Title: Corrupted Race

Author: Quill Holland

Genre: Science fiction

 

Quill Holland’s Corrupted Race is the third installment in the Forgotten Saga Series, picking up from where book two leaves off: Raith, under a new identity and life, is trying to settle down with his family after only knowing tyranny and corruption at his own hands and from his own mind as Tynan. When a powerful alien race, the Caezors, invades humanity’s newly terraformed planet, Gaia, they use theta waves to control everyone’s minds. Only Raith, his son, and daughter are impervious and now must ally themselves with the Resistance, a collection of many different alien races, to try to defeat the common enemy.

The novel is told from a first-person point of view. This works very effectively for getting inside Raith’s head as he grapples with his identity. A complex backstory of him being a tyrant who ruled with absolute power as Tynan explains why, as Raith, he simply wants to step away from all that. He clearly loves his son, Ichiro, and his daughter, Emma, as well as his two daughters and their families who live on Earth. Even though he is divorced from Amorina, he often describes her as the love of his life, and this is further emphasized by his memories. Raith is capable of deep love and loyalty, but he remains a troubled, conflicted man.

The building tension within Raith as the Caezors attack Gaia, and the ensuing mission to stop them, keeps the pages turning. His inner battle rages alongside the outward battle between the Caezors and the Resistance. Raith must constantly decide between wielding absolute power again without losing himself to it in the process. This is the central driving question throughout the book and no doubt the series. Holland doesn’t disappoint, as he doesn’t shy away from making Raith deeply conflicted yet relatable.

We see Raith’s humanity most effectively when he’s with his family. Scattered throughout the novel are exchanges between him simply as a dad who loves his kids, which gives the story heart. This is impressive for a science fiction book that is wrestling with large-scale battles and several alien races.

The enemy, the Caezors, prove a real, terrifying threat. Not only is their mind-control ability all-consuming and almost unfathomable as to how to defeat it, which ultimately requires use of an ancient weapon itself called the Horror, but their sheer arrogance is sinister. They feel akin to a human stepping on an ant, but the ant is humanity.

The cast of various aliens in the Resistance adds a nice touch, feeling like Star Wars. The established backstory of all these aliens and the galaxy neighborhood, plus the technology, clearly shows Holland’s love of sci-fi and his ability to craft page-turning epic adventures.

Some important revelations are delivered by characters reasoning them out through conversation instead of action or discovering them, which lessens the tension some. For example, Raith tells Emma about theta waves, but she seems to come to an easy conclusion that’s central to the destruction of the Caezors.

Corrupted Race ends unresolved, settling the stage for the next book by introducing a new threat that is even more unsettling than anything we’ve encountered so far. Holland’s novel is a gripping and emotionally honest exploration of a protagonist who we root for and sometimes want to shake. The Forgotten Saga Series is a stunning addition to the sci-fi genre and especially recommended for readers who enjoy moral complexity.

 

 

This Editorial Review was written by the Book Review Directory staff. To receive a similarly honest, professional review for one of your own books, click here.