THE HANDS WE'RE GIVEN
Aces High, Jokers Wild, #1
by O.E. Tearmann
Narrator: Kirt Graves
Length: 13 hours and 16 minutes
Released: June 28th 2019
Publisher: Amphibian Press
Genre: Technothriller; Cyberpunk; LGBT
Narrator: Kirt Graves
Length: 13 hours and 16 minutes
Released: June 28th 2019
Publisher: Amphibian Press
Genre: Technothriller; Cyberpunk; LGBT
O.E. Tearmann's Ten Reasons To Listen To This Book
- Listen because Kirt Graves absolutely rocks. No, I mean it. As a narrator, Kirt has done a fantastic job of nailing everything from the somewhat shifting voice of Aidan, a trans man, to Janice, a former agricultural worker whose scathing drawl can skin a donkey. He nailed the voice of a tiny woman with a stutter, a baby and a ten-year old. And they were all absolutely perfect.
- Listening to this book will give you hope. It was begun as a response to the disheartened apathy of 2016. It felt as if everyone was assuming that we were going downhill, and that the erosion of America was inevitable.
- Okay, fine. Then let’s write the darkest incarnation of America we can envision if the country continues down this road. And then let’s write characters who take care of one another, fall in love, and laugh in spite of it.
- That’s the Wildcards: an eighteen-man unit in a force fighting to overthrow the Corporations that run America and restore democracy to the country. They are fighters. They are dreamers. They are a family. And they are going to kick the world’s ass together.
- Listen for the laughs
- One of my influences for this series was the classic show MASH 4077, and I’ve drawn on it as a reminder that humor helps people survive dark times. The Wildcards are very smart, sometimes bored, and always up for a laugh. On this base, there are puns. There’s pranks. There’s overwriting one another’s personnel files to make jokes. There’s innuendo and a betting pool on who’s going to fall in love with who. There is some of the funniest cursing you’ve ever heard.
- Listen for a love story you don’t see every day.
- As Aidan and Kevin perform a slow and sometimes awkward courtship, they trip and stumble more than once. But they also work to understand and support one another. They both act with compassion. And they give each other the gifts of their truths. This highly inclusive LGBT story showcases romance between people who society too often ignores. These stories are worthy of being heard.
- Listen for the sex.
- Oh, yes. There is sex. Very fun, very queer sex.
- Listen for the drones.
- Things get pretty crazy in this climate changed version of Colorado. If dodging attack drones and stealing shipments from Corporate overlords is your thing, this is your book.
- Listen for the rock and roll
- Kevin is a hopeless history geek. Living in 2155, he adores the 1980s. Get ready for screwy references and hollered Bon Jovi lyrics.
- Listen for a different kind of hero, and a different kind of leadership.
- Aidan isn’t the leader you expect. He’s quiet. Self effacing. He doesn’t give many orders, and he doesn’t do much shouting. But his quiet presence draws his people into the tight knit unit that they need to be, and his kind of leadership showcases a different, less harmful way to be a leader.
- Listen to the warning of America’s future
- Between climate change, the for-profit nature of American society and the mind-numbingly pervasive ads on the city Grids, the version of America in these books is not a fun place to live. How it ended up there is discussed. I wrote this as a warning. Let’s not end up there.
- Listen to the dreams
- This world may be grim, but it lays out a path forward that we can follow. Together, we can rise. Let ‘The Hands We’re Given’ prove it to you.
Sex. Drones. Rock and roll.
Aidan Headly never wanted to be the man giving orders. That's fine with the Democratic State Force base he's been assigned to command: they don't like to take orders. Nicknamed the Wildcards, they used to be the most effective base against the seven Corporations owning the former United States in a war that has lasted over half a century. Now the Wildcards are known for creative insubordination, chaos, and commanders begging to be reassigned.
Aidan is their last chance. If he can pull off his assignment as Commander and yank his ragtag crew of dreamers and fighters together, maybe they can get back to doing what they came to do: fighting for a country worth living in.
Life's a bitch. She deals off the bottom of the deck. But you play the hands you're given.
READ MORE . . . THE HANDS WE'RE GIVEN (Aces High, Jokers Wild, #1) . . . AUDIO EXCERPT & GIVEAWAY . . .
