This novel started out incredibly strong with an opening sequence that was brutal and devastating. It is always fantastic to find an author who isn't afraid to write something dark. Beyond the beginning, the story mostly read like a fairly conventional space opera. It followed the major tropes of the subgenre, leaning hard into the idea of found family. 

I loved the diversity among the aliens species. I particularly appreciated the natural inclusion of diversity including gender fluidity and the normalization of neutral pronouns.

I am not personally the biggest fan of naive children in my stories so I was happy that Caiden matured relatively quickly. The characters were fairly well developed, although I never became particularly attached to anyone.

The world building in this universe was actually one of the most unique aspects of this space opera. The multiverse travel felt like a strange choice and didn't quite make sense from a scientific perspective. My favourite aspect of the worldbuilding was easily the alien creatures. The beasts felt so uniquely alien, yet the descriptions conjured such vivid images in my mind.

Overall, I enjoyed this one and would recommend to one to scifi readers looking for a new space opera adventure.

Disclaimer: I received an ARC of this book from the publisher, Orbit Books.

Immaculate world building and complex alien technologies form the backbone of Essa Hansen's debut novel NOPHEK GLOSS, an angst-riddled space opera about one boy's quest for vengeance in the face of genocide. The first chapter blew me away. This is a powerful and compelling tale that establishes Hansen firmly at the scifi table.

When you live in space you end up friending a lot of strange people and beings. Caiden, who is all alone because his planet was destroyed, ends up meeting some questionable and unruly aliens who are on a funky galactic ship that its own conscious. Even though the aliens march to the beat of their own drum, they help Caiden grieve by opening his eyes to the infinite possibilities of space, both good and dangerous.

‘Author, swordswoman, and falconer. Sound designer for SFF films at Skywalker Sound, with credits in movies such as Doctor Strange and Avengers: Endgame,’ reads Essa Hansen’s Meet the Author page. With such a varied resume, it’s small wonder that her debut novel Nophek Gloss crackles with fresh, diverse creativity. It is hard science fiction at its best, flush with rich themes and sharp innovation.

Hansen tends to keep the book’s descriptions concise, yet it took me twice as long to read as other books of its length as I often paused to re-read passages in order to fully digest each sentence. This allowed for me to visualize it all in my mind, savoring each scene like a chef’s tasting menu. Speaking of menus, make sure you have a full stomach before diving into this one, as there’s plenty of mouth-watering space foods that might make you want to snack-read to an unhealthy degree. Or so I’ve heard.

The book covers a lot of ground, approaching various topics with care. Inclusivity and fluidity are underlying themes, and gender identity is often spotlighted as one character is able to shift genders and appearances at will. Body augmentation elevates these discussions into new areas to consider. Other areas the story addresses include examining maturity of the body versus the mind, doing bad things for the right reasons, deferring versus coping with grief, fear and acceptance, and the advancement of technology versus the shortcomings of humanity.

But don’t get hung up on just the heavy themes. There’s plenty of badass action scenes, eldritch beings, morphing coats, pleachroic everything, and a bleeping spaceship capable of creating its own universe on command.

For as detailed a world as Hansen creates, she is careful with exposition. I was not aware there was a glossary included, but I highly recommend avoiding it unless absolutely necessary, as I had much more fun unpacking the intricacies of the story’s multiverse on my own. Scene settings and descriptions are often no more than a line or two, delivered in a subtle, yet decorous prose. Complex life forms are rendered with just enough sketches of detail to balance with the user’s imagination. Scenes of lilies make repeated visits. ‘Shipping and fan art is inevitable.

There were a couple of plot points where I felt the characters’ behaviors were a bit of a stretch. One or two instances I asked myself if I thought those moments felt genuine. There is also a lot of information to absorb, between its world-building, characters, science terminology, and other topics. It is not the easiest of reads, but the more time you spend in its multiverse, the more rewarding it will be.

Plus, this book is just so damn COOL. I mean… that cover, right? Mike Heath’s art and Lauren Panepinto’s design sets the tone for the entire story: sleek, futuristic, and grim, with promises of light peeking through its dark tone.

