Primordia

In Search of the Lost World

By: Greig Beck

Narrated by: Sean Mangan

Length: 11 hrs and 58 mins

Publisher's summary

A journey into the deepest, darkest jungles of the Venezuelan Amazon...and a primeval place and time that mankind was never meant to exist in.

Ben Cartwright, former soldier, home to mourn the loss of his father, stumbles upon cryptic letters from the past between author Arthur Conan Doyle and his great-great-grandfather who vanished while exploring the Amazon jungle in 1908.

Amazingly, these letters lead Ben to believe that his ancestor’s expedition was the basis for Doyle’s fantastical tale of a lost world inhabited by long-extinct creatures. As Ben digs some more, he finds clues to the whereabouts of a lost notebook that might contain a map to a place that is home to creatures that would rewrite everything known about history, biology and evolution. But other parties now know about the notebook and will do anything to obtain it. For Ben and his friends, it becomes a race against time and against ruthless rivals.

In the remotest corners of the Venezuela, along winding river trails known only to lost tribes, and through near impenetrable jungle, Ben and his novice team find a forbidden place more terrifying and dangerous than anything they could ever have imagined.

©2017 Greig Beck (P)2018 Bolinda Publishing Pty Ltd

Well...

I really like the author and the person that reads his work. In fact I automatically buy their work with full confidence that it will be worth the money. This book wasn't a favorite. I felt like a lot of characters were here just to be "red shirts!" (Star Trek joke) And while the story had all the things I usually like there was the feeling that this book was more about the author fufilling the obligations of a contract to the publisher than actual passion about the project. In the acting world it's referred to phoning in a performance. Would I recommend this book? Sadly I cannot.

Good Book, Ruined by Narrator

The book itself is good. I like the storyline, though it does ask you to suspend belief at times - people just don’t have that much luck, finding stuff on the first try. But to me a good story drags you in, and this one tries to do that. However, the narrator ruins the effect. He reads very precisely at a set pace, not modulating his voice for exciting parts of the story. His reading style lets you know it’s just a book and you can’t really get drawn in.

Fun Prehistoric Adventure

Overall I enjoyed it. The premise is a fun one. "What if "The Lost World" was based on real events?"

The set up for the main adventure in the Lost World is honestly better than what happens once they arrive there. Which is a bit disappointing. After they travel around the world getting the things they need for their prehistoric journey, the story just kind of drops... They explore, get attacked, someone dies, explore, get attacked, someone dies, and the process repeats until they decide to try and leave. There's no real goal once they are in the Lost World so there's no story to keep your interest other than who will survive at the end of the book.

Some of the characters are set up for what seem like bigger plotlines later in the book, but are just killed off and/or hardly mentioned again... Kind of making the setup earlier pointless. As an example, one character is played up to be almost a romantic foil for the lead couple... And you think that it's going to be a small side plot... But it goes nowhere. It's never mentioned again after its initially brought up.

That said, I still enjoyed it and look forward to what the sequels bring... Hopefully a meatier story though...

Entertaining, but not sequel worthy

I turned up the treble in my equaliser and lowered the bass. But other than that, the narration was acceptable.

The story was good, based on an interesting concept, yet a concept that fell well into place since the author was the "god" of that world. That being said, you really felt that certain events happened due to the author's lordship over the world he was building. In a sense, I would have rather some events to happen in less convenient ways.

I enjoyed how the characters were developed, and how they were not humans who could defeat all adversity. The main character is ex military, and I have read/listened to books where that one fact made the character more like a Rambo figure.

However there was a point where you knew what would happen once they got to where they were going.

I didn't like the story enough to buy the sequel. But I wouldn't reject the book entirely. It was entertaining for sure.

a very enjoyable story

surprisingly good the beginning was a little slow and I'm not crazy about narrator sorry to say but all in all it was a very good story and get me interested

Argh.

To start with, the story itself is not bad. Some aspects seem to be rushed to condense down the length. Other aspects of the story seem drawn out to run on for no reason. I found the narrator some what monotone in his presentation. Characters seem to flow into one another. Kept drifting off as I listened to this. The primary thing that irked me was some of the interaction between characters. You have one guy who is always there when some one dies. And the lead in is this guy is the only one to go off with the victim before the jungle kills them. No one finds this suspicious?! Either the rest of them are too trusting or stupid. It’s like the slasher flicks where people go hide in the basement where the killer lives. Really?!

Unique Setting, Usual Sci-Fi

I liked the book. It’s well written, good for a quick adventure. I’m not going to give any spoilers, but there was a moment in the story that didn’t really have any bearing on the story itself, or it was ignored/unrealistically and easily forgotten by the other parties. I didn’t like the antagonists. There reason for being involved in the story wasn’t very believable to me, or at least for me it didn’t seem like it carried actual weight behind it. More like the bad guy facilitating a hobby or habit instead of being the antagonist. Even so, I enjoyed it. It’s a unique idea, a spin on dinosaur fiction I haven’t seen yet, but was otherwise a pretty run of the mill storyline. Most of the points I give it is for the unique idea and setting, and the skill of the writer in writing it.

OK Story - The narrator is too slow

Someone else said it before me - It seems like a 70's or 80's made for television story. The concept of the story is great but it took a long time to get moving and I almost quit several times before the author got to the exciting part.

Some predictable plot mechanisms - What was it Chekov said "If there is a gun on the wall in act 1; it must be used by act 3".

But the Narrator in this novel is not good and it looks like they used him for all of Mr. Beck's books. He is too slow in delivery and with very little emotion in his voice and he doesn't vary it much by character except for a bad Russian/Serbian accent. He robbed this story of a lot. Several mis-speaks that SHOULD have been caught in final editing so it isn't all his fault. The director of this production obviously wanted to get it out cheap and not good.

Stupid decisions, but series is movie material.

This type of book isn't expected to be realistic, but the super-stupid decisions/actions made by supposedly seasoned special forces types was pretty maddening. Nevertheless, there were times when I wanted to be shouting Movie! Movie! Movie! Especially when the changes occurred where you'd never expect them to.

(See how neatly I dodged the spoiler? IT'S THAT WORTH IT!)

Very well written

I like the blend of history, science, and classic literature. I find this to be a very engaging story