About the Book
After a devastating galactic war, disgraced veteran Ralston Muck ekes out a living as a bouncer at Last Stop Station's premier nightclub, A Curtain of Stars. Night after night he listens to the club's star performer, Siren, sing her memories and ease some of his aching loss. But when Siren goes missing, Muck finds himself drawn into a world of dirty cops, drug lords, and conspiracies that trace back to the war itself.
The only person he can trust isn't even human. Angel, Siren's personal AI, was ripped from the singer's mind the night Siren disappeared. With no idea what has happened to her human host, and pursued by a killer virus, Angel flees to Muck for answers.
Together they struggle to comprehend the conspiracy that entangles both their lives. Can Muck and the angel on his shoulder recover Siren before it's too late? Or will he lose everything that matters to him one more time?
About the Author :
Griffin Barber spent his youth in four different countries, learning three languages while holding down jobs in marinas, bars, cafés, and, memorably, cold-calling casino guests. Finally settled in Northern California with a day job as a police officer in a major metropolitan department, he lives the good life with his wife and daughter. 1636: Mission to the Mughals, coauthored with Eric Flint, was his first novel; he has also written numerous short stories. Second Chance Angel is what he hopes to be the first of many collaborations with Kacey Ezell.
Kacey Ezell is the author of the Four Horseman Tales and the Revelations Cycle.
Jennifer Jill Araya has been trained as an opera singer and orchestral cellist, lending a musicality and depth of understanding to her narration that help bring her authors' stories to life. When she's not narrating, Jennifer can be found hiking, biking, running, or generally exploring her home city of Cincinnati with her husband, Arturo, and their two children.
David Drummond has made his living as an actor for over twenty-five years, appearing on stages large and small throughout the country and in Seattle, Washington, his hometown. He has narrated over thirty audiobooks, in genres ranging from current political commentary to historical nonfiction, fantasy, military, thrillers, and humor. He received an AudioFile Earphones Award for his first audiobook, Love 'Em or Lose 'Em: Getting Good People to Stay. When not narrating, he keeps busy writing plays and stories for children.
If you've watched TV at all in the past ten years, you've definitely seen her face and heard her voice countless times in any number of wildly successful national, global, and Super Bowl commercials, as well as playing the first blond Vulcan in Star Trek history. The daughter of two English professors, Natasha Soudek was raised in the South, speaks native German, lived in Berlin and Vienna, and finally settled in the Lower East Side of New York City as a teenager. After honing her stage presence by studying acting and playing hundreds of sold-out live music shows (singing and playing bass), she moved to LA to record with Channel/DreamWorks and act on TV. Favored on KCRW, Chris Douridas compared her voice and songwriting to the Beatles' Let it Be in meaning and soulfulness . . . qualities that translate especially well into her career as an audiobook narrator. Her voice is as distinct and memorable as the range of characters she's played on-screen, which gives listeners an immediate familiarity to connect to, along with a warmth and intimacy that spans and uplifts any genre.
Review :
"A war veteran and a disembodied artificial intelligence form a partnership to solve a string of horrible crimes. The human/AI detective theme hasn't been done this well since Isaac Asimov's Lije Baley and R. Daneel Olivaw novels, The Caves of Steel, The Naked Sun, and The Robots of Dawn--with the advantage that the AI science in Second Chance Angel is that of the modern era, not Asimov's time."
-- "Eric Flint, author of 1632"
"In Second Chance Angel, a pair of badly damaged combat veterans team up to find the kidnapped woman who is crucial to both of them. One vet was an enlisted grunt. The other was an officer's artificial intelligence. Vivid action and intelligent backgrounds as the team unravels a criminal conspiracy that goes well above their pay grades."
-- "Dave Drake, author of Hammer's Slammers"
"Space opera, sentient AIs, and a mystery to solve. What more can you ask for?"
-- "S. K. Dunstall, author of Linesman"
"With this fun, noir-tinged thriller, the first in the Last Stop Station series, Barber and Ezell weave together intrigue, action, and romance, all with a hard-boiled sensibility...The authors expertly contrast claustrophobic interiors and the vastness of space, creating a world that feels both alien and lived-in. Readers will be hooked."
-- "Publishers Weekly"
