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Roxanne Smolen

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Alien Worlds (Colonial Scouts Book 1) Kindle Edition

by Roxanne Smolen (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

3.4 15 ratings

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The Girl and the Wormhole

The Colonial Scouts are an elite group of explorers who seek out habitable planets for the Colonial Expansion Board. They travel through space via programmable wormholes.

Impani, a brilliant girl with a dark past, dreams of escaping the streets by becoming a Scout. Because she is homeless, she feels she must study twice as hard to get into the program. The day before her final exam, however, a transporter malfunction sends her jumping uncontrollably from planet to planet. Although the error could be corrected from inside the wormhole, the Board decides she is too young to understand that level of tech.

Will she prove them wrong? Or will she die on an alien world?

Alien Worlds is a throwback to Saturday afternoon sci-fi shows. -- Jonathon Banks
Fast paced and full of surprises. I couldn't put the book down. -- Lynda Montague

Character Sketch:
Impani was found in a shoe box beneath a bus stop bench. She’d been making a mewing sound, so the old woman who found her named her after a cat she’d once had. Although they lived on the streets, Impani never felt homeless. The streets were her home. The old woman looked out for her and taught her right from wrong. But she died when Impani was ten. Not long after that, Impani got trapped in a trash compactor while searching for food. She spent the night in the dark with insects skittering over her arms. When the workers came to compact the garbage, they heard her screams. She was remanded to a local orphanage. The institution was not for her; she hated the structure and the rules, but was thrilled to finally learn how to read. She ran away two years later, but continued to read all she could. That was how she learned of the Colonial Scouts. It became her dream.

Print length

361 pages
Language

English
Sticky notes

On Kindle Scribe
Publication date

May 1, 2016
File size

3578 KB
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Word Wise

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Enhanced typesetting

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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Roxanne Smolen is a prolific writer with twelve novels in the Science Fiction and Urban Fantasy realms. She also co-writes a line of children's books under the pen name R.A.P. Smolen and a series of how-to-write books with her fellow members of the Coral Springs Writers' Workshop.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B01E1SB2OO
Publisher ‏ : ‎ moonRox, Inc. (May 1, 2016)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ May 1, 2016
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 3578 KB
Simultaneous device usage ‏ : ‎ Unlimited
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 361 pages

Best Sellers Rank: #3,249,516 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #1,246 in Teen & Young Adult Aliens eBooks
- #1,669 in Teen & Young Adult Sci-Fi Action & Adventure eBooks
- #2,117 in Teen & Young Adult Survival Stories eBooks

Customer Reviews:
3.4 15 ratings

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Roxanne Smolen

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Roxanne Smolen writes for and about young adults because she believes young people are the future. You can connect with her on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

Customer reviews

3.4 out of 5

15 global ratings

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mollyt

A gripping story for adults and teens

Reviewed in the United States on August 11, 2016

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Smolen's invention of the Colonial Scouts as an organization is splendid. In this book, she introduces the group of explorers whose job it is to investigate newly discovered planets and decide if they are acceptable for human colonization. Alien Worlds focuses on the cadets, sixteen year olds who are completing their training and hoping to become full fledged members of the organization. On their last training session, an error in the impellic rings (which transport the Scouts instantaneously to other worlds) takes them on a perilous journey. Impani and Trace, the two teenagers who are the protagonists in this novel, are thoroughly believable, multi-leveled and vulnerable enough to be identified with. Smolen's impellic rings, stat guns and survival gear are all described clearly, and she provides enough background to make them all believable. This is a fast-paced, fascinating read for adults as well as teenagers.

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Quella

Quantum Leap meets Disney Animation

Reviewed in the United States on August 19, 2016

Let me start off saying this book is more geared toward beginning young adult (YA) readers, however some older reader may enjoy the journey the story takes you on. I enjoy science fiction very much and read to quite a few book in the genre, but this book seemed geared towards a younger group than I enjoy. I was happy to have a more modern science fiction book that that did not contain any vulgar language or even crude jokes. This is another reason I would feel comfortable recommending it to younger teen readers.

Would I recommend this book to others? It depends. I left wanting more, but for a younger reader who wants an exciting journey with action and warp jumps to new worlds, get this book. If you are looking for a deep science fiction story with deep character and storyline, you may not like this book.

The story’s concept and ideas was quite refreshing along with being presented well. The author did a good job of the initial story setup and quickly grabbed my attention and sucked me in at the start; good job. The book for me was more like watching a modern cartoon where there is always action and no real periods where the characters’ pause to reflect or have much internal dialogue. Because I listened to this in one sitting (during a long drive), I felt that in the beginning the action-based events seemed to come too frequently. Monster, jump, monster, jump, etc. Reader of the story will understand what I’m saying here. I would have also liked to have had some more suspenseful moments throughout the story. Often it was something like a character turns a corner and comes head-to-head with a new creature to face. I would have like to have seen a creature stalk the characters more, seen their fear levels rise, etc. The book often went from 5mph to 60mph in a second. Some of this may have been because the author geared the material at younger audiences and they want this constant action; I’m not sure.

