Bria

By: Mikayla Lane

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

The shadow governments of Earth are complicit in the alien kidnappings of innocent citizens from all over the world. Traded among the darker denizens of the galaxy, humans command high prices as slaves, experimental subjects, and worse. The League of Aligned Worlds (LAW), is the only thing that stands between these helpless human victims and the dark fate that awaits them on lawless worlds. A collective of sentient planets with highly advanced technology, LAW, actively monitors Earth and similar worlds for abductions. In the majority of cases, LAW, rescues the victims, apprehends the kidnappers, and resettles those who cannot go back home on compatible worlds. These are the stories of the humans, who cannot return to Earth, and the new worlds that they now call home. Bria Carmon’s life had never been the greatest, but the icing on the already stale cake was being kidnapped by aliens and told she was going to be a slave on another planet. Life expectancy: Five years. Things didn’t get much better when Bria was rescued and found out she couldn’t go back home. Instead, she would be forced to resettle on a strange, unfamiliar world. A planet that was chosen for her based on nothing more than a questionnaire. As the king of the ruling Cadrake Clan of the planet Empari, Thrain Cadrake anxiously awaited the arrival of the first human to ever test compatible for resettlement on his planet. Unable to greet the human at the LAW transport ship, Thrain had sent his soul brother, hoping the human would appreciate the honor he was bestowing on them. He never expected his most trusted friend would be coerced into trying to kill the human and jeopardize Empari’s membership in the League of Worlds. As treachery, misunderstandings, and culture shock threaten Bria’s life and sanity, she and Thrain will have to learn to trust one another to save Empari’s seat in the League of Aligned Worlds, and secure Bria’s place on the only planet she ever felt was truly home.

AI Voice isn’t “bad” per se

AI voice (or virtual voice) is as bad as I expected, but then again, I’m fairly forgiving. It didn’t really try to do different voices for the various characters. But sometimes I prefer a male narrator NOT try to do a woman’s voice cause it often comes out stupidly breathy and ditzy. And at times the AI struggled with consistent pronunciation of alien names, stressing an “i” sound in some chapters and a “y” sound in other chapters. Like Vicken vs Viken. But it’s free, so I’m not too picky. It got me through a few days of long commutes to and from work at no cost.