Narrative in Fiction: Whispers in the Background

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He becomes involved with an eccentric man whose isolated villa in the Greek countryside becomes the stage upon which the major drama of the novel unfolds. Therefore, it makes sense for him to launch a scene in this manner:. The sea stretched like a silk carpet across to the shadowy wall of mountains on the mainland to the west. The reader needs to be able to see in detail the empty Greek countryside in which Nicholas becomes so isolated.

It sets the scene for something beautiful and strange to happen, and Fowles does not disappoint. These final three methods can create an effective scenic launch:. If your character is deserted on an island, the reader needs to know the lay of the land. Any fruit trees in sight? Are there rocks, shelter or wild, roaming beasts? Say your scene opens in a jungle where your character is going to face danger; you can describe the scenery in language that conveys darkness, fear and mystery.

Say you have a sad character walking through a residential neighborhood. The descriptions of the homes can reflect that sadness—houses can be in disrepair, with rotting wood and untended yards. You can use weather in the same way. A bright, powerfully sunny day can reflect a mood of great cheer in a character. Take your time with each scene launch. Craft it as carefully and strategically as you would any other aspect of your scene.

Remember that a scene launch is an invitation to the reader, beckoning him to come further along with you. Make your invitation as alluring as possible. This article was written by Jordan E. The author's work is definitely worth looking at, and some of it is also FREE. Dystopian, action-packed, gut-wrenching tale of betrayal, revenge, love, and death. Smart, tough, female protagonist teamed with smart, reluctant vengeful male Anxious to move on to the next installment. Sep 11, William rated it it was amazing Shelves: I enjoyed Whisper of the Stars so much I bought the second book in this series before I wrote this review.

I'm actually surprised that I'm taking the time to write this review because this is really one of the books you-can't-put-down. You must know the feeling where you just have to find out what happens next, well, this entire book has been like this. I normally don't like to give summaries of the books I review because I believe the authors do a much better job of this than any reviewer could. However, the premise of this book is so interesting I must comment on this.

The story takes place some ninety years in the future at a time when the population exceeds the Earth's ability to support it and Global Warming is accelerating at a rate that is rushing us to a Doomsday situation. The population must be dramatically reduced, and quickly before the human race faces extinction. Instead of mass extermination, a plan is implemented that requires almost ninety percent of the population to hibernate for lengthy periods of time before returning for their ten percent of the time reactivated before another period of hibernation.

What could go wrong with this plan. Won from goodreads Just starting reading and the story has me already the world is not as we know it and you have hibernation as compulsory better to choose yourself than let them choose. Jennifer is a police officer who has to crack down on illegal body swapping is what I'd call it as can course splintering you will understand more as you read.

Death Whispers (Death, #1) by Tamara Rose Blodgett

Jennifer has bad dreams but something happens which unlocks that nightmare amd things change she is going to end up on the run not knowing whose on her s Won from goodreads Just starting reading and the story has me already the world is not as we know it and you have hibernation as compulsory better to choose yourself than let them choose. Jennifer has bad dreams but something happens which unlocks that nightmare amd things change she is going to end up on the run not knowing whose on her side.

I enjoyed this novel and look forward to any sequel Engaging from beginning to end. The Whisper of Stars will keep the reader engaged from start to finish.

The Whisper of Stars

People hibernating as a way to address climate change in the future. Mar 01, Lucinda rated it liked it. Might just look around for the next book. Will definitely read some more in this series! This was a return to the genre and thoroughly enjoyed it! Mar 11, Sylvia rated it really liked it Shelves: Free e-book on amazon. It is set in and the interesting questions that are raised with regards to over population, big brother control over every day life, technology and its effect on the quality of life for the average person. A debut author, self-published.

And a really good read. There are so many writers out there trying to get their books seen, it's hard to choose which ones to try. I'd recommend this one. It's confident, it's fast-moving, the characters are sympathetic, the story is good.