I don’t think Nophek Gloss is a book for everyone, as it leans heavily into its themes that some may find a bit too grim or divisive. But if you’re like me—someone who thrives on challenging and imaginative stories that push the boundaries of thought and imagination—then this debut is a can’t-miss.

I enjoyed Hanson's multi-universe. It was interesting to explore the multiple worlds and universes in this novel. Hanson's imagination is top notch and the book is well written.

This was an example of a book being the following: high quality, incredible writing, dense and creative world-building, and also---not for me. I cannot fault this book for its quality, however my reviews are also a reflection of my personal feelings and I really struggled with many of the thoroughly dark themes in this book, which is in many ways a nuanced and graphic exploration of a young man's heavy trauma.

However, if the trigger warnings (listed below) aren't something that typically bother you in books, I would highly recommend this as a creative sci-fi debut. The world-building is top notch, imagining a richly complex multiverse in which aliens ("xenids") and humans and hybrids of both can travel with ships between universe "rinds", many of which have different biological perimeters and physical laws. Our protagonist, a fourteen year old boy named Caidan, must grapple with the sudden and horrifying loss of the world he knows after his society of cattle farmers are brutally slaughtered and he is stranded on an unfamiliar planet. He is picked up by a rag-tag group of space "passengers" who take him under their wing.

I think I would have enjoyed this book a lot more if it leaned more heavily into the "found family' aspect of the novel, a la Becky Chambers or Ann Leckie. My favorite characters were Caidan's companions, and my favorite scenes where those depicting their interpersonal relationships.

TW for: slavery, physical abuse, animal death, graphic violence, torture, graphic depictions of death and mutilation

Overall 4⭐

Plot:5⭐

Worldbuilding:5⭐

Pacing:4⭐

Ending:5⭐

Characterization:5⭐

Diverse characters:3⭐

This book was one of the best sci-fis I've ever read. From the first page to the last it's gripping.

Every character stands out and is wildly well done. Even though it's in third person, you get a fantatsic feel for all of them, but best of all Caiden.

He looses more than any character I've recently read and it happens very fast. I was too wrapped up to put it down.

When Caiden meets the rest of the cast, he's all anger and hurt with no place to let it out. When he tries, it never goes well.

From the start, all the adults want for him is for him to be somehwere safe where he can process his trauma.

The handling of trauma the right way--healing--is a huge theme. Healing takes time and acceptance and a safe haven. And the adults want to give it to him. They can see his anger, they've all been there and all of them had their own difficulty moving on with their own pasts.

Family is also a huge theme. Not leaving anyone behind. They traverse the multiverse in this book in a fantastic way.

Now, while it was a phenomenal read, for many reasons, I can't give it five stars.

There are characters who can shift gender at will, who are fluid in almost every way. There are many different species, only a handful are shown. So, even in this vast multiverse, in a world where almost anything is possible, why is there not a single minority?

In 2020 there's a real lack of diversity. It causes real harm to readers. This book is set in an unimaginable future and there are no characters, main or side, or even mentioned, who are a member of a minority.

There's no excuse, no reason. If we can get people who can change their bodies at will and others' whose skin changes color with their emotion, is it too much to ask for more representation?

Thank you to NetGalley the publisher.

Hi. I love love love this book. The unique multiverse world, the universe-creating spaceship, the brutal, mind-bending technology. And Caiden, raised to replace the livestock used to feed the creatures known as nophek for the energy in their brain known as gloss, When he and is family are dumped on a planet to be food for these monsters, and he is the only survivor, he escapes on a ship with a group of misfit aliens who become his new family. I especially love En, the augmented genderfluid character who has stolen every bit of my heart.

Nophek Gloos has action, tension, revenge, emotion on every page, stylistic prose, and twist after twist. Thank you for providing me with this ebook along with the physical ARC. I'll be posting about it A LOT in the months to come.

DNF.

The author has an amazing imagination and there is clearly a very enjoyable story to be found in this book, but I’m just not able to get past the many inconsistencies that constantly pull me out of the story.

