by Joski Cottee
BOOK DESCRIPTION
The Slowers is a fast paced science-fiction thriller set in 2033 against the backdrop of a fragmenting USA and belligerent China. Slowers are people who can visit times and events from the past fifty years using their daydreams. Some can view the event, some can interact; none can change the event nor alter the past save one twenty-three year old economics graduate, Zak, who is barely aware of what he can do.Other forces are fully aware of his abilities and are moving heaven and earth to find him before he disappears like the others before him. Zak finds he may need to trust someone who could also have designs upon his talents or be used as the ultimate tool to reverse the rise of the East and the stagnation of the West.
Not just a race against time, but a race against those who would control it.
AUTHOR BIO
I teach music, I live in North London with partner and two young children - and I write, when I have time. 'The Slowers' is my take on the world in twenty years time - and the story of those people who can use their daydreams to visit events from the recent past
I was playing along with Deep Purple's 'Highway Star' on my guitar this morning. It's funny - when I used to write songs, I always enjoyed other people's music more than my own...
www.slowers.org
This is the website to accompany the 'The Slowers' book. The site is live and has info on it. You can visit and leave comments for discussion whether you are a Slowers or non-slower!
REVIEWS
5.0 out of 5 stars Time Travel Nasty Corporations and Nirvana - what's not to like? 16 Jun 2013
By Tommy D TOP 100 REVIEWER
Format:Paperback
This is a science fiction novel about time travel and if you think, we've been there before, well think again. The title of the book refers to people who can `slow', that is they sort of day dream and put themselves back in time to a place of their own choosing. The main type can just go back and observe what is happening, like a voyeur. Then over time a new type of `super slower' emerges who can interact with the past, then we get the Holy Grail where one or two, very rare individuals are able to go back and actually change things from the past with all the concomitant uncertainty of how that will affect the future.
Enter Zak, a student in London who likes old fashioned grunge and likes to slow back to classic gigs of the nineties, like Nirvana, and I must say if I could `slow' I would be at a gig every night too. He is one of those who can go back and change things. We also have an organisation from the European Space Agency who want to change time so that they can fund research into alternative planets to move to when Earth dies. Plus the real sinister bunch from a shady business group called Cansiis. These want to go back in time and basically trip up China, this is as we are in the 2030's China sort of owns everything, America is going down the tubes and the whole world as we know it is going to hell in a hand cart. So if they can go back and pull a few strings then China will stay in the economic doldrums and the West will stay top dog forever. Well that is the plan.
There is also a love interest for Zak in Ava the daughter of the Space Agency's Professor of something or other space related. The Cansiis people have sensors which detect when Zak has been changing things and they hire the best people in the world to track him down to `work' for them. The Professor and Ava do not know what they are letting themselves in for when they start to help Zak. What follows is a chase across Europe and a game of cat and mouse that keeps you on the edge right up until the very end.
Enter Zak, a student in London who likes old fashioned grunge and likes to slow back to classic gigs of the nineties, like Nirvana, and I must say if I could `slow' I would be at a gig every night too. He is one of those who can go back and change things. We also have an organisation from the European Space Agency who want to change time so that they can fund research into alternative planets to move to when Earth dies. Plus the real sinister bunch from a shady business group called Cansiis. These want to go back in time and basically trip up China, this is as we are in the 2030's China sort of owns everything, America is going down the tubes and the whole world as we know it is going to hell in a hand cart. So if they can go back and pull a few strings then China will stay in the economic doldrums and the West will stay top dog forever. Well that is the plan.
There is also a love interest for Zak in Ava the daughter of the Space Agency's Professor of something or other space related. The Cansiis people have sensors which detect when Zak has been changing things and they hire the best people in the world to track him down to `work' for them. The Professor and Ava do not know what they are letting themselves in for when they start to help Zak. What follows is a chase across Europe and a game of cat and mouse that keeps you on the edge right up until the very end.
I really enjoyed this book and absolutely devoured it in a few sittings, it is well written and a lot of thought has gone into the actual story, and being sci - fi it also has a fair dollop of existential angst, especially over the rights and wrongs of changing time. This is a self published book by Joski Cottee, who asked for a review in exchange for a free copy and I think she is one author that a major publishing house will be seeking out in the future. This is not high literature and it never claims to be, it is a rollicking good actioner with plenty to keep you hooked and I think for a first effort it is really rather good indeed.
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