It's very reminiscent of 'Minority Report' the film and other dystopian sci-fi films and books set in our world gone to the dogs. Here, Hibernation of the human species is the answer, to preserve resources in a society threate A debut author, self-published. Here, Hibernation of the human species is the answer, to preserve resources in a society threatened more and more by global warming. In this world, people live into their mid-hundreds comfortably, but body swapping has become a dangerous underground activity for those trying to defy the aging process for even longer.

And that's Jennifer Logan's area - she's part of the police Duality Division, her role to stop those from swapping bodies illegally. But as often happens, she suddenly finds herself at the middle of a conspiracy involving her long-dead father, some deeply buried memories, and the whole system. Who can she trust? I enjoyed this so much more than I thought I was going to. The writing is instantly accessible and the genre is clearly a love of the author.

I really liked picturing Jennifer's world and thought Nick Jones did a great job setting the scene and creating her world. It's visual enough to make a film from. Jennifer is a great protagonist, and her 'sidekick' that she picks up later has his own story, his own personality and skills, and isn't just a secondary character. There are some good 'set piece' scenes, the title is finally explained and makes sense , there is a hanger of an ending, with a sequel to follow, I presume. With thanks to the author for the review copy.

This appears to be a first effort, and it is a good one. It is best described as lying somewhere between science fiction and fantasy where depends on your definitions and is set somewhere near the end of the 21st century. Human population has expanded intolerably, lifetimes are almost doubled, the planet is under pressure, and hence society has taken a novel way out: Everyone volunteers to get an implanted chip and report at periodic intervals to be put to sleep, to wake up some t This appears to be a first effort, and it is a good one. Everyone volunteers to get an implanted chip and report at periodic intervals to be put to sleep, to wake up some time later so that the waking population at any time is at reasonable levels.

Of course, criminals do not do this, as they fear they may not wake. There is also an illegal way out: How that works is unclear because while one party benefits, the other party is not mentioned in the book. And there needs to be policing of this policy, and one such policewoman is Jennifer Logan. Jennifer's father had a secret that he buried before he died; Jennifer finds it: Unfortunately, the powers that be know she has found it, and they want it, meanwhile Jennifer finds all is not well with officialdom.

There is the odd "hole" in the story, but if you overlook those you have a genuinely imaginative and exciting story, well-written, and with one of the better long action sequences that I have seen. The book is the first in a series, but it has a very clean ending, and can be considered self-contained, but with an incentive to wait for the next one. I won this book on Goodreads today, what a lovely thing to wake up to. I cannot wait to receive it in the post soon I hope and start it!!

The cover of this book looks amazing and I suppose it's what drew me into even entering the competition. The blurb after rereading it sounds just up my street with a bit of everything in it. I can't wait to try out Nick Jones as a new a I won this book on Goodreads today, what a lovely thing to wake up to. I can't wait to try out Nick Jones as a new author and see what his writing and stories are like: D ok I received this book today 3days after I won it!!

And my the cover is even better in real life! Not being an avid Sci-Fi reader i love fantasy though it probably would be the cover alone that would make me buy this book. However I'm wiling to try out new things every now and then. I have started it already just to see what it is like, I only meant to read the beginning but ended up reading 5chapters and it didn't feel like that much.

I like the fact they are short chapters because it make the pace of the story feel fast and that goes well with the nature of this book. The story line has had me hooked from the first sentence with the writing style and most of all the action and characters. I'm not going to say much about the story as I don't want to spoil it too much but defiantly a must read if you like action, sci-fi, futuristic, detective stories with strong plot lines and good characters. A fast-paced futuristic sci-fi techno-thriller with some truly interesting concepts, The Whisper of Stars is the debut novel of Nick Jones nickjoneswriter.

After a brief prologue that raises questions that won't be answered until much later, the story skips ahead thirty-odd years to The future as envisioned by Mr. Jones is filled with cool technology but overshadowed by concerns about climate change and dwindling resources. With human survival in the balance, the solution seems to be Hibe A fast-paced futuristic sci-fi techno-thriller with some truly interesting concepts, The Whisper of Stars is the debut novel of Nick Jones nickjoneswriter. With human survival in the balance, the solution seems to be Hibernation, with the population divided into lots so people alternate "sleeping" with remaining awake and active.

