I liked the idea of thos novel and it was well paced. There were. A few times I really thought the author could've used something less typical but in all I loved it!

Great development work as well.

I can't give this a full review because I struggled so much with the synthetic voice. I will probably not request them anymore because they don't do a book justice.

This is a very unique book. I think fans of Lore's previous books will enjoy this new book and find what they seek in his writing. The really enjoyed all of the characters and the fast paced nature of the book. I can't wait to read the physical copy or listen to the final audiobook.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for letting me read this early!

Sydney is half Denzen and half human. After being on the run from the government alien program after his father disappeared, his uncle finally finds him and tells him his father is alive, and the only person who can find him is Syd. But Syd would have to leave Earth forever and go into the vastness.

This book was just okay for me. The writing just seemed to be for a younger audience, more middle grade than you adult. I just couldn’t get into it, I wasn’t invested really. I liked some of the side characters, but Sydney was just okay for me. The narrator (even though I know it’s synthesized) was very distracting with random pauses, and weird inflections. I think it made it harder to get into the book.

I have received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Ashfall Legacy sounded like it was going to be a good book. Maybe even great. However, since I've only ever read one book (I think?) by this author.. I didn't trust myself before I dove into this. So, that being said, here is what I thought.

The beginning was actually pretty interesting. I thought things were going to go one way but then it kind of switched on me. Which was a nice a surprise and I thought the rest of the book was going to keep me on my toes as well. Spoiler alert: It really didn't.

I'm not going to lie. This book confused the heck out of me. Especially towards the ending because my brain felt like pudding. So while having pudding brain.. I just kind of went with the flow and just wanted to see how this was all going to end.

It also didn't make things easier with it being an audio - which is kind of weird to say. Typically audios are supposed to make reading a bit easier because you are listening to someone read to you. Yet, with this.. I got a very robotic narrator that was all kinds of monotone and made me want to fall asleep at 4pm. 4 freaking pm. That's not bed or nap time for me AND I was still working.

Maybe the book is better in ebook or physical form? Not sure though since I received the audiobook version. Maybe I'll dive into the actual book.. maybe not. At least I tried.

**4.5 stars**

I’m a big fan of the Lorien legacies series and was beyond excited to see that Pittacus Lore came out with something new, and I am glad I got to read it!

First things first, I gotta say, I was expecting far more of this book to take place on earth, but it really felt like an unnecessary precursor to the real story. It’s not that this was bad, but it was a little weird because the things brought up in the first few chapters have basically no impact on the rest of the story. Also I was expecting Roswell to play at least some role in the story, and unless I missed it, it was not mentioned once... so I don’t really know why it’s mentioned in the description, but whatever.

With that said, I must say this book definitely gave some me Aurora Rising vibes. It follows Syd -a half denzen, half human hybrid- who joins an intergalactic space program (not a spoiler because you find out about it VERY early on) in pursuit of his long missing father. Enter the ragtag crew, interesting alien species, long-distance space flight, and fight scenes.

As a whole, the book was good. It was not my favourite, but the characters -most of them at least- were quite lovable, the plot was unique, and I love the moral dilemma that we are left with (even though it stresses me out). I don’t want to spoil anything, but it was definitely written by the same people that wrote the Lorien Legacies series, so you can expect similar heart-stopping things to take place (*cough, cough* do with that as you will). Anyways I’ll definitely be excited to see where the series goes from here, but hate that I’ll need to wait so long for that to happen.

I would say that for lovers of YA sci-fi, this book is definitely worth checking out!

This is difficult for me to review because the main reason I didn't like this audiobook was the robotic narrator. It's an artificial voice reading the story and usually I don't find them so bad, but this one was rough. It made the plot very difficult to follow and I found myself lost a lot of the time.

I haven't read the Lorien Legacies series so I'm not sure if this ties in or not. The plot follows Sydney, a half human, half alien hybrid on the run with his mom. After ten years staying one step ahead of their pursuers, Syd is found by his alien uncle. He then journeys into space to attend an academy and search for his missing father. That's about all I understood, there were several species of alien that I couldn't keep straight and I didn't really get what the school was doing for Syd. There's a battle at the end and I feel like there will be a sequel with how open it's left.

Maybe a human narrator would help me like this better, but I also felt like the events in this were a bit jumbled and some parts didn't seem like they mattered to the whole story. I'll have to check out the author's other books and maybe come back to this when it's released.

I received an advance copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review

The story was interesting, but the characters fell flat for me. None of them were all that interesting. In a SciFi world that is built up incredibly, this was a little frustrating. I wanted to like Syd, but he fell so heavily into the chosen one trope that it was boring. Admittedly, I never read the I Am Number Four books, and so I don’t know if this is a common theme with Lore’s writing. The book was enjoyable, but nothing particularly cerebral.
I enjoyed the different creatures and the general lore. The way that humans are described and what you find out that they truly are was intriguing. Again, the real downfall here was the characters.

Thanks to Net Galley for the ARC. I know that Pitticus Lore is really a group of people,but this is the first time that the book actually feels like there are different people writing it even though all of the chapters are told in first person from one character. It was uneven and I had considered stopping a few times. It is an interesting new universe. I will be willing to try out the second book in the series, but it will have a short leash.

Thank you, NetGalley and Harper Audio for providing the synthetic voice recording of Ashfall Legacy by Pittacus Lore in exchange for my honest review.

