Title: Framed on Titan
Series: The Adventures of Astropilots Stern & Moreno #1
Author: Stevie González
Genre: Science Fiction / Space Opera
ASIN: B00GSRF9GY
Length: Novella (136 pages)
Publisher: Schäffer & Ojeda Verlag (November 13th, 2013)
Heat Level: Explicit
Heart Rating: ♥♥2 Hearts
Reviewer: Thommie
Blurb: In the mid-23rd Century Zy Stern and Bon Moreno work as astropilots, transporting freight shipments between the various bases and colonies of the Outer Planet Region. On a routine assignment to Titan, they suddenly find themselves at the centre of a perfidious plot by a high-ranking Titanic official to gain control of interplanetary security for his own corrupt purposes. Somehow, they must prove their innocence, and in doing so it will be necessary, to succumb to the wanton lust that lurks in the dark corridors of Titan Base.
Product Link: http://www.amazon.com/Framed-Titan-Adventures-Astropilots-Moreno-ebook/dp/B00GSRF9GY
Review: As much as I like Sci-Fi and hopping around the Galaxy on a space ship, this book failed to satisfy me. While the main idea was certainly full of possibilities, the execution was bad in so many ways.
Firstly the typographic errors were numerous and quite annoying. Even the blurb has typos and that shows that the amount of work on this read was not enough.
Moving on the world building info when compared to the active plot was huge, dumped on us instead of given out slowly and in small increments, resulting to large boring passages that drone on and on boring me out of my mind before the real story even started. By the time, things started making sense I had already lost all interest in it.
The storytelling was bad as well. The entire action plot was given at hand from the very beginning resulting in a simple read/wait lacking any sort of mystery with nothing left to be shown, nothing to anticipate. We were told what happened, who did it and why, and it immediately was followed by the savior of the hour in the face of an old friend. In general, this read was the least thought-provoking, mind-challenging book I’ve had the displeasure reading this year. A book that dragged so hard it was a real labor finishing it in order to make a proper review.
That leaves us with the intimate scenes and the romance part of it. Romance, now there is a term that wasn’t met in any way in this story, though I admit some attempt was made toward it back there at the end, yet that too died a horrible death. The erotic part though, as much as there were plenty of sex scenes, they lacked chemistry and connection, they lacked sensuality and eroticism, and they even lacked the carnal passion one might expect from people wandering in space alone with their hands for days on a row. All that managed to render the text quite bland especially as so many clichés were implored, such as distracting the guards with sex and lust so one might escape a highly secured cell, and/or tempting a guard to get a special treatment, and I’ll not even mention the victorious scenes in the end, because every hero must have a worshiper around on a twenty-four hour basis. Yes, it is safe to say I was not impressed. I wish I could say the dialogues were impressive and enticing, or even funny, but even that would be false. Tasteless is a harsh word to use, but can’t find another one to represent them more adequately.
Bottom end I was left unsatisfied and with a bad aftertaste with this book.