Review of "Dissonance Volume 1: Reality" by Aaron Ryan

Score: 91+/100 (9.1+ out of 10)

Military sci-fi, action, and dystopia collide in Dissonance Volume 1: Reality by Aaron Ryan!

The story is set in 2042, about sixteen years after monstrous flying predators called gorgons appeared, broke the world, and drove what is left of humanity into fortified underground “Blockades.”

Our narrator and main protagonist is Sergeant Cameron “Jet” Shipley, a tired young veteran in Blockade DN436 near Clarksville / Nashville, who lives with the memory of watching gorgons devour people, including his own family, and now spends his days running patrols, scavenging, and killing whatever threatens the Blockade. The gorgons hunt primarily by sound and some kind of telepathic pressure, and one look into their eyes can freeze you in place (giving them their Medusa-inspired names), so soldiers wear special masks and visors to disrupt their influence.

Along with the monsters, strange alien “amulets” fell to Earth when the invasion began. High-level scientists learned to harness them, using them with high-frequency sonic waves to create EMP-like “dissonant tidal floods” (DTFs) that fry gorgon senses and sometimes kill them outright.

All of this is monitored by a massive supercomputer called the Beast, which chews on satellite remnants, sensor feeds, and old internet data to find a way to drive the gorgons back. One patrol changes everything for Jet. While out near the Blockade wall, he recovers one of the mysterious amulets from a gorgon and narrowly escapes being seen. Back inside, he gets pulled into a larger operation: escorting a small recon unit north to Austin Peay University and its surrounding area. Their job is to scavenge food and supplies, check out weird thermal readings, and report on gorgon patterns. On campus, they discover Harvill Hall, where a ragtag community of survivors has been living for years, unaware of just how long it has been or how organized the Blockades are.

Jet’s squad ends up recruiting some of them, notably Joe Bassett, Fox, Vera, and others, who join the military effort. In the background, we slowly learn that President Graham and her scattered government are not just hiding, they are coordinating a long-term counterattack using the amulets and data from the Beast.

The mission escalates when Command hijacks the original “supply run” and orders them to do something far more dangerous: capture a live “berserker” gorgon, tag it with a tracker, and let it go so Command can follow it. This is the su*cide mission that the core of the action centers around, a truly nightmarish mission for the participants who must survive attacks from the gorgons and other obstacles. The Austin Peay action sequence is one of the highlights of the book.

This book reminded us of a lot of books we've read in the past: every Ethan Richards book ever written and Ultimatum by Vladimir Fleurisma.

Similar to the Ethan Richards monster novels, the book involves military, mercenaries, or military-adjacent characters brandishing guns and bazookas/rocket launchers/RPGs, working together to combat some mysterious monstrosity of some sort. It's interesting to note the references to "Godzilla toys" that are totally something that would be mentioned in an Ethan Richards novel. You can tell that Ryan is a fan of kaijus and monster ficiton himself.

However, Ultimatum is arguably a much closer comparison. Both books take place in a post-apocalyptic world in which people live very cut off from one another for safety reasons. In fact, in both books, the characters literally live underground. In Ultimatum, the characters live in underground bunkers to survive mutated beasts called "Uglies." In Dissonance, the characters live in underground "blockades" to survive monstrosities called gorgons.

Both books follow young military characters who often get excited or fixated on mundane things in the underground, things that we all take forgranted like having access to real foods like bacon, eggs, and our selection of romantic partners.

However, this book breaks away and reaches another gear that Ultimatum hadn't quite reached. There's real chemistry between characters like Jet & Allison Trudy, for example. And you do grow to like them (or at least not want to see them get eaten/mutilated/killed). There are some really human moments like the reading of the bedtime story "I Love You Forever."

We think that this series has potential moving forward.

Check it out on Amazon!