Hibernation means people live much longer, and there are laws to protect the rights of those hibernating, but it wouldn't be much of a thriller if there wasn't something else going on, would it? London MI5 agent Jennifer Logan works in the Duality Division, tasked with enforcing Hibernation and rooting out illegal cloning and mind replication operations.

In the aftermath of an operation gone bad, she meets Nathan O'Brien, a grieving widower searching for those responsible for the death of his investigative journalist wife. To say much more would spoil the fun for future readers. The story moves at a good pace, the action sequences are exciting and well described, and there are some mild twists along the way, too.

I received this book in a Booklikes giveaway and it is a signed copy! The year is It took me a while to read this book, but it's because I read other books in between. It is not the kind of book I'm used to reading, but I liked this one. This book is really well written, it is captivating. As I received this book in a Booklikes giveaway and it is a signed copy! As far as I'm concerned, I would have liked a little bit more world building, because it took me a few chapters to understand what was happening. He keeps on trying to make it seem cool, as if he's better than everyone else even showing off these things to his friends , but it just seems sad.

Going on with that point, the futuristic not really that far ahead of us in time aspects are kind of lame and poorly explained. The author first introduces the "Pulse" as if we should all know what they are. It turns out they're just glorified mobile phones that people use a bit like texting. Other pulse related items also have little imagination, being that they're all just basic items we have nowadays, only that they use Pulse technology instead. They basically have television and games connected to the Pulse. They also have the Pulse connected to their house, landline phone or Pulse, now and various other things in everyday life.

I would have thought that being in the future, there would be much neater things, even though it's not that far ahead in time.

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I might go back to that point later. For now, I'll go on about the government stuff. So, basically, he's worried they're after him. He's worried about all the police now in his life. A little bit in the future, he's also going to be going through the AP test where it will be decided what school all these students will go to next. It will also be where these children will be "found out" by the government and what sort of abilities they have not all of them do. Yet, weirdly enough, the majority of his friends do have abilities, even the bunch he's now gained from the start of the story which doesn't even make much sense to me, either.

So, after doing the test, he's found out as a 2 point AFTD on a scale from Or 6 as they later assume. He'd taken a medication his dad had given him to make sure he didn't test as a full 5, as we all assume he is. The government knows he's a 5, anyway, because they've been keeping an eye on him for a while. Later, he finds out that the government had been sort of tapping his phones and his home. They know he's a high level AFTD because of the information they've gained from this and watching him closely.

They end up trying to kidnap him Because of the awful things said about the government gossip , we're meant to assume that it's all bad and he'll be made to do bad things with them. They didn't need to try and kidnap him. They could have just had him arrested or maybe "taken him into custody" or something "legal". They're the government and the way the author was making it seem, they could have just turned up anywhere and legally take him. Yet, they try and kidnap him within a large group of teenagers and were planning on taking him away with a helicopter.

They didn't need to go to that much effort, even if they were kidnapping him. They could have taken him at any time in the past few weeks- at home, school, shopping, in the graveyard, etc. They could have waited until he was alone. However, for some really unexplainable reason, they decided to wait until he was surrounded by a group of people, other paranormals.

It doesn't make sense. Yet, I think for some reason, the author was trying to make it seem cool; the government coming to take him with a helicopter sounds cooler than just trying to gag him and drive him off in a dark van. It was a useless scene. Much of the novel was useless, though.

A lot of the book is about teenage things. It seems as if the author takes us through a heap of useless things during Caleb's day. We wake up, we get dressed going through dirty cloths to find the few that smell the least , eat breakfast he always eats more than his father , we go to school and spend ages in class with him talking about useless things , having lunch he hates vegetables and is continually shock that it's all Jade eats , etc, etc, etc.

I'm all for including details in novels, but this was so ridiculous. This was absurd with detail and just went on forever. It's very condescending, even going so far to explain minor words that people really ought to already know , yet doesn't explain things more important to the novel like what Pulses really are, but instead we need to figure it out ourselves. If teenagers are really like this, than this is really sad- not to mention that it will be really sad if teenagers and adults become this stupid; that's an awful thought for the future of the human race.