A few examples from the 20% of the book I read (very mild spoilers):
- A ragtag group of semi-legal scoundrels are willing to accept that a kid owns a super advanced starship because he took refuge in it a few hours before they arrived to fix and pilot it for him (the fact that he somehow owns the ship is repeated again and again);
- The same child, who lived in a society devoted to raising livestock, doesn’t know the meaning of the word ‘sterile’ but is absolutely comfortable with terminology like ‘gravity’, ‘planets’, and ‘universe’; and
- The fact that an incredibly diverse multiversal society would break down sentient beings into only two categories - Human or Xenid.

I believe this will end up on a whole lot of year end lists. For me, it will probably fall into the debut author list. The book is really good, it has an Ann Leckie sort of vibe. Great world building, great descriptions, and entertaining plot. I've always been a sucker for any plot line containing a multiverse component. This story has an abundance of new words/terms and concepts as well as being and creature. While I was most of the way through this, eBook ARC, I realized there was a glossary at the end. Knowing this first would have made understanding portions so much easier if I had read the glossary first. On the whole this is a fun adventure and interesting book.

Thanks to Orbit, and #netgalley for an advanced e-copy of the book in return for a fair and honest review. This book is the debut novel by Essa Hansen, who has an absolutely incredible imagination. The book starts off with a fantastic and horrifying adventure sequence where the main character’s world is upended. The story then becomes a lot about the main character’s growth as a person in how he interacts with his newfound pseudo family and the world (and the universes). Yeah you read that right, universes plural. I try not to give too much away but this was a nice touch in order to give the worldbuilding even more complexity. The main character literally has to grow up at an accelerated rate, and the alienation he feels from this could be analogous to what a lot of teenagers and people in the early 20s may feel as they begin to navigate the wider world. I don’t know if that is what the author intended but I drew that from the story. Oddly, the valuable Gloss, which ostensibly plays a huge role in the story, is secondary to the struggle of wider powers of the universes, and how the main character interacts with them, which I won’t spoil here. There are neuroatypical characters represented here, and even the main character feels like an ‘alien’ to the situation in which he is in, so it is a difference in many respects to space operas where the protagonist is self assured and it feels like different types of people are well represented. There are hints of Orson Scott Card in the interaction Caiden has with the Nophek given his history with them, and then he felt like a hero in a space opera who had self doubts, almost in the way a Marvel superhero would. Trying to come up with additional comparisons is tough but Ann Leckie would stand out, given the types of characters involved. With a story scope the size of universes, characters that feel Marvel-like, and an author style that is unique but feels a bit like Ann Leckie, or Orson Scott Card or even Timothy Zahn. The action scenes are top notch. Recommend strongly-put it on your to read list.

Nophek Gloss is the hard to pronounce title if the first volume of a brand new science fiction series. The title refers to a little gem that comes from the skull of a rare animal and powers spaceships. Like the spice in Dune, the gloss is valuable beyond imagination. It's a coming of age novel, although the hero of the story bargains to age six years immediately and kind of gets to skip adolescence. Of course, like with many space operas, he is welcomed into a crew of misfits and there are space stations filled with all manner of beings. Within the squares of the chess game being played out are genetic design, mind control, and ships that ply routes not just between between planets, but between universes where different physical rules apply. Nevertheless, for this reader, it never quite achieved believability within its universe-building. That lack of realism detracted from an interesting book that began with incredible excitement as the main character struggles to survive among hungry beasts and marauding slavers.

A compelling story set in a rich multi world build,
This first book by Essa Hansen will fill your imagination as you follow young Caiden through a perilous and sudden journey into adulthood. This is not your typical coming of age story and contains harsh worlds where it is grow up fast if you want to survive.
while I found the story often made me stop and re read due to the unusual definitions of words I thought I knew, I still found myself devouring the book in a day, I just had to know what happened next!
October 2021 is a long way away for the next installment of this Trilogy.
just a quick note that I got a chance to read an advanced copy of this book.