The Last Engineer
Darrk World, Book 1

by Russell E. Van Dyke

Narrated by: Peter Leppard

Review by W. D. Douglass

Marooned Aliens with Special Abilities!

This is a story about marooned aliens who have lived through humanity’s recorded history and their inner faction struggle to protect humanity or return home which could spell destruction for earth. These aliens have a unique combination of aspects from vampire, werewolf, and superman lore. For the first in a series, this book focuses mainly on character and world-building. While only giving us small bites of conflict to keep the story moving. All this is acceptable and well done for the beginning of a multi-book series but not for a standalone read. This is an entertaining read, but the true conflict makes no sense to me. Why return to your home planet far across the universe 8,900 years later? The risk to reward ratio does not make sense. If you go back to the home planet, everyone you ever knew would be dead, the political body most likely has been overthrown, and the planet might not even exist. Were as you remain on earth and have power, wealth, and magic powers? Keeping that in mind the character's relatability, realism, and interactions will have me reading the next book in this series.

The narration by Peter Leppard was skillful and flawless. He shows his voice acting skills by conveying the characters' emotions perfectly. The only shortcoming this performance has is the lack of spacing in between scenes mid-chapter.

Editing, quality, and production were on par with most books I have listened to. It was clear, there was no issue with sound or quality.

Disclaimer: This Audiobook was provided free of charge by the author, narrator, and/or publisher in exchange for a non-bias, honest review.