The Arwen
Tim Callahan, author of “Ida,” presents his second title for Podiobooks.com:
When a comet the size of a small moon threatens the remote world of Regal the Earth Alliance assigns the most decorated ship in the fleet, the Arwen, to destroy it. Its Captain, Marjorie Cook, sees this as an opportunity to redeem herself after a tragic mistake in her past causes the death of over 400 of her crew. It seems like an easy mission but, when the Arwen arrives, it finds things are not what they seem.
April 2nd, 2007 at 7:30 pm
I enjoyed Ida, and so far, I’m enjoying Arwen. keep up the good work.
(beware of talking over music - words can be hard to hear at times).
April 2nd, 2007 at 7:49 pm
Thanks Doug! I’m still new with the music thing but I think, after six or so chapters, I’ve got it down okay now. Let me know if future chapters are too loud.
April 3rd, 2007 at 3:40 pm
Hey. no the music is not to loud but I’m running a compresser through winamp and the audio as I listen so I can’t tell. Good job on the story so far and can’t wait until the rest of the story.
April 4th, 2007 at 6:28 am
Hey Sarah, thanks, I can’t wait for you to hear the rest of the story! *GRIN*
April 17th, 2007 at 3:02 pm
Tim, Enjoying the story and I can’t rate to hear the rest.
April 17th, 2007 at 4:17 pm
Thanks Alan, more chapters coming shortly!
April 25th, 2007 at 6:44 pm
Just finished chapter 11. Wow what a cliff hanger and I love the music.
May 14th, 2007 at 10:07 am
Just finished the book and Wow! I can’t wait for the continuation. good job!
May 14th, 2007 at 10:32 am
Thank you Sarah, glad you enjoyed it and thanks so much for the comments!
May 19th, 2007 at 2:30 am
Good story really enjoyed it, Reminds me of the optimistic, light hearted kind of sci-fi i used to read as a kid.
May 19th, 2007 at 5:51 am
Thanks, Chris. Those stories are a big part of my inspiration for my stories so it’s no conicidence. I’m glad you enjoyed listening to it.
June 12th, 2007 at 12:46 pm
I loved this audiobook. So far it’s on my top three of favorites. The music was a great addition and really pulled me into the action. Great work! Any word on when part two comes out?
June 12th, 2007 at 1:21 pm
Thanks, the other Tim! (For a second there I had to think, did I leave myself a comment and not remember?)
Anyway, the second book should be out late September, that’s my goal date for it. I was writing it while recording this chapter and I just got done writing it a few weeks ago. I plan on doing the revision in July which gives me a few months to get things in order.
Glad you liked the story and thanks for the great comment!
June 12th, 2007 at 1:43 pm
It’s going to be a long wait for me until Sept. I was surfing around and found the other podcast you have, Ida. I just finished downloading it in time for work and can’t wait to get into it. By the way, I did a google search on Tim Callahan and it pulled up some interesting sites. I don’t know if you’re the millionaire Tim Callahan or not, but congratulations on your impressive severance package if you are.
June 12th, 2007 at 4:38 pm
HA! The millionaire Tim Callahan, oh man did that make me laugh! Tim and Timothy Callahan is a common enough name that if you find something chances are, it’s not me and I can promise you, I’m not a millionaire (YET!)
Hope you enjoy Ida, let me know what you think!
September 9th, 2007 at 10:19 pm
I just wanted to say thanks Tim, and let you know how much I enjoyed the book. My only complaint - too short! Can’t wait for the continuation of the story. The strong point of the book for me is that you really developed unique and interesting characters and I felt like I had gotten to know them. The story is obviously science fiction, but I felt like you could have placed these people into any story and it would be interesting. Many science fiction stories get bogged down in the science and forget the human element, which is certainly not the case here. Looking forward to more of your work!
September 10th, 2007 at 8:09 am
Thanks Jason, so glad you enjoyed the book and I totally agree, a lot of science fiction places too much focus on the science and not the character. I really enjoy that kind of science fiction cause it teaches me a lot but sometimes it just feels like a science lesson. I try to bring character first in all my stories, mostly because it’s just more fun to write an interesting character.
Arwen II should be up shortly and I’d love to hear what you think of that once it’s finished.
November 5th, 2007 at 1:33 pm
I am enjoying the book but I have one quibble. Handling a comet by trying to blow it up is probably not recommended. Unless the comet can be virtually vaporized I belive all that would be acconplished is to change a bullet into a shotgun blast, maybe making the result much worse.
November 5th, 2007 at 8:38 pm
Hi Keith, thanks for the comment! Glad your enjoying the story. Maybe it was in earlier draft but I seem to recall mentioning that the plan was to destroy it from the inside then use the Arwen’s energy beams to blast the rest of the comet bites. The Rulla and his ship was also supposed to help in that second phase of the operation.
If that didn’t make the final version I’m sorry for the confusion, sometimes in edits things are missed!
November 15th, 2007 at 11:27 am
Chapter 14 and Epilogue, ends abruptly part way through a sentence for me. I think I’m missing the end.
November 17th, 2007 at 8:47 am
This is the duality of the self-published author: 1) Unique and cutting edge plots - stories too different or edgy for mainstream publishing. 2) However, the writing quality is lacking here.
This is a great adventure, a nice story. If you get through the beginning, which is boring and doesn’t grab your attention.
But the quality of the prose, dialogue, and writing is very poor. Getting your work ripped apart by a good editor is always a great thing.
By the way, you have grammatical mistakes in your book’s description, and even on your author’s website.
