Frightening, But Slow
2.5 out of 5 stars
The summary sums up the plot perfectly… “The year is 2141. Islam controls most of the civilized world, including all that exists in the former United States. Climate change has made fresh drinking water a scarce, and valuable, commodity. Islamic states that once controlled the oil now control the largest freshwater deposit in the world, the American Great Lakes.” Life is extremely hard for everyone and only promises to get tougher because of the Fourth Caliph of the Bashir dynasty, Abdul-Muttalib Bashir, plans on making life for the infidels even harder! But a band of revolutionists won’t take this lying down and will do anything they can to get rid of their oppressors.
This book was truly original and very frightening, but it was also extremely long and boring at times. I know the authors had a lot of world-building to do, but honestly, there were times that I wanted to give up reading, and I think a big part of the problem was the narrator, which I’ll get to in a minute.
The plot of this was intriguing, interesting, but very frightening. It shows us a world where the ruling families word is law, where human life doesn’t mean anything to them and what extremism looks like. We get to see the story told from the ruling family, their son, who doesn’t like the way his family handles things, from a group of people who are trying to retrieve their family members who were taken, and from the people who want freedom and will do anything to get it.
It makes for difficult reading at times, especially seeing how they treat their slaves and how they treat women. The fact that you can get killed on the spot for saying something against their beliefs, is but a drop in the bucket at what they do. It really was frightening to read!!!
I think I may have enjoyed it more if I read it rather than listen to it because the narrator read the story but didn’t perform it. By that I mean, he was very monotone while reading and didn’t put much inflection into his narration, so it all kind of ran together and didn’t come alive. His tones for the Muslim men were also all the same, so I didn’t know who was talking at any given time and was confused. I found myself tuning out at times because I just wasn’t drawn into the story.
Book Description:
Toxicity by Aiden James & Fiona Fraser
Narrator: Timothy McKean
Length: 14 hrs and 53 mins
Published by Self Published on November 22nd 2017
Genres: Adventure
Pages: 549
Format: Audiobook
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In the tradition of The Stand, The Man in the High Castle, and The Road comes an epic story of struggle against tyranny in a future America....
The year is 2141. Islam controls most of the civilized world, including all that exists of the former United States. Climate change has made fresh drinking water a scarce and valuable commodity. Islamic states that once controlled oil now control the largest fresh water deposit in the world, the American Great Lakes.
Washington, D.C., and New York City are mere memories of the old world as a new regime of Caliphs has ruled the eastern half of the country for the past century. The barren no-man's-land east of the Mississippi River is but an encroaching desert, and the realm of the Great Lakes - known as Al-hayat Miyaah - dictates life for the rest of the realm.
Jihadic allegiance and the Lakes' bounty decide a person's worth, where clean, drinkable water is far more precious than gold... and more valuable than the lives of infidels.
In this hostile environment, Joaquin Martinez and six others risk certain death as fugitives crossing state lines to reclaim loved ones stolen from Hernando, Mississippi, and sold into slavery in Detroit. Meanwhile, survivalist Malcolm Foster and his daughter Renee begin a journey to Kentucky with other survivalists hoping to strike a blow to the Muslim empire. Lastly, in the heart of Al-hayat Miyaah, the youngest son of the Caliph, Abdul-Bari, sets out on a quest to determine the truth about infidels... their worthiness of scorn and indiscriminate death.
Much is at stake for them all, as a crossing of paths determines who inevitably is destined to win... and who must lose everything.
I received this book for free. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
About the Author:
Aiden James is the bestselling author of Cades Cove, The Judas Chronicles, and Nick Caine Adventures (with J.R. Rain). The author has published over thirty books and resides in a small historic town in Tennessee with Fiona, where they share an old antebellum home with several ghosts.
Fiona Fraser played a key role in the shaping Aiden’s early novels, including “The Forgotten Eden”, “The Devil’s Paradise”, and “Cades Cove: The Curse of Allie Mae.” “Toxicity” is their first official co-authored effort.
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