I will say that I liked the author’s uniquely constructed worlds, environments and creatures. However, I would have like to have had a much deeper description of most of them. The author would often describe just enough to move to the next part of the story, so at times these items all seemed a bit flat for me. The characters were also somewhat flat. The author does give us a glimpse into the lives of the main characters throughout the storyline, but again I wanted more. I wanted to feel for them as they took this great journey. The romance, yes there is some of what I would call puppy love, also seemed very forced and in some ways unnatural. It reminded me more of those experiencing their first kiss, but these characters are nearly 20 years old. Some of the terms and sayings also seemed either cliché or would not be sayings I would believe to come from this society.

I would have like to have had more information and detail on the technology used and how this was created, tested, evaluated, etc. Maybe these items are coming in future books in the series or even a prequel. We are dropped into this story with a fantastic technology that is never really explained; apart from what it can do. I wanted to know who or how they discovered it, and more. The book provides very little here and again often just enough to carry the story forward or answer a question or resolve an issue in the book. For me, I was looking for more science fiction with my travels and would have enjoyed it more if there was. Tell me how the guns work, what they look like, do they require batteries or ammo?

I was a bit concerned with how the narration of the story would be for this book based on the narrator’s previous books listed on Audible. Overall she did a decent job with the book, but for me there were a few inflection and character distinction problems. At times it seemed the narrator was speaking as if the scene was action-filled, yet it contained no action. Sometimes it was difficult to know if these were a problem with the story or the narrator’s interpretation of the material. As of this review, this narrator has mainly performed short children’s books and this may have had some influence on her reading of this book. Often she did a good job of expressing a character’s emotion or emotional state.

There were a few narration issues that would take me out of the story, but they were few and far between. In a few places there were long pauses, swallows, audio interference, or other non-story related event that was on the recording which would pull me out of the story and it would take some time to get back into it.

This book was provided to the reviewer by the author, narrator, or publisher in exchange for a my posting a non-bias review.

Helpful

Dr Zero

The voice actor really can make or break a audio book and this one broke

Reviewed in the United States on June 5, 2019

I really tried to give this series a chance but I could not get past the dialog it was just too whiny for me. I know these are supposed to be young girls but it is an insult to young women to portray them as its read. This might be a ok book to read but the audiobook edition leaves much to be desired.

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Betty Jane Housey

and then caught up in the wonderful feelings that Smolen gives her characters

Reviewed in the United States on September 2, 2016

Verified Purchase

Alien Worlds by Roxanne Smolen

Smolen has done it again. Alien Worlds is a fast paced suspense filled novel with characters we care about and settings that leave us filled with revulsion, horror and wonder. Impani is as always a central character in this series, and her boyfriend Trace is there too. Will they make it back to the station safely or be killed on one the ghastly worlds they're being transported to. Try Alien Worlds if you are in the mood to be horrified, and then caught up in the wonderful feelings that Smolen gives her characters.

Helpful

Midwestbonsai

could be quite compelling for young teenagers

Reviewed in the United States on August 18, 2017

Impani escaped from the streets by being self-taught in order to form part of the called colonial scouts. They are children used to explore habitable planets. In one of these explorations, the ring used for transportation gets corrupted and Impani and her partner get stranded on an unknown planet.

I first thought this was intended for young adults, but I think it would work better with young teenagers, since the average age of the characters is sixteen, and most of the time they are more immersed in the drama of younger ages than with the perils at hand.

I found the first half of the story a bit repetitive but with no evolution. The kids were traveling without control from one planet to the next quite fast. There is nothing of importance happening here apart from some interactions of the two main characters.

The second half is much more entertaining though since the story starts moving forward, and the interactions among characters are more developed. There is also the resolution to a more important mystery.

If it were not for the first part I would have given four stars to the book. I understand that this book may not be attractive when read by an adult, but I think it could be quite compelling for young teenagers.

Jennifer Fournier's narration was okay. Her diction was clear and she transmitted the characters emotions, but there were a couple of issues. Her voice range is quite limited, and in many occasions it was difficult to discern who was talking, and I even got confused between narration and dialog. There were also audible breath intakes which distracted me from the story and noticeable audio edits.

I think this audiobook could work well among young teenagers, but in my personal opinion, it would benefit from being edited.

Audiobook was provided for review by the author.

Please find this complete review and many others at my review blog

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Alien Worlds (Colonial Scouts Book 1) Kindle Edition

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Roxanne Smolen

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