February 26th, 2008 at 4:33 pm
I wanted to like this book for many reasons. The idea of the ship as a character is great. And thanks to Charles Stross and Ian Banks I have become a space opera junkie these last few years. However, there is one major problem and its quite simple. I can introduce it by contradicting the comment above: there is nothing unique here.
From the second this story begins and through its rapid development you will be thinking one thing, Star Trek. The main plot line alone (saving a planet from destruction via comet/whatever) I think was covered in dozens of ST shows. The ship, its crew and their designations, the polarized alien worlds, interpersonal issues, a very Kirk-like brush with authority and idolatry of the ship, the “guest actor as infernal science/expect guy” - its really everything. And thats really where I draw the line here. This influence is so heavy that I see no reason to criticize style, grammar or dialogue (which are wanting).
I think that if the description had said, “Star Trek Fan Fiction” I would have left it completely alone. Sadly, I leave it unfinished, wondering of the author, why?
February 26th, 2008 at 8:15 pm
Okay, you caught me, The Arwen was highly influence by Star Trek, I am a huge fan and I love those kinds of stories.
You asked why, well, I’ll tell you. I’ve always been a big fan of Space Opera myself and I’ve got a lot of ideas for such stories. If I ever write all those stories I wanted a ship and a Captain that I could easily place into the plot or idea.
Even though The Arwen was influenced by other stories I did try to bring thing unique to this universe. The idea of wormhole space through the use of Strangelets, the idea of a religion that wanted the planet destroyed, the idea that not every planet automatically joins the Earth Alliance and, not every planet wants to join. The idea that even the Captain can make a huge mistake which would have repercussions on her and the crew, even going so far as causing the death of most of her crew. That’s the kind of stuff you’d never see in a Star Trek ep or book, at least none that I’ve read or seen.
Thank you for the comment Router and thank you for giving the story a try. Hopefully my next none Arwen story will be more to your liking and, if it’s not, don’t hesitate to let me know! All constructive comments are welcome.
March 27th, 2008 at 6:32 pm
Good story, good dialogs, good imagery, but, yes there is ALWAYS a “but”: For God’s sakes SLOW DOWN when you read!!! As much as I liked the story, I was afraid that if I sneezed I would miss half a chapter! And please, please kill the music, not necessary when the story is good, and the story is good!
I did find one thing kinda hard to swallow: An intruder was able to to disable the ship by password protecting/encrypting the computer responsible for controlling the strangelet ejection,and no manual override existed to eject it other than blowing parts of the ship away? Mr. Scott would have been shocked at that oversight in engineering, Captain Kirk would have pounded the captains chair, and Mr. Spock would have raised an eyebrow and inwardly scoffed at the poor design.
Oh well, one must suspend disbelief when reading sci-fi.
April 19th, 2008 at 2:17 am
EXCELLENT!!! Both parts one and two. YES YES YES please write season three!! You can’t leave me hanging!! I want to know how they repair the planet and if indeed Admiral and Captain Cook get back together. And if they don’t, how they continue. So please write another season!! Thanks
June 16th, 2008 at 1:05 pm
Yes, of course there should be another story — can’t be leaving cliffhangers at the end of a series after all.
My one niggle is near the very beginning of the story. Captain Cook is a commander with 20 years of combat experience, in command during an on-going interstellar war (if I understood correctly). She travels across space completely blind through “wormhole space,” comes out and -isn’t- already at least at Yellow Alert? She’s entering an unknown situation in a combat vessel, and doesn’t prepare for all eventualities?
Nothing jumps out as absolutely absurd; it’s a very good book.
I’ll be putting a review on my “Grizzly’s Growls” podcast, probably next episode. Not a lot of listeners, but hey, couldn’t hurt.
June 17th, 2008 at 6:41 am
Hi David, to answer you question, Marjorie thought she was entering a safe system, she had no indication there would be any hostility from the Regals or anyone else. Of course, she probably should have gone to yellow alert if only because she was entering a new system, a mistake she’s had to live with and hopefully has learned from.
Arwen III will be out on Friday June 20th!
June 17th, 2008 at 10:09 am
Cool, I’ll make a mental note. Going to do the usual post-one-episode-at-a-time thing, or put it all up at once?
June 18th, 2008 at 7:01 am
Well, you’ll be getting five on Friday, I have two more almost ready and will probably release them next week. The story only had 12, maybe 13 chapters this time so I should be able to get them out pretty quickly.
June 23rd, 2008 at 4:45 pm
Ah. Well, I’m subscribed this time, so I might actually manage to listen to the show the way Podiobooks intends.
FWIW, I reviewed Arwen 1 and 2 on my most recent “Grizzly’s Growls” podcast. (Had some technical difficulties, but the show’s actually available now.) Not a glowing review, but favorable overall. I think it’s as good as the “regular” stories the Golden Age authors did — they weren’t always brilliant, either, but your books are as good as their regular stuff. Held my interest throughout — and since I’ve been reading science fiction for as long as I’ve been able to read, and I’m dealing with Asperger Syndrome along with some elements of ADD, holding my attention is a good sign.
Nice work. So, when’s book 4 coming out?
June 25th, 2008 at 2:43 pm
I am really trying to enjoy the book (mixed results). I think my main “issue” with it is there is a time between episodes, but there is no “Arwin, Season 3, written and read by Tim Callahan. And now, the story so far” I looked on my iPhone and it didn’t say who wrote it and I couldn’t remember… how about a canned beginning promoting yourself, and help refresh our memories. It was really bad on episode one, I had to remember the first two books. Just my humble opinion… thanks for the story.