Review: Lost Souls, by Noah Chinn
Lost Souls
Noah Chinn
ISBN 9781990411175
347 pages
Release: December 17, 2022
Publisher: Noah Chinn Books
I realize I’m breaking several rules regarding how I should review novels:
- Keep the novels current.
- Review a series in order. (see review from January 18, 2024)
We’re going to blame my exception to these protocols on my personal misunderstanding of the order of these titles, and with that send my abject apologies to the author, Noah Chinn.
However, I do feel it’s important to say this first novel in Chinn’s Get Lost Saga is a rocketing (forgive the pun) good science fiction read. You have to realize that’s high praise from a person who is ambivalent about most science fiction.
First, the marketing blurb so you’ll have an idea what this novel is about:
Maurice “Moss” Foote used to be somebody. Then nobody. Then somebody again, for a while. Now he’s back to square one, using his last hundred credits to try and get back his old ship and start over. Again.
Hel doesn’t have a last name. Or maybe she does. She was born a slave. Or maybe she wasn’t. It’s all rather confusing to her, just like the strange compulsion that has her trying to build… something out of spare ship parts in the junkyard she calls home.
When she sees an opportunity to escape on board a rebuilt transport, she takes it, not realizing what she’s getting herself into. All she knows is the answers she’s looking for are on board that ship. Or maybe they’re inside her head.
Roy “Hellno” Herzog left the Silver Legion in favour of becoming a pirate, only they didn’t like his attitude any more than the Legion did. Now he’s got a lead on a prize so big it could set him up for life, if he can stomach working with other people.
All he’s got to do is track down one runaway slave.
And thus, the adventure begins.
Right from the first opening lines Chinn’s effortless style draws you in through excellent character development, believable world-building, and a brisk pace. There’s nothing extraneous here, no ponderous exposition, no lecturing about the very real societal issues with which he deals, no precious prose. The entire story—peopled with a reluctant hero, an AI that’s more than algorithms, individuals lost in manipulation and enslavement, and deliciously dastardly villains—is a perfect layer cake. There’s nothing half-baked here.
What makes this an even more remarkable novel is the fact it’s indie-published. As I said in my review of the second novel in the series, I don’t often review indie novels simply because the basic protocols of good grammar and story development are eschewed in favour of personal gratification. I know more than one indie author guilty of this. In fact, have previously published one or two of them before I had to close my publishing house in 2020.
Noah Chinn, however, is plainly a professional in every sense of the word, deeply committed to excellence in his craft. If I were seeking an editor, I would most definitely hire him. And if I were a reader seeking my next really immersive, entertaining read, one which would take me to interstellar space and people just trying to do the right thing and get by, I’d go looking for his Get Lost Saga. Highly recommended.