-flowing narrative, where it didn’t really matter so much who was doing the telling. There weren’t really major awkward jumps between perspectives, but each one felt like a natural build on the last one, so it made sense instead of tripping me up. This cast, though, is just absolutely full of surprises, and they kept me guessing right to the end. I confess that I was hoping for more of a found family type theme based on the blurb, but I suppose this falls more into the Guardians of the Galaxy sort of crew. I’ve intentionally told you absolutely nothing about this crew because it’s all freaking spoilers and you just have to read the book if you want to know.

- The philosophy in this both blew my mind and was easy enough to follow and just … wow, there were some big thoughts here. For the most part, I loved all the philosophical elements, but I’ll admit that I struggled to wrap my tiny mind around the scale of some things, and there were definitely moments where the characters took time to wax a bit philosophical, and the story slowed down to a crawl as a result of it. I do so love books that make you think, though, and if there’s one thing you should go into this knowing, it’s that you will come out the other end really questioning existence, which I loved. If you want an entertaining book with some deep thoughts, this fits that bill.

Sticking Points:

- In the last quarter of the book or so, the action really slows down and the book takes a more philosophical bent. While I do love philosophy and broaching those big, icky philosophical questions that make us nervous … I have to admit that this really slowed down the reading for me. I found myself sort of stuck here and having to push myself through. It picked back up again towards the end, but it definitely felt like it lost some of its forward momentum for a while, where it ended up being just a lot of lengthy dialogue and monologues.

This was fun, but the humorous bits and the OTT philosophical bits didn't always mesh well. Somewhere around the middle of the book, there was a big switch from the former to the latter, and guess I was expecting a switch back that never really came.

The relationship between Sarya the Daughter (the titular "last human") and Shenya the Widow (scary alien creature, adoptive mother) is a highlight. It's both bizarre and normal at the same time! The other characters aren't uniformly interesting. I loved Ace and "his" limited artificial intelligence, but the rest weren't as developed. The author's particular vision of a collective alien society is intriguing, but not as original the book seems to think, and it also provides the base for over-philosophication.

It's like when someone gets stoned in college and has a "blow my mind!" conversation at 3am, and then decides to write a book about it. Which is a shame, because the first half of the book is so good!

2.5 stars

You can read all of my reviews at https://www.NerdGirlLovesBooks.com.

This is a promising science fiction book that took a weird turn in the middle and went down hill from there. I was enjoying the book even though the premise was a bit weird, because, you know, I like weird - but only to a point. The author lost me about 60 percent into the book and I couldn't wait to finish it and be done with it.

Sarya is a human being raised by a fierce spider-like creature on a space station with a lot of other aliens. Sarya must hide the fact that she's a human because they are considered dangerous and were supposed to be eradicated and not exist. One day a bounty hunter arrives on the station and begins hunting her down. She is saved by her adoptive mother, with the help of a rebellious spacesuit, and is launched into space on a ship with other captives.

The ship lands and then things start getting really weird and the author loses me. I am not a big fan of characters talking to themselves, or having big internal existential conversations with themselves. The stream of consciousness nature of portions of the book drove me nuts. Others mind find this intriguing, I find it annoying.

Overall, the book was good until it wasn't. I think that die hard science fiction fans will really like this book. People that only dabble in it, like me, will probably like half this book and not like the other half.

I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The galaxy is filled with all sorts of alien species living in harmony, all connected together by The Network, an all knowing being. The only thing that is truly feared is, well, humans. The main character, Sarya, is one of the last humans living under a false identity with an adopted mother that is a giant killing widow spider. But then Sarya meets a stranger that knows who she is, and more importantly, what she is. This triggers events that takes Sarya off her little space station to the other end of the galaxy. She ends up being an integral part in a fight between The Network, which represents cohesion and peace, and The Observer, a multi-mind being that wants to sow chaos everywhere he goes. While I liked this book, I certainly didn’t love it. I enjoyed the first part when we meet Sarya and her world. Even the middle part when she is exposed to more of the galaxy. But the end got a little too big, but too simplistic with the topics it was trying to discuss (freedom, personhood, etc). What I thought it would be a fun space opera turned into something that tried to go deep, but really only dipped your toes in.

"The Last Human" is a philosophical space opera that is arranged in tiers of increasingly abstract action. It starts with an interesting premise: Our heroine, Sarya, is the adopted daughter of a ferocious creature of a species known as Widow. Sarya is very much the underdog when we first meet her--her technology is low-grade compared to the her peers, she's clearly distinct in her abilities (in an inferior sense) to her neighbors and classmates. Her future in their highly organized society, joined together by the Network, appears grim and boring.

But it isn't, as an outside force appears set on Sarya for some reason. This sets off a set of adventures in which Sarya has to fight for her life and escape danger in the nick of time. Along the way, she meets a variety of creatures and robots/androids, including some hilarious AI personalities that dwell in the on-body tech the different members of the Network wear. (Sarya's helper is just hysterical.)

What's good: The premise is interesting and it's fun to see a story about a young woman that is not in any way about romance. Bechdel test winner, right here! The relationship between Sarya and her mother in particular was surprisingly moving. And the humor, when applied, is spot-on.

What's iffier: As the book goes on, it loses steam. There's no character as sharply outlined as Sarya and her mom, and when we move past that story, some of the color fades from the page. The characters who end up on Sarya's adventure feel more like movie roles than characters--they're flat and they feel simple, even though the characters are given qualities that should stand out in theory. The plot as it progresses becomes more and more theoretical, with extensive exposition by the central characters.

In short: If you want a book first and foremost to think, you might like "The Last Human." But if you reach for fiction for emotional resonance and memorable characters, this book is weaker in those areas.