The characters are extremely unlikeable to me trying too hard to be cool, using swearing just because and even showing major bouts of stupidity. The futuristic society doesn't show many decent changes, instead it seems to be a little bit of propoganda. The plot idea was good, but really badly performed. I think the bad performance was predominantly a mix of the bad writing and the author just kept on going with every stupid idea that popped into their head, even if it didn't pan out into anything useful to the plot oh, I'm going to pretend it's Friday the 13th coming up so they can go to a haunted house Usually I'm generous with rating books I didn't like.

One star is more than generous in this case. I will probably not continue to read this series. I got this as part of a three book pack from Amazon the first three books in this series for free. If I had actually paid for it, I would have been really upset. As it is, I'm just pretty disappointed with this book.

That's just all my opinion, though. I can't trudge through it any longer, not without booze, and I guess this is a sure sign I shouldn't go on. I wanted to like this story so, so badly. Necromancy is exactly the kind of magic or, more generally, power that fascinates me, for all the possibilities it offers and questions it raises, and from the blurb, I thought I would love this story.

But I just can't, for the following reasons: Juvenile prose, for starters. Granted, the narrator is supposed to be , However, the jumbled thoughts, run-on sentences and limited vocabulary still made it hard to go through the story. Some sentences were also really weird: Too much useless dialogue and everyday life scenes. Those needed serious trimming.

I don't demand action and only action, but I really don't need to know about every breakfast food, teenage thought, phone sorry, pulse conversation, and so on. Here, it was just too much of the latter. On top of it, Caleb's observations weren't particularly interesting. Annoying characters, especially Jonesy. Jonesy wasn't funny nor clever. He was just the kind of moronic teenage boy who's probably going to earn a Darwin Award someday. From the start, I just couldn't stand him.

With such friends, who still needs enemies? Too Stupid To Live characters. The whole lot, adults included. The premise seems to be about Caleb not wanting to end up like the one guy who had exactly the same abilities as him basically, this would mean being stripped of all his freedom and human rights, and be used as a government tool. So why, why does he have to blab about it to everyone, and show off his power? In the most idiotic ways possible?

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He faints in biology class due to "hearing" all the dead frogs. However, he doesn't want the two school bullies to think he's a sissy. What does he do? Take them to the local cemetery and raises some random bloke from his grave. The guys are bullies. They never miss an opportunity to taunt him. Worst people ever to show off to. He raises a dead dog in the middle of the street.

With plenty of witnesses around. Then why did you tell said cop about his being AFTD? I broke the silence. Not a bad guy overall, but still, someone whose duty involves reporting people like Caleb: Jonesy doesn't seem to grasp the basic concept of "talking about Caleb's abilities could mean the government finding out". Of course, he flaps his mouth in front of Caleb's parents and the cop: They don't rat Caleb out. Seriously, if I had been a villain, and disliked some guy like they seemed to dislike him, I'd have used that golden opportunity to get rid of him.

His father's the one who mapped up the whole human genome, thus paving the way to the tests and injection that would later awaken latent abilities in teenagers. I expected much more from them. The best course of action they devise is to take him to the cemetery to talk to his great-grandmother, and potentially, raise her from her grave by the time it happens, they already suspect he's not just the basic AFTD kid who can merely see and talk to ghosts.

It is your fault. At this point, you're too stupid to be left running free, because who knows what harm you could do, considering the dumb ideas you and your pals could still come up with? I won't find out on my own, though. Feb 19, Tammy K. Two things stand out the most with this story for me. The second is that in spite of that the supernatural plot line was highly entertaining. There is a talking dog. I almost deleted this book off my kindle and moved on when we got to that part, but by that point I had already invested a fair amount of reading time into the book, so I pushed forward cringing every time the dog's internal dialog occurred.

