The Kasari Nexus

Rho Agenda Assimilation, Book 1

By: Richard Phillips

Narrated by: Alexander Cendese

Jennifer Smythe escapes Earth's invasion by the insidious Kasari race, hijacks an alien starship, and survives the deadly passage through a wormhole.

But escape is short-lived....

When Jennifer emerges on the new world of Scion, she is confronted by the same deadly enemy. Now the Kasari have sided with the planet's angel-like elite against the warrior underclass, but with the intent of ultimately ruling both. And when Jennifer is captured by the brutish Koranthians, her alien-enhanced abilities make her a crucial asset in battling the Kasari and their winged allies.

Back on a divided Earth, Jennifer's brother, Mark, and Jack "the Ripper" Gregory wage their own war against the Kasari. As the global government welcomes the extraterrestrials, Mark, Jack, and their rebel faction seek to use the powerful mind-altering skills gained from the Kasari's sworn enemies to repel the would-be conquerors. But faced with the might of Earth's ruling forces, has the cause already been lost?

©2016 Richard Phillips (P)2016 Brilliance Audio, Inc.

Seemed more like an intermediate story than Book 1

How could the performance have been better?

MacLeod Andrews nothing against Alexander Cendese I just preferred MacLeod Andrews way of performing these characters.

Any additional comments?

To really get this book you will have had to read/listened to the previous Rho novels it was good but not great.. enjoyable becaus I am already invested in this universe and want to see where it goes.

Good story terrible Narrator

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

No, the narrator destroys a perfectly good story, his inability to do multiple voices is so distracting. The other books in this series read by MacLeod Andrews were great, and then they changed narrators, What a shame

How could the performance have been better?

Have MacLeod Andrews read it. This guys voice was distracting, he couldn't adjust to play multiple roles and not even close to a female sounding voice which comprise most of the characters in this edition.

I have a huge regret...

...and my regret is that I came across this author only in this book, without looking for the previous books in the Rho Agenda universe.

That took a sizeable chunk from my fun, since there were many references and character relationships I (obviously) did not understand.

However, even considering that, I was able to follow the story decently and enjoy the time spent. I'll probably re-start the series from the actual beginning, and enjoy it as it was planned to be.

Solid story in a well thought out universe

Richard Phillips is getting better with every book he publishes. Characters in the early books had little depth and he seemed to shy away from detail to avoid inconsistencies. The Kasari Nexus is a big step up, and I found myself looking for excuses to listen. He's not in the same class as someone like Sara King with respect to character and plot depth (the gold standard for the genre IMO), but I still thoroughly enjoyed it.

I enjoyed this book a lot, happy to see

Everything coming together from the previous books, I listened to the Audible versions so the change in voice acting took some getting used to. Macleod nade jack sound like David Hayter performing in Metal gear solid while the new actor makes him sound more like Stallone, both good just took a little while to get used to after the last 6 books being performed by Macleod.

Awesome

Overall the story was great. I just wish they didn’t change the narrator for this one book. He did ok, I just wished he listened to all the other books to try and get some what close to the other narrator.

More of the same

After the Rho Agenda.
I can't say I could always suspend disbelief but I liked the good guys not the bad ones and the sticking points were pretty far away (talking to weapons and learning to Drive). The plot is complex enough and well enough detailed to fit most of the time. That said, it is built from the perspective of my world view. Listened in a day.
Waiting happily for the next volume.

The Rho Agenda Goes Off ... Planet

Picking up immediately after Wormhole ends, Phillips takes his sci-fi to a whole new level. With alien technology running amok on Earth and with politicians promising to rebuild Dr. Stephenson's wormhole gateway, we get to experience the ongoing Kasari assimilation of the alien planet, Scion, through the eyes of Jennifer Smythe. With all of the heroes from his previous two Rho Agenda series under severe assault, it is amazing to see how these plot lines intertwine. This is the first of Phillips's books not narrated by MacLeod Andrews and I was a bit skeptical at the beginning, but found myself really enjoying the voices that Alexander Cendese brings to this story. Fabulous listen.

great story but could have been two books

the story is very good and has a lot of depth.
but it could have been two books. it never brought the two lines together. it would build action just to stop and goto a different plot.
Also the narrator needs to go back and listen to the first 6 books and get Jack's character voice better. He sounds like a little kid not the ripper he should be.

The final trilogy of trilogies?

For those who haven't listened to or read the first and second trilogies, The Rho Agenda and A Rho Agenda Novel, you really should suspend this series until you have, since a lot of what is covered here is based on characters and events in those prior series. You wont regret the deferment because each of them are worth additional the time investment. Note: I plan to mention items that had occurred in the aforementioned trilogies so those who haven't experienced them may want to skip the rest of this review.

Honestly, I wasn't sure what to expect on the next set of Rho novels since each of the two prior trilogies had left several plot arcs unresolved. However, it was not too long into this novel than it became clear that Richard Phillips intended to gather those prior open arcs loose ends and continue knitting the story where the other two trilogies had left off.

As far as the SciFi elements, it was really a treat to see how Jennifer and Raul, out of existential necessity, worked together combining their different scientific knowledge gained for the different alien ships to survive after being sucked into the wormhole. Their interaction ended up causing a significant change to Raul's character which Phillips expertly and slowly rolled out over several chapters.

There are also a new cast of characters that they have to intermingle with as they find themselves on another planet where the Kasari has intentions of subduing. This was written in such a way that made it very entertaining.

Most of the original primary characters are also off doing their thing back on earth, mostly trying to stop the follow-on Earth governments from resurrecting the Kasari wormhole gate. Jack and Janet's son Robby and his AI hitchhiker also begin to play a more significant role in the unfolding events.

MacLeod Andrews, who expertly narrated the first two trilogies, has been replace with Alexander Cendese. While I was a bit leery with this change since I really enjoyed Andrews voice skills, I was pleased to find Cendese narration also very good. In fact, his slightly more mature-sounding voice seemed more fitting after I considered that the whole cast of characters had aged since where they last left off.