Specimen 959

Written by Robert Davies

Narrated by Wayne Mitchell

Astronaut. Repairman. Prisoner.
CenturoCorp engineer Darrien Norris begins a journey across Terran Colonial space to restore a broken mining machine on a distant, mineral harvest world. It was supposed to be routine—a good run to finish his career—but his shuttle is thrown without warning from its course by an unseen power and survival becomes the only thing that matters.
Catapulted across half the galaxy to a violent and hostile place, Norris has been left to survive or die inside an inescapable, alien horror merely for the crime of being lost—of being human. Escape is his purpose, but what he finds in the grinding, desperate fight to live will forever change the path of human history.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Everand Productions
• Release date: Nov 23, 2021
• ISBN: 9781094432311

Robert Davies

Robert Davies enjoys writing science fiction as well as exploring other genres. His work includes the science fiction series The Specimen Chronicles (Specimen 959, Echoes of Esharam, The Primus Initiative), When the River Ran Dry, and The Seventh Life of Aline Lloyd. Robert’s work has earned several IPPY awards, including his debut novel Specimen 959 and When the River Ran Dry. When not writing, he enjoys music and flying. He lives in southwest Washington with his family and four mildly overbearing cats.

Reviews for Specimen 959

[Jay Kabel · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

It was enjoyable, but has significant opportunities for improvement that an editor could maybe have helped with. It has some interesting and compelling scenarios and plotting. It's sometimes clever. Good delivery of mystery and answers. It is marred by sometimes immature and cringy characterization, and sometimes drawn out and repetitive dialog, which the melodramatic and angsty reader doesn't help. Characters will often repeat themselves with some comic book, tough-guy phrases and histrionics. Some very strange gaps in the rendering of characters...several alien species and main characters don't get clearly described. And one of my sci-fi pet peeves - references to Earth flaura and fauna appearing on alien worlds. All that said, I was compelled to finish, and I want to know what happens in following books. In sum, It was good, but some editing and polish would have taken it to another level.

[joshua.raul.barrera · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

If you can find enjoyment from listening to this man speak kudos to you i could not stand monotone voice a robot

[Sarah Cudney · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The concept is very interesting and I enjoyed the beginning and ending the most. I found certain middle parts too drawn out for my liking and had to repeat them to pay attention.

[vecharo · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

It’s a coin toss which was worse, the book or the reader. Twist that had no real relevance. Total lack of common sense for the sake of having something to type on paper. The readers choice of voice characters, lacked realism. Mitty started sounding the same. For me it went from a possible good book to just background noise to a total waste of time.

[Robyn Munns · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

The book seems ok so far, but the narration is rather whiney and a bit annoying... actually, I can't stand the narrator - he oozes drama even when describing the contents of a cargo bay!
Shame, it might have been an interesting book...

[robert.lewter1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

War and Peace. That's what this story is like. Once you figure out all the characters it's a wonderful story.

[Jenna Vaughn · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Not my typical read but it was intriguing and I liked the group of friends bound together by their shared captivity. The turn was interesting and almost could have been saved for the next book. I'm looking forward to reading it.

[Scott Stout · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Very well written. I enjoyed every minute. Can’t wait for the next installment.

[Elena Kennedy · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A pleasant listen but it had lots of plot holes.

[joseph8wood · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

An amazing book field filled with amazing stuff and amazing people and amazing places and amazing circumstances.

[Steve Austin · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Liked this story along the introduction to the prison and the last chapter, but I still want more

[Matt Lemmon · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I really enjoyed it. It is written well. The story line is easy to follow and you become inthralled with the characters.

[caytlain hewitt · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Really enjoyed the story. Kind of annoyed that all of the book is not here. Look forward to part 2

[AMP · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Want to hear part 2 this was awesome love Sci fi

[Kent Trustrup · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This was a weird book, the story is overall fine, but the author writes all characters as super suspicous. But ok, they are alien etc., but this also includes the only human. Everyone is so aggressive, dismissive and downright paranoid. Also his way of writing female characters and his view on mental illness is really odd. Getting PTSD from excessive violence, fuck you must be crazy. But overall if you can get through this, then the story is actually ok.

[Daniel Randall · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Bit is a slow start but very happy to have gotten to the end. And can now say I enjoy the book going to next book now ?

[Keith Thompson · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

very interesting
a great book at a different look of sci fi

[edbrackin8057 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I have no clue if the book is any good or not. I wanted to listen to an audiobook and the person reading the story was terrible. He was monotone. I couldn’t listen to him for three minutes. I fast-forward to halfway through the book he sounded the same then. Get a different narrator next time.

[belinda grimm · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The narrator is horrible. Over dramatic, terrible with the women characters. He makes them all sound ridiculous. The book may have been good but this guy reading it is too much.

[John Johnson · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Too wordy and excessively over descriptive. Get lost and side tracked.

[Jacob Cybulski · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Great story, however it has never been disclosed that this is book 1 in a series, so if you like it there is more coming. There are segments of fast pace action, political intrigue, and sections of incredibly long (often tangential to the plot) conversations, with some unexpected twists to the very end. The reader's military style of narration takes a while to getting used to but after chapter 3 you may not even notice.

[Louise W · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

**This covers all three books in the series** Very slow to get going so I was zoned out and not really listening in the beginning but it didn’t matter as it was a bit repetitive so I got the gist. A lot of dialogue explaining the story: more of a tell rather than show at times. Action/military scenes were good, probably because the author is ex-military and is writing what he knows. Good concept but story was a bit predictable. Was good enough to get through the whole trilogy but not the best. The narrator was one of the best I’ve heard, reading the different characters with distinctive voices but not putting on irritatingly bad accents. Apparently other reviews have said he’s terrible with a horrible monotone, however, I listen on 1.5x speed so that usually fixes that problem. Unfortunately it’s not his fault that the characters kept saying each other’s names repeatedly which is incredibly unnatural. Overall, worth having on to listen to while doing the cleaning, etc, to keep your mind from going numb!

[Shawnne Springman · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I really enjoyed this book I just found it challenging to understand what was happening at the very final minutes of the book the way it ended had me confused

[Karen Adams · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It’s really good but I got lost T the ending.

[Justin Riggs · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Really good book
I'm excited for the next one in the series

[Matt Hutch · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Fantastic book. Ending leaves open for a 2nd book which hopefully we be available soon.

[Stephen Walton · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The story and characters are great, but what really brings this audio book to life is the narrator. His ability to increase the tempo at tense situations and produce the most menacing and malevolant voices make even conversations between people feel like they are life or death situations. I hope he continues reading the following book(s).

[David Van Dyke · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Really enjoyed the book but disappointed with the ending. It just needed 1 more chapter to finish the story.

[Andy Hunter · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I'm giving up on this book about halfway through. The writing is cliched and repetitive. The narrator is so over-the-top, every line reading is dripping with DRAMA. I can't take it anymore, I'm done.

[Anthony Leo Quinn · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Maybe the book is good, it would be impossible to get through it with the narrators droning monotone, that sounds like he is one step away from ending it all.