A whirlwind adventure story with a thrilling plot, inventive world-building, and delightfully charming characters. Cam is a refreshing change of pace from traditional sci-fi lead characters.

Enjoyed very much. Kept me thinking until the end. Good work.

I found this a decent read, a little hard to get into at first. I enjoyed the characters, particularly Cameron, and am looking forward to where it goes next.

WOW ........ I loved this book so much I couldn't put its down and now feel sad that I've finished its. This one of the best book I've read in a while.
I received this book from net gallery in exchange for a honest review.

The decision to read this book is quite random. I just wanted to start reading a Netgalley ARC while waiting for my phone to fully charge. I was very surprised how I love the characters, the plot and the writing on this story.❤

I read this book on one seating. Like I flew through the pages of this book (on my Kindle). I knew a few pages in that the writing is up to my liking. It was a smooth read to me. I was able to focus on the plot, the world building and the characters.

Maybe scifi is really my thing. I enjoy books with concepts of time travel and multiverse on it. Admittedly this one isn't that super science-y, but it was just right for me.👍

The book centered on Cam. How at the start he felt that he does not belong anywhere and that something isn't quite right.

I love how the author built the world on this book. I love that there are inter-dimensional gates/portals, different races and all the advance technologies introduced. The characters are likeable especially Cam. I love how diverse the cast is. And the mystery is super exciting.😆

Totally recommended.😄❤

*Thanks to the publisher for making this book available for review via Netgalley. This review is voluntary and contains my honest thoughts and opinions of the book.*

*Thank you NetGalley and publishers for the ARC. All thoughts and opinions are my own*

I was intrigued by the synopsis of this book as I am a big fan of anything scifi. I think the writing is really good, but I had a hard time really getting in to the book at times. It was fast paced and Cam is a great character, but I wasn't always engaged. I do recommend reading this book!

Wow, this story blew my mind in many ways. I really enjoyed the characters and the plot the most. I was enthralled from the very first page.

Into The Lightning Gate by Robert Roth - 5 stars!

This was a great return to real sci-fi for me. I loved this read and really got into the characters, their backgrounds and of course the diversity represented by the multiverse. Action-packed yet full of reflective moments, the pace felt fairly balanced and by the end I really wasn't ready to leave the story and characters behind!

Bits I liked:
- fantastic diverse cast with rep across the BIPOC and LGBTQ+ spectrum. Full of queer characters, and I was super happy with enby rep that really just flowed as part of the story.
- I found it well-written and nicely paced, avoiding some of the overdone tropes seen more recently in YA sci-fi.
- it felt mostly unpredictable. Though I did see a few bits coming, it didn't detract from my enjoyment of the story.
- exciting plot with some great quantum and multiverse elements. I'm not a sci-fi expert but I really enjoyed the exploration of a world with completely different human cultural development.

Bits I liked less:
- it took a little while to get to the multiverse part of the story, but that wasn't really detrimental.
- it's not a story that feels complete by itself, the way books in some series can almost stand alone. By the end it really felt like you were at the beginning of the real adventure, with so many questions left unanswered! Again, not necessarily a bad thing, but I wasn't prepped to start what feels like a saga!

Overall it was a fantastic, queer, diverse story with exciting sci-fi action and relatable characters despite the otherworldly plot. I'm definitely looking forward to the next installment!

Wow, such a great story. Stargate vibes, since I'm a huge fan of Stargate and the sci-fi genre, I've enjoyed this book enormously. The character are very good built, the scenario and the background are amazing. I loved how the author explained through Cam his relationship with his parents, and I fully understand why, Cam doesn't want to meet them again.
I loved the different representation and the treatment of some important subjects as racism, capitalism. etc.
It's fast paced, that don't get you bored in any moment of the reading. I would love to read the next book. Highly recommended for the fun of sci-fi.
A huge thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with this amazing book

This book was terrific. I loved how catchy it was. The plot was pretty fast and exciting. The action scenes were described in a way that made them very convenient to visualize.

The diversity is very well done. And I loved how explicitly the skin color, sexuality, etc of the characters was portrayed. It felt bold and we need more of this.
And each character was very complete on their own and interesting to read about. I would watch a 10 season TV show with this gang going on inter-dimensional adventures.

With respect to the advanced, alternative civilizations described in the book, I liked how it was very sociology and psychology focussed, with an obvious ever-present nod of appreciation to non-capitalistic indigenous cultures. It gave the portrayal a level of freshness.

I cannot wait to see what happens next in the series!
Thank you very much for this review copy.

