Title: Axiom’s End

Author: Lindsay Ellis

Publisher: St. Martin’s Press

Publication Date: July 21, 2020

Page Count: 384

My rating:  3 stars

About the book:

The alternate history first contact adventure Axiom’s End is an extraordinary debut from Hugo finalist and video essayist Lindsay Ellis.

Truth is a human right.

It’s fall 2007. A well-timed leak has revealed that the US government might have engaged in first contact. Cora Sabino is doing everything she can to avoid the whole mess, since the force driving the controversy is her whistleblower father. Even though Cora hasn’t spoken to him in years, his celebrity has caught the attention of the press, the Internet, the paparazzi, and the government—and with him in hiding, that attention is on her. She neither knows nor cares whether her father’s leaks are a hoax, and wants nothing to do with him—until she learns just how deeply entrenched her family is in the cover-up, and that an extraterrestrial presence has been on Earth for decades.

Realizing the extent to which both she and the public have been lied to, she sets out to gather as much information as she can, and finds that the best way for her to uncover the truth is not as a whistleblower, but as an intermediary. The alien presence has been completely uncommunicative until she convinces one of them that she can act as their interpreter, becoming the first and only human vessel of communication. Their otherworldly connection will change everything she thought she knew about being human—and could unleash a force more sinister than she ever imagined.

Axiom’s End by Lindsay Ellis is the first book of the science fiction Noumena series. This one takes readers back to an alternate version of 2007 and gives them a glimpse at alien contact that of course the government wants covered up.

Cora Sabino has not spoken to her father in years but she often hears his speeches on the state of the world and aliens. Cora never expected there to actually be any contact with aliens but one night she and the rest of her family experience a blackout as odd things began happening.

After Cora comes around she heads out of her home in search of the family dog but while she’s out big black SUVs arrive. Cora goes on the run not knowing what is happening to her family and soon Cora comes into contact with an alien visitor which seems to have done something to Cora that night so that he can communicate through her.

I have to say Axiom’s End is one of those books I enjoyed parts of then other parts found myself getting a tad bored with the story. The pacing seemed to be somewhat decent but for me the main character felt awfully young and I had to keep reminding myself this was even supposed to be adult and not young adult but the feeling kept coming over some of those “dumb” moves moments to me. So overall for me this one really turned into just one of those juse OK novels where I wished for a bit more.

I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley.

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