Daisy, is constructed as a stereotypical snarky technologically-apt guru, who wakes up to find, the ship she is on, needs repairs. But, this eventuates to be the least of her worries. (Repeat after me, they’re not always watching, and they’re not out to get you……. Convincing, yeah?)

It’s not often that you see a female lead, in a Sci-Fi series, at least, not one that’s simply used as a plot device, or for love-triangle purposes. It’s fun, and yet frustrating, yet the intricacies, and the inclusions of technical jargon helped to set the scene, as a technologically based novel, rather than simply a novel, with technology.

It’s only limitation, is the over-use of the inter-personal relationships developed by characters – I’m not, not a fan of romance, but it’s an overused trope that I try my best to avoid.

All-in-all, I loved the futuristic-centric setting, and the technological aspects, contributing to a strong-female lead.

Having previously read other works by Scott Baron, I was excited to pick this one up. This one feels a bit distinct from the ones I've read in the past, as it has a lot more sci-fi elements to it. The main plot focuses on Daisy, who has just been awoken from a cryogenic sleep on a spacecraft headed to earth.

I think the highlight of this book is definitely the amount of attention and imagination that went into world-building. There's a very futuristic spin on all of the technology present in this book, but it was generally described well enough that I never really felt lost. I was fascinated by the descriptions of cyborgs and fully integrated cybernetic limbs and I think the concept of a world where not all "people" are necessarily human is kind of fascinating.

That being said, there were a couple of aspects of this book that I didn't enjoy as much:
1. The excessive sex scenes. Don't get me wrong, an occasional sex scene would have been fine -- but in this book, they felt a bit forced and awkward. More than once I found myself skimming ahead to skip over these scenes.
2. The exceeeeeessively long build-up to the explanation of what has transpired to humankind. I think Daisy spends about half the book actively running away from the other characters who are trying to explain the state of things, and then once the explanation occurs, it's a very hefty info dump at the end. The problem that goes hand-in-hand with this is that, by the time you reach the end, the explanation is not surprising. In fact, I was probably no more than a quarter of the way through the book before I guessed at some of the major details, and by the time Daisy lands on earth, it was fairly clear... but it was still frustrating having to wait until the end to get some greater context.

Overall, the plot pulled together some compelling ideas for a storyline, and I found the setting really intriguing. Though I do think some tweaks would improve the overall novel, I enjoyed this one.

I received a copy of this title from Netgalley for review.

I went in thinking this was YA Sci-Fi, but it is clearly New Adult or General Market considering the language and sex. The storyline was intriguing, but it felt at times that the protagonist was more male than female in actions and motivations and was written from the XX POV as a marketing tool rather than staying true to the character.

This is the first in a series. I am not sure that I will be seeking out the rest of the series to find out what happens next.

I wasn't especially surprised to find out, at the end of this book, that the author works in Hollywood (as an on-set doctor). A lot of it only makes sense if you apply Hollywood logic; consists of Hollywood cliches; or makes mistakes that Hollywood makes.

For example, people in real life don't sit bolt upright after they wake from a nightmare. It's a Hollywood cliche, to convey an internal experience in a visual medium.

The far side of the moon is constantly referred to as the "dark side"; anyone who knows any actual astrophysics knows that both sides of the moon get light, in a cycle that produces the phases of the moon. There's even the old myth of human brains using only a fraction of their processing and storage capacity, which a doctor should know is not true.

Things sometimes work in a way that those things simply wouldn't work, because plot and/or cliche. This includes a device that somehow gets more energy out of a system than was put in, covered over by some technobabble. Lights dim when the AI does a complex calculation.

No popular culture is referred to that originates after the book is written, which is a very common fault of this kind of book.

About halfway through I also started to notice that nobody seemed to have any backstory, and the ship was coming from a vague place for vague reasons, without apparently having any cargo or other raison d'etre. That eventually turned out to be kind of a feature, but... well, let me talk about the most annoying thing.

The most annoying thing is a protagonist who seems to go out of her way to cut off anyone who's about to explain what's going on. After she's done this a couple of times, it becomes painfully obvious that the author is doing it to maintain the tension. When she is finally cornered and has to listen to the explanation, at the 90% mark in the book, it turns out that the reason she wasn't told the secret in the first place is... weak.

"Weak" is a good description of a number of plot points, in fact. At one point, people have to travel physically across the solar system to take a message because their electronic systems have been compromised and they might transmit a virus if they used radio. So why not blink a laser on and off in Morse code?