I need to preface my comments by saying that listening to the synthetic audio was, at times, incredibly difficult. You get no emotion. At times it felt right, because of the world this story takes place in, but it made it difficult to connect with any of the characters. That caused me to lose interest in the story quickly. That said, here’s what I can tell you about Ashfall Legacy.

We meet Sidney, who is a teenage boy on the run with his mother. Most of his life has been on the run because he’s half-human and half-alien. We get some basic background information and then we follow Sidney on a trip to his father’s home planet and a quest to find his missing, thought to be dead, father.

The story itself was lacking the details I seem to need to get into a world. I found Sidney to be okay to start, but I didn’t care for a long time. He slowly grew on me, but it was really difficult to immerse myself in this world, I can’t say if that’s due to the writing or the audio and for that reason, I don’t know how to rate this one.

I think if you’re into Lore, or half-alien characters give it a try, but I would recommend reading the book, as it may provide a better feel for the world.

Unfortunately, I didn't like this book. I thought the premise interesting, having a boy half human half alien looking for his missing father after a life of running with his mother but the execution is where the book lost me and in the end, I simply did not enjoy reading this book (or listening to in this case).

I honestly don't have a lot to say about Ashfall Legacy as it never manage to grab my interest. It is now among those books that I never managed to connect with. The last YA sci-fi that I didn't connect with was The Last Human.

(Thank you for letting me read and review an ARC via Netgalley)

Thanks to the publisher for providing a voice galley of Ashfall Legacy in exchange for an honest review.

I'm not a Lorien Legacy fan. I read and disliked I Am Number Four because of what I found to be an incredibly lackluster narration style and stopped with the series there but all of the Pitticus Lore fans I know constantly insist that the writing duo's style drastically improves as the series continues so I figured there was no better way to check that out than with Ashfall Legacy.

I found the narration here a lot better! Sydney felt like a real person thrown into all of the book's chaos and it was fun to listen to his narration. I also really liked the supporting cast here and the pacing was really well done. This is a fun, unique sci-fi adventure that I could easily see being enjoyed whether or not you're a fan of the writing team's previous works.

Ashfall Legacy

This audiobook is spoken by a synthetic voice, male to be exact. I found the voice easy to understand but at times near the end of a sentence the word would be clipped off. That made listening to the book at times harsh. I did find the voice easy to understand but needs to be slowed down a few seconds.

I had never listened to an audiobook before (literally never!) and I was excited to start with this one, but unfortunately the robotic synthesized voice made it too difficult to tolerate. I could not properly review this or finish it - it was too horrible to listen to. I'm giving it three stars only because I'm sure the storyline is great.

Well, I have to say that this is a first for me. I requested and received an ARC for this new series, but it was given to me in an audio form. The audio form was a synthesized version of a book reader, not what is going to be the final audio version with a narrator. To say that it was a unique experience would be an understatement. Now, that is not going to take anything away from the actual book comments - but it was an odd experience.

Having enjoyed the I AM Number 4 series by Pittacus Lore, I was interested to find out more about this new series. I wasn't sure if it was in the same world - it isn't. And I didn't know if it was a spin off of the Number 4 series - again, it wasn't.

This book introduces the reader to a teenage boy who is on the run with his mother (on Earth) and they spend their life hiding off the grid. In fact, they have been on the run for most of his life. This boy's name is Sidney and after a couple of years his mother informs him that his father was a being from another planet....or, as he says it - an alien. That means he is half human and half Denson (this was on audio so my spellings of names are probably wrong)

So, after certain events, his Uncle finds them (he is also an alien) and he takes Sidney with him away from Earth. They are going to be on a quest to find his long lost father. The book is interesting. There are many different types of characters that we get to meet. The ship they meet up with has a crew of people from several different planet (i think) because there are many different species. The secret the Sidney finds out is that in outer space, humans are the super people with super strength and almost invincibility. Interesting....

Alright, enough of the summary. Don't want to give out any spoilers. The story is extremely unique and the characters, while not completely fleshed out, are at least given some development for the reader to make determinations on whether they like them or not. But, all is not as it seems and before long it becomes apparent that there are several factions who want different things.

The story kept my interest, but it was also very superficial and not as descriptive as I would have liked. I did liked Sidney, but I didn't like him enough to REALLY root for him. As the story got more involved, I did begin to like him more - so there is that. Maybe it was because I didn't actually read this, but I felt like I never really was able to immerse myself completely in the story. And to be honest, the plot kind of made me think, "really?"

Obviously, this is book 1 of a series, so the ground work is just being laid out and the characters are just being introduced. As far as that goes, that was done fairly competently. The story, while not ending in a cliffhanger per se, does end at a point that makes you want to find out what is going to happen next. And I will be interested to see what happens so will be getting book 2 when it comes out.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC. The opinions expressed are completely my own.

QOTD: name a sci-fi book or movie that you’ve really liked

I am literally shocked by HOW much I liked this story about a a kid who is half-human and half-alien. I had heard of I am Number Four by the same author(s?) (pseudonym Pittacus Lore-which is apparently a team of five authors?!), but had no idea the Lorien Legacies were a WHOLE THING 🤯🤯

It was totally an accessible and hilarious sci-fi story. I was able to finish the almost 13 hour book in 2 days! Moms out there know this is an accomplishment, but I really was wrapped up in the Ashfall Legacy universe.

It doesn’t hit shelves until August 17, 2021 (thanks @harperaudio and @netgalley for this gifted audio copy!), and I’ll be over here reading the whole rest of the story between now and then (you will want to, too).

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