“Action abounds, intrigue and secrets are always lurking around the corner. The fight scenes are excellent, and the author Pimpinella’s experience and credibility as both armed forces veteran and paramedic are on full display. ”
“Blade Runner”. “The Bourne Identity”. “Star Trek”. If these franchises excite you, then “Nexus Point” by the outstanding author, K. Pimpinella, is for you! I just finished reading this thrilling Sci-Fi novel! Now time to put some thoughts down here on Goodreads about this book, which is the first installment in the “Time Ranger” series, and the debut publication for K. Pimpinella.
“Nexus Point” is the story of a group of highly specialized 22nd century military operatives – Time Rangers – who travel back in time to thwart and arrest what are known as Time Runners. Time runners are rogue time travellers who compromise the future, by endangering the past with the actions they take that alter history. The Time Rangers are able to traverse back into antiquity via the eponymous Nexus Point, a mysterious technology that facilitates time travel, and allows them to complete their missions by going back into the past.
The book’s protagonist, Kai Sawyer, is the son of the overall commander of the Time Rangers, Rear Admiral John Sawyer. The Sawyer family are considered akin to space military nobility: prestigious, with an immense reputation for glory. Kai – almost a newly minted space academy graduate at the start of the book – struggles with this legacy. With a legendary, highly exacting and demanding father as his superior Officer, a cloudy past, and immense genetic gifts bestowed on him by the military, Kai strives to forge his own destiny, under the iron grip of his abusive father’s manipulation of his career.
The book is extremely well-written, with a breakneck pace. Action abounds, intrigue and secrets are always lurking around the corner. The fight scenes are excellent, and the author Pimpinella’s experience and credibility as both armed forces veteran and paramedic are on full display. There is a sense of realism and urgency that Pimpinella’s writing brings to the action sequences. The combination of old and future world settings, were fantastic, and Pimpinella manages to write so well that one never feels disoriented or lost at which slot in time the plot has landed. The author has a clear, straightforward, and smooth writing style, that perfectly lends itself to this kind of novel.
The plight of the central character, Kai is fascinating. He tries to forge a military career for himself, protect those under his supervision, deal with grasping hangers-on who mainly like him for his family name, coping with anger-management issues, his cruel father, all the while putting the mission first. The secondary players, Beaumont, Hawk, Santiago, Perry, are awesome, and no cardboard stock characters here: they are all lushly written, and feel real. The villains are great too, and there will be no love lost for Mercier or Arnault. The reader will love to hate them – I certainly did!
I absolutely loved the sense of camaraderie, the wit, and the overall vibe of energy and excitement that I found in Nexus Point. Like watching those movies / TV shows I referred to in the beginning of this review, there is a breathlessness one feels when reading K. Pimpinella’s work, and huge adrenaline rush of warp-speed sensory arousal. As the reader I was furiously flipping the pages to find out what comes next.
Nexus point is a fantastic book – highly recommended. I can’t wait until the next entry of K. Pimpinella’s “Time Ranger” series!
