The Rosetta Man: Book One of the Rosetta Series

Claire McCague

Nov 2015 · Rosetta Book 1 · EDGE-Lite

About this ebook

Wanted: Translator for first contact. Immediate opening. Danger pay allowance.

When aliens finally make first contact, they abduct Estlin Hume from his home and take him across the globe to act as translator — too bad he has no idea what they’re saying.

Estlin Hume lives in Twin Butte, Alberta surrounded by a horde of affectionate squirrels. His involuntary squirrel-attracting talent leaves him evicted, expelled, fired and near penniless until two aliens arrive and adopt him as their translator. Yanked around the world at the center of the first contact crisis, Estlin finds his new employers incomprehensible. As he faces the ultimate language barrier, unsympathetic military forces converging in the South Pacific keep threatening to kill the messenger. The question on everyone’s mind is why are the aliens here? But Estlin’s starting to think we’ll happily blow ourselves up in the process of finding that out.

Ratings and reviews

4,5 stars! If I were being my usual grumpy old self, I'd round this down to 4 stars - partially because the number of spelling and grammatical errors in the PDF form of this book drove me nuts (guys you have to proofread the e-versions, too!). However, I want to give this boook 5 stars for two main reasons: 1) first and foremost, it earned them. This was a hell of a read and finished from so far out in left field that I can't even begin to think how we were being led to that conclusion. It had humour, a plethora (yes, I counted) of interesting and unique characters, and enough suspense to literally make me read until my eyes felt like some idiot had blasted them with an EMP pulse (trust me on this). I can not begin to exclaim how pleasantly surprised I was reading this book after (a) it was offered for a mere 1$ or so on BookBub and (b) it seems to be Ms. McCague's only book to date. Which brings me to my 2nd reason for the high rating: 2) Good golly but I want this talented Renaissance lady to write more like this! Her biography reads like she's perhaps too busy with all her other interests to make this necessarily her ONLY job, but damn, I'd wait in line to buy the next one she writes for sure! Two words: BRA-VO! Seriously, if you like your sci-fi with a bit of humour, with totally absurd twists and turns in the plot, that's speculative as hell and with international intrique wrapped up in a package that reads smoother than good whiskey, this is a book for you. Just wow. Freakin' wow.

This is a very different first contact story. A bit of a whirlwind ride at times but fun. The author's attention to detail makes the military aspect of the story ring true and the science elements are interesting without bogging things down. The bad guys of the story could use a bit more fleshing out. I am looking forward to the next installment (wishful thinking, perhaps).

An original take on the first alien contact tale. Heavy on the science, made accessible and fascinating by strong writing. Really enjoyable - hope there's a sequel!

About the author

Claire McCague is a writer, scientist, and folk musician who fabricates nanostructured materials by day and spins words into scripts and books as the stars rise. She lives and doesn’t sleep much in British Columbia. Claire McCague has spent time playing with focused electron beams, femtosecond laser beams, neutron beams and plain, old x-rays. She has a doctorate in chemistry, achieved explicitly to support her arts habits, and spends her days trying to save the world through development of nanostructured materials for sustainable energy conversion systems. Claire performs regularly with the Sybaritic String Band and her plays have been featured in festivals across Canada.