"One millionth of one percent of the population" have a particular feature - which, if you work it out, means 10 people in a billion, so probably fewer than 100 people in all. That seems too few for what it is.

An electronic tablet has wires inside that can be physically rewired with no tools for a different purpose. Have you ever seen inside one of those? No wires.

Most of the book is in tight third person, following the protagonist; and then we get a few random paragraphs in someone else's POV, before returning to our regularly scheduled viewpoint.

Meanwhile, it's become evident that the genre I thought I was getting is not the actual genre (because secret), and the actual genre is one I strongly dislike.

The protagonist is ridiculously over-powered, possessing every conceivable skill that could help her; there is (eventually, at that 90% mark) an explanation for this, but even then it's clear that she's done things she ought not to be able to do, for vague reasons.

She's also prejudiced, against machines and people who have machine parts (which nearly all her shipmates do). Making your viewpoint character irrationally prejudiced is not a good way to endear her to the reader, even if you feel you have to do so to drive the plot.

A lot of convenient plot points are not foreshadowed until immediately before they become relevant, which (added to everything else) makes me suspect that the book wasn't plotted in advance, but discovery-written, with the author not knowing for a long time what was going on either. Now, discovery-written books can be just as good as plotted books, but only if you put the work in afterwards to do your foreshadowing and make everything make sense, as if you'd plotted it from the start. It shouldn't be possible to tell the difference. (Of course, now that I've said that, the author will probably tell me that I'm wrong and he did plot it through from the start. It doesn't read that way, though.)

There are some pluses. The action keeps moving (apart from some repetitive infodumping near the beginning). The author contrives - and it is a bit contrived - to give the protagonist another woman to talk to, even though she's physically on her own for most of the book. But on the whole, the weaknesses outweighed the strengths for me. The plot is a thin skin over an obtrusive skeleton, and is forced along by one unlikely thing after another, hitting a bunch of stupid cliches on the way through.

I received a copy via Netgalley for review.

Daisy's Run is probably my first ever science fiction read of its sort: the cyborgs, the AI, the space travel, and the threat of aliens. It opens with the characters being rudely woken up from a state of 'cryo sleep' over six months early, and trying to keep their ship in order as it makes its way to the Earth. The book is fast-paced, and the reader largely experiences the world of the book through Daisy's eyes.

I liked Daisy as the protagonist for the most part: she's clever, driven, sly, and determined, but her bigotry against AI and cyborgs really ticked me off as the book progressed. I think Scott Baron did a good job at keeping both Daisy and the readers in the dark about what was really going on - a lot of things are kept from us until the very end, when all the revelations flood in. The entire time, as Daisy goes rogue on her own shipmates after the loss of her best friend Sarah, I was stuck in this state of ambiguity and uncertainty over what the crew and cyborgs' agenda was. This ambiguity was what really made me enjoy Daisy's Run. I couldn't quite tell who to side with: the crew who believed Daisy was endangering their mission and herself from her overdose of implanted knowledge and skillsets, or Daisy who believed the crew were plotting, as she called it, a 'Cyborg Revolution'. It's only towards the end that everything becomes clear.

With this sudden turn of events towards the end that fixes the ambiguities and pins them down into black and white certainties, came what was practically an information dump, even as we were cued for it from Daisy's brief time on Earth. I think the revelations could have come in doses instead of all at once, even if that's how Daisy learns of it too, because at this point, it felt as if the history of the world prior to the narrative was being squeezed into the last few chapters.

Apart from the information dump, I really enjoyed this book, and I'm curious to see what else is in store for our hard-headed and spirited protagonist in the sequel! (I hope she gets over her revulsion towards cyborgs and AI.)

Daisy's Run by Scott Baron is an amazing story with compelling characters, plot and amazing spectacular writing.

I would first like to thank NetGalley and the author for my eARC, I received my e-copy for free in exchange for an honest review - and honestly I loved this book!

Let's talk about Daisy's Run by Scott Baron. This sci-fi thriller will release on 11/15/18 and the good news is that it looks like the rest of the series will also release at that time. I know that I can't wait to find out what happens next!

As their spaceship is damaged and the crew is awoken early from stasis, we meet Daisy and company. Enter a world of technology and artificial intelligence, mystery, conspiracy, friendship and some bluntly described romance. Daisy and her shipmate Sarah are likeable characters and a big part of the hook was the development of our feelings towards the rest of the crew - for good or for worse.

