Review: Overload Flux by Carol Van Natta

Overload Flux (Central Galactic Concordance #1)
by Carol Van Natta

Rating: 5 stars
Genre: Science Fiction Romance/ Space Opera

Blurb:
Two loners fighting to stay alive discover they must now save the galaxy.

The only vaccine for a deadly galaxy-wide pandemic is missing … and the only ones who may be able to find it are a powerful talent on the verge of a meltdown, and a security specialist hiding her extraordinary skills in a menial job.

Brilliant investigator Luka Foxe must act fast if he’s going to save the civilized planets of the Central Galactic Concordance. For as a pandemic sweeps across the galaxy, someone is stealing the vaccine. To make matters worse, Luka’s hidden mental talents are out of control, leaving him barely able to function in the midst of violence and a rising body count. The convoluted trail leads to a corrupt pharma industry and the possibility of an illegal, planet-sized laboratory. In the face of increasing threats, he must rely on an enigmatic, lethal woman who has secrets of her own.

Mairwen Morganthur hides extraordinary skills under the guise of a dull night-shift guard. The last thing she wants is to provide personal security for a nova-hot investigator, or to be plunged into a murky case involving sabotage, treachery, and the military covert operations division that would love to discover she’s still alive. Worse, she knows that two more deaths won’t bother their enemies one bit. Their only hope for survival is to share their darkest secrets. With everything in their universe at stake, can they learn to trust one another?

My Review:
Overload Flux was such a great read with the perfect mix of romance, complex characters, a solid story and an awesome sci-fi world that came alive. I first heard of Carol Van Natta when I read Pets Trade in the Pets in Space 2 anthology. Ever since I’ve been meaning to check out more of her books and I finally decided to buy the box set containing the first 3 books in this series. Before I finished Overload Flux I had bought the rest of the series available at the moment as that’s how good this book was.

When Overload Flux starts we get introduced to night shift guard Mairwen, quickly it’s obvious there is more to her than meets the eye. What seemed like just another normal job for her turns into much more than she anticipated. While at first it was a bit hard to get into the story and world, it’s the type of world building I like where there is no info dumps, but you just kinda have to figure out what is going on from what is said and happens. The author handled that very well in this book and I loved discovering more about this world.

Overload Flux is told from dual point of views or both Mairwen and Luka, with a few chapters from other point of views. Mairwen and Luka are such an awesome couple and great characters. Mairwen is very capable, but where she excels in a lot of skills, social skills are a bit more challenging for her. Luka is very smart and intuitive and has a physic-like skill that allows him to analyze people and analyze crime scenes. But he now struggles to control his talent after the latest case where he pushed it hard. I loved how both these characters had their struggles, flaws and strengths and they felt very realistically and I loved reading about them. I also liked how they both change throughout the course of the book and get a handle on some of the things they struggle with.

The story was intriguing and well written. I liked the almost suspense like plot thread about what was going on with this pharmaceutical company and why Luka’s colleagues got killed. It almost read like a romantic suspense book set in a sci-fi world at times. One of the few small niggles I can mention about this book is that I would’ve liked to know what happened to the pharmacy company after the things came to light and would’ve liked few things tied back to that a bit more. As at times I had a bit of trouble remembering everything that was going on and how it tied together.

One of the few things that’s so rare to find is a book that manages to strike the perfect balance for me between the sci-fi and romance elements. But this book totally did. I loved how the romance never overshadowed the plot line or the world building, but at the same time the romance was a very essential part of the book as well and get enough attention as well. It was wonderful to find a book that balanced all the different aspects so well.

Speaking of romance, I loved Luka and Mairwen together. How there was already a connection/ interest when they first met, but their romance builds slowly throughout the book. They start working closer together and grow closer and I loved seeing them open up to each other and how they are there and help each other. They were such a great couple and I am glad there is another novella about them as well and I hope we get to see them sometimes in the future books as I just want more of them.

I loved how the author handled the world building. It’s one of those book were you piece things together piece by piece, but it’s very well done. And most things you can easily gauge from the conversation or context what’s going on or what certain words mean. Most of this book takes place on two planets and a few space ships, but we get a feel of how there is a whole galaxy around this and how things work in this world. And at the same time I just want to know even more about this world. I am excited to see how this series continues.

Another thing that I noticed about this book was how some of the plot progressed in a slightly unusual fashion, which is great. Most books have a certain build-up with a big event at the end and then a quick wrap up. I liked how this book pacing felt slightly different and how there is a slightly longer wrap up part at the end. I also liked how the epilogue hinted at things to come in the rest of the series. And in a sense this book only feels like the start of a much larger plot line.

To summarize: I really enjoyed Overload Flux. This book had the perfect balance between story, sci-fi elements and romance. The story read a bit like a romantic suspense in space at times, with a mystery like set-up with how they’re trying to uncover more about what’s going on after two colleagues of Luka are found dead. The only niggle I had was that it could be a bit hard to remember all the details about what was going on at times. I really liked both main characters with how they had their flaws, strengths and struggles, they felt like realistic characters. I loved seeing them change throughout the book and grow closer. The romance was so well done, I loved these two together and how well they worked and fit together. I liked how the romance plot line nicely wove throughout the story and I loved seeing them grow closer and closer as the book progressed. All in all this was a fantastic start to this series and I am excited to read book 2.

Links:
– Goodreads
– Amazon
– B&N
– Kobo

You can also read my review on Goodreads and Amazon.

Which books did you give a 5 star read so far this year?