The teenage angst and first time true love between a year old, was like nails on a chalk board for me. Now here is why I kept reading the book: Set in a future that is "realistic" for a fictional work. There are plenty of action packed scenes with supernatural youths including, psychics, astral projection, talking to the dead, necromancy, fire-starters and more. When it came time to deciding between giving this book three stars average read and four stars better than average read , I found myself sitting on the fence. The strong story line which I enjoyed was about equal to the teen dramatics which I disliked in my mind.

Whisper Background story with Narration

The final deciding factor boiled down to the homophobic slang, which although not constant throughout the story, happened with such ease and no commentary to correct it that I was personally offended by the homophobic teasing. Not the kind guys did to let you know they could kick your ass. The ones they did when they wanted to hug you but that was totally not okay, no-homo, right?

So do I recommend this book? Yes, but only with the cautionary comments above. I really like this novel. I especially love that the main character is male, as more often than not, lead roles in YA literature are female why is that? With a main character that can raise corpses, how can you go wrong? It is obvious that Blodgett spent a lot of time writing Death Whispers, perfecting the scientific and technological aspects of this futuri I really like this novel.

It is obvious that Blodgett spent a lot of time writing Death Whispers, perfecting the scientific and technological aspects of this futuristic dystopian novel. I was reminded of one of my favorite TV shows, Heroes, as I read. While many young adults will come into their special power during puberty, not all will choose to use their powers for good. And, with many new powers coming to light each year, the government, of course, is going to be on the lookout for any powers that may be politically important. It was really interesting to read about this, and Blodgett writes in such a way that the reader can easily visualize it though thankfully not smell it!

To read my full review: I tend to stay away from YA books that involve high schoolers because I find them to be immature and silly. This book, so not the case. I grabbed this book as a freebie a couple of years ago and am so glad I did. The author just 'gets it' with describing teenage life. It felt as if it could really happen. As a result, our government has decided to inoculate the children to bring I tend to stay away from YA books that involve high schoolers because I find them to be immature and silly.

As a result, our government has decided to inoculate the children to bring out these paranormal abilities, that just so happen to manifest during puberty. We all know how puberty works. Some are early bloomers, some are on time, while others are late bloomers.

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Having paranormal abilities is no different. However, the government has taken notice to certain people, let's say with certain paranormal abilities, and use them for nefarious reasons, for their ill intent. It's happened before this generation and they are not keen on that idea. I mean who would be? Your freedoms stripped, having no say in how you want to live your life. Not a life at all. So these kids, with their newly discovered abilities, are trying to gain control over them and try to live their lives like normal teens.

This is just the beginning of their story But I'm just very weird that way. Other than that, it was a great book, and I can't wait to get the second book in the series! I found the grammer improved, figured id mention that first since im weird like that. About to jump into the next book, looking forward to the next part of the ride!

I don't know where to start! I felt like I was a fly on the wall listening to these kids talk unguarded Even though the story takes place in the future, there were so many references to today's times and the semi-recent past, that it was all totally believable! Loved the characters, young teens at that in-between stage coming from so many different lifestyles. I wasnt sure about this book at first since the main character is a guy, and I am used to reading book that have female leads.

But I was suprisingly astounded. I really loved this book. The kids in it crack me up, and the parents, well most of them, are great. On a few parts I am sitting here saying wtf are these boys thinking doing that, and then I realize well they are boys, and thats what boys do. Im starting on the 2nd book in the series right now. What an incredible book. Tamara Rose Blodgett captures the essence of teen boy relationships and combines it perfectly with a fantastical paranormal tale. I'm glad I did. The most basic premise is this: What we end up with is a YA novel about this kid and his friends dealing with first loves, friendships, burgeoning abilities, independence, abuse, trust, etc.

For most of the novel, I wasn't sold on why AFTD was a more dangerous or scary power than something with much more overt aggressive applications like pyromancy, weather control, etc. I enjoyed the characters; I enjoyed their voices; I enjoyed their stories. This is a book I would read again.

This is a book I'd suggest for others. Not that I don't have quibbles: Our protagonist's two best friends, "The J's. While they were thankfully sparse, the parts that drift into the reanimated dog's perspective were more distracting. I thought the end was too easy, which makes sense on top of my only real quibble: