CBR Bingo: North America – Touched by an Alien is set in the American Southwest, particularly Arizona and New Mexico.
A few years ago I picked up Alexander Outland: Space Pirate by G.J. Koch and it was a blast. Funny, fast paced, sci-fi adventure. Afterwards, I looked for more books by the author and discovered she also wrote under Gini Koch and was impressed by the volume of books on the shelf at the bookstore. As I didn’t know where to start, I got overwhelmed and went on to something else. This July I had the very good fortune to be able to attend San Diego Comic Con. While wandering the exhibitor floor, Ted and I came across a booth with the name Gini Koch splashed across the back. “Gini is the author who wrote Alexander Outland!” I exclaimed. “Yes, I did.” was the reply of a woman standing in the booth. We started chatting and ended up buying five her books. The first three of her ‘Alien’ series. a collection of sci-fi/western of short stories, The Dawning of the New West (under the name A.E. Stanton), and The Night Beat a ‘Necropolis Enforcement Files novel’ (also under Gini Koch).
Seeing the kissing couple on the cover of Touched by an Alien, I could tell Ted was reluctant. Gini assured him that the readership of her ‘Alien’ series was 50/50 male and female readers and then he got on board. He hasn’t read it yet, so I don’t have his take, but it was as Gini advertised, funny, action packed, and a quick read. The book opens in Puebla Caliente, Arizona where Katherine (Kitty) Katt is just getting out of jury duty. To her shock a man transforms into a monster with giant wings, filled with razor-sharp feathers that he sends hurtling into bystanders and the court house. Kitty notices a gelatinous, jellyfish looking thing between the man’s shoulder blades. Intuition tells her that to stop the man she needs to attack the blob. Armed with a Mont Blanc pen, and skill as a former track athlete, she launches herself and stabs the pen into the man’s back killing him. Cops start swarming when an incredibly handsome and tall man steps up, shoos the police away, and informs Kitty to come with him for her safety.
Kitty is quickly swept into a world of aliens from Alpha Centauri who are secretly helping humans with an invasion of a parasitic alien species. She is also swept off her feet by Jeffery Martini, the handsome man (alien) who arrived so quickly on the scene. Martini is an incredibly powerful empath who declares he will marry her upon their first meeting. He thickly lays on the charm and while Kitty is physically attracted there is reticence on her part to fall for someone she literally just met. However, she soon finds that his empathetic abilities, which allow him to be so closely in tune with her needs and wants, wins her over.
The book is a whirlwind of revelations about aliens, agendas, and even secrets her mother and father have kept from her. It has me engaged and looking forward to the next two books in the series. Gini was right, since it was a fast read I’m glad to have the next two ready for reading. The writing is a little rough at times which has me thinking this may be her first book. One detractor is that there is a lot of exposition dump. A LOT of information on the aliens (how they got here, their physiology, their society, why they are helping humanity), alien technology (how and why it works), and backstory to explain why things are happening. I suppose this is necessary worldbuilding but sometimes I felt that it would have been okay to say ‘alien tech’ and move on without further explanation. I’m hoping now that so much is established the further books will have less time devoted to explanations.