The Socket Greeny Saga: A Science Fiction Thriller

Tony Bertauski

Jun 2011 · DeadPixel Publications

About this ebook

If you liked Ready Player One and Ender's Game, strap in for Socket Greeny...

“A brilliantly-written complexly-layered plot, set in a vivid, tangible future world.” --IndieReader

I was a nobody.

I had this funny name and white hair and really didn't care about anything. But then one day something happened. Change is like that. One day you're a nothing, the next you're saving everything. Not everybody.

Everything.

It's not that I didn't want to do what I did. Someone once told me that true nature is a train—you either get on board or get run over. So I got on. What I saw… the androids and the off-world stuff. The psychotic minders. It's out there.

The rabbit hole is deep.

That's the thing with the truth. It's been in front of us all this time. You just have to see it. Once you do, you can't ignore it. I was once a nobody and now I'm a legend because I saw the truth about reality, about this universe.

And I did something about it.

 

REVIEWS FOR SOCKET GREENY

"Absolutely the BEST sci-fi! Totally enjoyable!" –Dr. Bill Encke, Reviewer "THE best book I have EVER read!" – Reviewer "I cried and laughed… I was captivated." –Teresa Koschalk, Reviewer "A story along the lines of Heinlein's best!" –SciFiGirl, Reviewer "Transcendent… a beautiful and well written expression." Tiffany, Reviewer "A Great Series for the SF fan of any Age." Greg T, Reviewer "Twists throughout woven in so well you may not notice the dominos until the very end." Reviewer "This was one of the best sci-fi/tech audiobooks I've heard lately, and frankly I can't believe it's still relatively undiscovered." Ms. Christian C., Reviewer

  

AWARDS

IndieReader's BEST BOOKS of 2014 7 Indie Titles Perfect for the Big Screen –IndieReader (2015)

Ratings and reviews

It was just a little slow to start but then it was a heck of a ride. Really great plot and fascinating ideas. The breadth of Bertauski's imagination is staggering. He really proves that in this collection. Creates an entire universe and awesome but believable tech. Gets impressively philosophical at times as well. Only a few parts that don't make much sense (like nearly dying from dehydration when it's pouring rain; or "consuming of the world" counting when it's fruit but not water); but easy to look past.

Two elements strung together means the story could go anywhere, and it did. I am glad I read it, but probably would not again. The story ultimately delivers. And be prepared for choppy sentences. Very short! And fragmented.

I struggled the first 50 pages or so but once I immersed myself and accepted the technology (I'm a bit of a techno phobe) I started to enjoy this book. I would certainly recommend this book although I felt as if two people were writing it at times. One person being a young person and one not. Perhaps the writer has his youthful days strong in his heart. and has his lead character being another part of himself. How could it not reflect his own self. I felt as if the writer were part of his own story but characterized in a different story set. Does that make sense? I'm so glad there was some conclusion to this book as I am always disappointed in books that don't. This author has a wonderful mind that stimulates thought. What else could you ask for in a book.. thanks

About the author

During the day, I'm a horticulturist. While I've spent much of my career designing landscapes or diagnosing dying plants, I've always been a storyteller. My writing career began with magazine columns, landscape design textbooks, and a gardening column at the Post and Courier (Charleston, SC). However, I've always fancied fiction. 

My grandpa never graduated high school. He retired from a steel mill in the mid-70s. He was uneducated, but he was a voracious reader. I remember going through his bookshelves of paperback sci-fi novels, smelling musty old paper, pulling Piers Anthony and Isaac Asimov off shelf and promising to bring them back. I was fascinated by robots that could think and act like people. What happened when they died?

I'm a cynical reader. I demand the writer sweep me into his/her story and carry me to the end. I'd rather sail a boat than climb a mountain. That's the sort of stuff I want to write, not the assigned reading we got in school. I want to create stories that kept you up late.

Having a story unfold inside your head is an experience different than reading. You connect with characters in a deeper, more meaningful way. You feel them, empathize with them, cheer for them and even mourn. The challenge is to get the reader to experience the same thing, even if it's only a fraction of what the writer feels. Not so easy.

In 2008, I won the South Carolina Fiction Open with Four Letter Words, a short story inspired by my grandfather and Alzheimer's Disease. My first step as a novelist began when I developed a story to encourage my young son to read. This story became The Socket Greeny Saga. Socket tapped into my lifetime fascination with consciousness and identity, but this character does it from a young adult's struggle with his place in the world. 

After Socket, I thought I was done with fiction. But then the ideas kept coming, and I kept writing. Most of my work investigates the human condition and the meaning of life, but not in ordinary fashion. About half of my work is Young Adult (Socket Greeny, Claus, Foreverland) because it speaks to that age of indecision and the struggle with identity. But I like to venture into adult fiction (Halfskin, Drayton) so I can cuss. Either way, I like to be entertaining.

And I'm a big fan of plot twists.