Ashwin (Gideon's Riders, #1)

by Kit Rocha

[Melanie]

My review and an extended sample of the audiobook are posted at Hotlistens.com.

I read this book as an eARC back right before it was first released in 2016. I was excited to revisit the series that Kit Rocha has created. I’m a huge Kit Rocha fan. I have been going back to when I read the first book from them, [b:Beyond Shame|15830843|Beyond Shame (Beyond, #1)|Kit Rocha|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1347036314s/15830843.jpg|21565716], in 2013. Gideon’s Riders is a spin off series from the original Beyond series. You can start reading with Gideon’s Riders without having read, the Beyond series.

This series is a post-apocalyptic dystopian romance series. It is set with civilization back up and running after a large solar flare took out technology. Some things are back up and running and even running better than prior to the flares. There is some genetic manipulation of people’s DNA to make them smarter, etx. There is also some increases in medical technology, with a med gel that helps in healing and regeneration machines which speed healing as well.

This is the first book that takes place mostly in Sector One. The war between the Sectors and the City/Eden is over. The corrupt leaders of Eden have been removed from office. The military is still in place, though there is a little more chaos. Ashwin is a Makhai soldier. He was created by the military to be the perfect soldier. He was not taught any emotions. Things like fear and empathy were beaten out of him. The Makhai have a reputation, so people are scared of him as soon as they learn he is a member. He has been charged with infiltrating Gideon’s Riders (they are the personal soldiers of Gideon Rios the leader of Sector One. The Rios family is also the leaders of a religious group in the sector).

Kora is a doctor. She was raised by adoptive father who was also a doctor. She got the best training and became the best doctor in the region. She worked on base and treated the soldiers, including the Makhai and Ashwin. He has been fascinated with her ever since he met her.

My favorite thing about this series are the characters. The Kit Rocha writing duo are great at creating characters that I love. They can be flawed, but that only makes them better and more real. In this story, they take two flawed characters, Ashwin with his lack of empathy and looking at everything in a strategic way, and Kora, who has so much empathy it overwhelms her at times. Surround them with a great group of secondary characters and you have the perfect mix of everything. They are great at balancing out the romance, action and plot to make for a great overall story for everyone.

If you haven’t tried their work, I highly recommend it. FYI, the first book of the Beyond series, their website.

Narration
This is my first listen with Tatiana Sokolov. I don’t often review an ebook and then review the audiobook too. But I love this series so much, I had to. It took me a little bit to get used to Ms. Sokolov’s voices for the characters (which isn’t anything new when you’ve already created your own voices for them in your head). It didn’t take me long to get used to the voices she’d chosen for each character. I found that I really liked her narration and voices. There are a lot of different men (more men than women), and she did a great job with all the different voices. I will continue to revisit this series on audio.

**I like to thank the publisher for providing me with a copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.