The most interesting point to me is that the book bluntly asks the question: How do you feel about artificial intelligence? Daisy has to do a lot of self-reflection regarding her views on cyborgs, technology, and humanity in general. Baron adds a great but short passage about how Earth looked before current events, including how with overseas travel becoming cheaper and quicker, xenophobia was all but gone as cultures mixed and erased old misguided prejudices. Speaking of misguided assumptions - that plot twist!!!

The majority of the novel takes place as Daisy runs from potential captors on her ship and learns their secrets. The conclusion rushes in and smacks the reader in the face with a baseball bat. I feel like that is intentional though; we can palpably feel Daisy's shock and it sets up the next novel well. I didn't quite grasp the full extent of what happened though so I wish he had drawn it out a bit more at the end with more background.

The book is fairly well edited with a few passages that seem repetitive, such as when Sarah was described later on. There is plenty of tech-speak reminiscent of Star Trek, which I love but some may end up skimming over

Summary: 4/5 stars. I would recommend this fully to any Sci-Fi fans, and only caution for some coarse sexual language. Thank you again to NetGalley and Scott Baron!

Really good book that will keep you wondering all they way through. I wish i was able to red them all and now i have to wit for the release

DNF - I’m sorry....

I wanted to like it, but if just seemed to take too long to get going. I read an article about novel writing and it suggests starting in the middle of an event, and then providing background after you’ve grabbed the readers attention.
This takes too long with the hum drum stuff, I’m sure the good stuff came later but I didn’t stick around to find out.

Professional, polished, and aggressively kickass, this book is engaging science fiction. I will definitely explore more work by Scott Baron when I can. He brought many speculative ideas together in a seamless and creative way.

Futuristic with lots of action and mystery. Surprise ending. Some portions of the book depicting body parts are graphic. Romance involved. Leaves you wanting more.

It’s been a bit since I’ve read a complete female led sci-fi story. I really enjoyed this world building the author took in this book, I sensed part the way through this would be a series and look forward to the next one.

The lead character is fun and frustrating and just interesting to read. The book itself has a lot of technical reference peppered throughout the story, which for me added to the telling.

I look forward to book 2!

Thanks NetGalley for the ARC.

This! Was! Amazing!
Old school Sci fi adventures! Crew to love! Mystery and mayhem! I ADORED this. And I will be buying every book in the series when it comes out.
Daisy is a regular human, woken up from cryo too early to fix a damaged spaceship. She soon feels like something is not quite right with the AI systems on board, and harbours racist thoughts to anyone that's not wholly human.
During her adventure on board the Vali, you are left wondering if her actions are due to paranoia from some bad choices she made, or if she's actually right and something horrible is happening right next to her...
Or is there a third option?!

What I loved was that the protag is set up to be possibly unreliable. Is she paranoid? Is she right? What the actual heck is going on?!
It's addictive reading and I didn't stop until I read the very last page... Just when the answers start coming and you think you know what's happening... It ends! Ugh! I need the next installment. It doesn't feel serialised though, this book was a nice size, and feels decently novel sized.
The author should be commended. I love sci-fi, but the genre has been weakened lately with a flood of self published first attempts and its amazing to find a true great, unless you read real old school sci-fi (which is fine, but is very male oriented, male protagonists, male audience). I'd compare this to the Expanse series, something else that is voraciously read by me.
Its so nice to read a female protag too. Cannot stop gushing about this book.
If you enjoy sci-fi, go for it, read it!
Highly highly recommended.

I loved this book! It was so exciting from start to finish.
Daisy and the rest of the crew of the Váli space vessel have been awakened early from cryo-sleep in the midst of some drama on their ship. There's fire, there's damage, there's a really peculiar AI supercomputer running things, and even after things seem to have settled, Daisy slowly starts to become uneasy.
I enjoyed this story immensely and could easily picture it as a movie. Sure, there have been other stories or films involving AI beings that have minds of their own, but there is so much more to the story here: things are definitely not how they appear.
My only snag is that I felt too much information was left to be revealed toward the end. So while it was still incredibly interesting, I simply felt it was quite a lot to take in, in such a short section. But I don't wish to deduct a star for that.
It was really good writing, and a really good story. The characters were well developed and you were able to sympathise with them. I'd love to read the follow-up parts to see where it all goes.