This was such an intense story! It kept you guessing from page to page, and it took a while to work out which way was up, but it was so interesting to read! I loved that your first impression wasn't always to be believed.

The world building and the characters were beautifully queer and diverse! I'm always so happy to find a book that doesn't treat a world as binary, and this book definitely lived up to it. The world building was absolutely fabulous to delve into, and I cannot wait to see what happens next!

Cameron Maddock isn’t just your average twenty-something, gay, tech guy in San Francisco avoiding his less-than-accepting family. He’s a cyber-security genius. But that doesn’t explain why a seemingly-alien assassin is after him.

Robert Roth’s Into the Lightning Gate is a fast-paced, pulpy sci-fi snack with a solid high-concept base that hits all the right notes - it’s a cocktail of easily accessible action, comic-book infused tech, mysterious motivations and topped with a young, gay, multi-racial lead.

Cameron (Cam as he’s known) knows he’s different from the people around him. Apart from being prodigiously smart, he’s always been an outcast - for either his colour, or his sexuality. When his apartment is broken into, his first thought is that it’s a disgruntled cyber-security client of his, but when they attempt to kidnap him he is surprisingly able to defend himself against professionals. And there's a little voice in his head telling him there’s more to his story than he realises.

Think of it as The Long Kiss Goodnight meets The Last Starfighter - as Cam’s newfound abilities throw him into the middle of a multiversal, sci-fi action-thriller. There are plenty of mass-market sci-fi elements on display here and Roth knows how to craft a real rollercoaster of a story. The sci-fi mainly consist of easily digestible concepts (teleports, multiverses, body-hacking etc), any viewer of TV shows like The Expanse, Star Trek or Doctor Who will be familiar with. Roth’s strength’s lie in his ability to print a strong image in your mind and choreograph an on-page action sequence - this is an action adventure page-turner.

As for the queer content, this is gay with a lower-case ‘g’. Cam spends most of the book on the run and while his attraction to his bisexual rescuer/ally Finn is clear (and clearly mutual) there’s no time to explore it further.

At times, Roth’s characters are a little two-dimensional - from a Russian who speaks with a broad accent straight out of a Bond film, and Cam’s best friend who uses frustratingly contemporary (and instantly dated) idioms. Similarly we barely scratch the surface of the wider multiverse at play here but that is less of an issue as Into the Lightning Gate is the starting point for The Gates Saga, hopefully we’ll get into the nuances in further installments.

Into the Lightning Gate is a fast and satisfying story that left me intrigued. A great summer-time read. There are many questions left unanswered, and hints of a bigger canvas to be explored. If this was Season 1 of the TV series, I’d be eagerly waiting for Season 2 to drop.

Told from third person, multi POV (Cam, Agent, Finn, Tony), there’s a lot of action in this novel, with a near constant loop of running/fighting/hiding. Watching the action unfold through various eyes helped keep the cycle fresh.

I loved reading about the gates, including the history of, and the other “Earths.” But the cool gate stuff didn’t really kick off until my kindle hit 27%, which was kind of a long time to wait. The back story and setup were still interesting though. It just felt like a lot of setup.

Great ending which I didn’t see coming—definitely a cliffhanger! 3.5 stars rounded up to 4.

This ARC was provided by NetGalley and publisher Jetspace Studio in exchange for an honest review.

I loved this! I found the LGBT rep to be some of the best I've seen for a sci-fi novel and the world building was something akin to Sanderson or Tolkien. I really cannot wait to see where this series goes.

Thank you for the e-arc!

This has a likeable MC, and the other characters are enjoyable as well. Good tech and good pacing are also part of the story. Most sci-fi thriller fans will probably like this.

Thanks very much for the review copy!!

This book was a fast-paced and fascinating science fiction thrill ride that reminded me of Stargate crossed with Fringe. The characters were well thought out and incredibly compelling. The LGBT representation was amazing, and the author did a great job of seamlessly introducing some great dialogue on heavy issues, including racism, heterosexism, capitalism, and environmentalism, without distracting from the overall story. The world-building was exquisite and done in a way that was fairly easy to follow without many giant info dumps. I wish I could live in the world the author created for these characters! The plot was interesting and had its twists to keep you guessing, but by the end it felt a bit repetitive, with multiple iterations of run, fight, and hide, over and over. However, the information learned and the world-building kept me from getting bored despite the repetition. I also still have many questions that I hoped would receive some type of answer before the end, but I guess that just means I'll have to pick up the next book. Overall, I really enjoyed this book and rate it 4 out of 5 stars. I recommend it for any science fiction or thriller fans that don't mind critiques of the current social order.

Oh, I LOVED this, this book was so unexpectedly amazing!

What I liked most:

All of the characters, even the minor ones, felt so REAL and layered, masterfully done!

This started off in such a familiar world that I honestly did not expect where the story was going and how huge the world wold become by the end of the book. WOW!

Aaah, that epilogue! I want the next book nooooooooooow!

Cam was such a likable protagonist, I loved seeing the world through his eyes and was rooting for him from page one

The lgbtq+ rep is a big plus of course - we desperately need more good rep in scifi and fantasy!

The pacing was immaculate, it had me at the edge of my seat the entire time and I read the book in one sitting. But despite that it never felt rushed

The world building was really cool and it feels like this is the very solid setup for what I am hoping will be a long and wonderful scifi series!

Overall I highly recommend this if you like scifi stories and/or fast-past, action-packed thrillers.

Great book. Interesting characters and an unusual plot . A slow burn romance and a killer cliffhanger ending. Cannot wait for the next instalment.

Roth’s “Into the Lightning Gate” was a fast-paced, addictive science fiction thriller. There were times I honestly did not wish to the put the book down for trivial things like sleeping.

Cam Maddock is a well-developed, likable character thrown into a world outside his understanding. The questions are can he stretch himself to learn what is happening to him and how does he fit into the mystery surrounding him? Cam must be willing to question everything he believes he knows about himself to discover why he has become a trans-dimensional person of interest to unsavory characters.

This was an extremely enjoyable read I rate 4.5 stars out of 5. The ending leaves me desperately wanting to know where Roth will take his readers in his sequel.

Note: This ARC was provided by NetGalley and publisher Jetspace Studio in exchange for an honest review.

4.5/5. I really enjoyed this one! This was my first proper Sci Fi read in years and what a great way to swing back into it.

The protagonist was really likable and had a solid mix of charm, intelligence, and adventure about him to easily imagine him reacting as he did to the series of fairly incredible world-building details this first novel in the saga delivers. Roth also does a good job of building in the science aspect in subject-specific terminology, but with mundane enough explanations that as a reader I walked away feeling I’d not only understood the story, but possibly joined an elite science club as well.

The supporting characters are developed quite well for a first in a series and I particularly enjoyed the mix of personalities and diverse representation from Tony (loyal, witty and deeply sarcastic Chinese-American best friend), and Tasha (young Russian spy vibes with deadpan humour and matter-of-fact delivery of essentially every line).

The settings are rich and the world-building was excellent, though I was slightly frustrated by the lack of any real information and a deep sense of secrecy that blanketed the first 37%. The revelations and quick pace afterward certainly made up for this, but it seemed we could have reached that point maybe 10% sooner, as that’s when the enjoyment really kicked in and deepened.

As an own-voices author for lgbtqia category, it was very evident that the author chose to fit in non-binary pronouns wherever possible, never informing the reader of people’s gender unless they were and acquaintance of the protagonists, and then often providing pronouns once we did get introduced - for example when describing bar bouncers, market stall vendors, multiple assassins and mercy etc, it was always they/them/their, and the readers were left to imagine the genders, or more importantly, realise that it didn’t matter and had no real impact on the story. It really grew on me. I’d never encountered this in a book before, and while I found it initially jarring and had to do some line rereading at first to make sure i was understanding, I eventually became accustomed. There was also a specifically non-binary supporting character eventually, which is thankfully finally becoming more commonplace in novels now - and I am keen to continue learning about them in the sequels - but this other method of only providing pronouns when absolutely necessary was novel and welcomed. I hope I see more of it.

There was very little romance in this story, though the possibility thrummed throughout and became far more present nearer the end, so I am keen to see how it affects the plot dynamics in the future sequels, especially because i like the pairing and think it will be fun to explore.

Overall a great read and one I would recommend to anyone who enjoys fast-paced adventure and Sci-Fi.

* This ARC was provided by NetGalley and publisher Jetspace Studio in exchange for an honest review.

Into the Lightning Gate advertised as an action packed cat and mouse chase, and it definitely was: there an introduction to the main character, Cam, then the story evolves into a chase and it is non stop action from there. For me, I found there was a lot of action but very little explaining. Each chapter switches to a different character, mostly Cam, but also Tony, the Agent, Finn, Omni, but despite the POV switching to so many different characters who each had more or less understanding of the situation the knowledge relayed to the audience remained extremely limited. For an author with such a wonderful writing style, including so many characters POV while wanting to keep the reader in the dark was a strange choice. This made for what should have been a mystery to both myself and the main character a little frustrating for me because I was in other characters POV yet still didn't know.