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Backyard Starship by [J.N. Chaney, Terry Maggert]

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JN Chaney

Terry Maggert

Backyard Starship Kindle Edition

by J.N. Chaney (Author), Terry Maggert (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

6,673 ratings

Book 1 of 8: Backyard Starship

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When Van Tudor returns to his childhood home, he inherits more than the family farm.

His grandfather used to tell him fantastic stories of spacemen and monsters, princesses and galactic knights. Little did Van realize, the old man's tales were more than fiction. They were real.

Hidden beneath the old barn, Van’s legacy is waiting: a starship, not of this world.

With his combat AI, an android bird named Perry, Van takes his first steps into the wider galaxy. He soon finds that space is far busier and more dangerous than he could have ever conceived.

Destiny is calling. His grandfather's legacy awaits.

Embark on the adventure of a lifetime with USA Today Bestselling Author J.N. Chaney and Terry Maggert in this brand new science fiction series. If you're a fan of found spaceships and galactic quests for glory, this might just be the story you've been waiting for.

Print length

606 pages
Language

English
Publication date

September 19, 2021
File size

2498 KB
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Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B099LJNCHQ
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Variant Publications (September 19, 2021)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ September 19, 2021
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 2498 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 606 pages
Lending ‏ : ‎ Enabled

Best Sellers Rank: #2,122 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #12 in Space Marine Science Fiction
- #13 in Space Marine Science Fiction eBooks
- #18 in Space Fleet Science Fiction eBooks

Customer Reviews:
6,673 ratings

About the authors

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JN Chaney
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Click FOLLOW to get new release emails from Amazon (or visit jnchaney.com).
You can join the Facebook group, "JN Chaney's Renegade Readers" for the latest news and discussions.
J. N. Chaney is a USA Today Bestselling author and has a Master's of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. He fancies himself quite the Super Mario Bros. fan. He migrates often, but was last seen in Las Vegas, NV. Any sightings should be reported, as they are rare.
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Terry Maggert
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Left-handed. I like dragons, coffee, waffles, running, and giraffes; order unimportant. Let's keep in touch. https://linktr.ee/terrymaggert
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Customer reviews

5 star		58%
4 star		31%
3 star		8%
2 star		2%
1 star		1%

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Top reviews from the United States

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C. W. Lampert

Space Opera or Military Sci Fi? It Doesn’t Matter What You Call It, Read This Book!

Reviewed in the United States on September 20, 2021

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I have read nearly everything J.N Chaney and Terry Maggert have written but “Backyard Spaceship” is, in my opinion, their best collaboration yet.

Van Tudor is a white hat hacker who, as a boy, was regaled with tales of aliens, space wars, beautiful alien women in distress, cruel criminals, and murderous interstellar crime syndicates, by his grandfather who, as far as Van knew was a black ops agent working for the Government. What if those stories were true, and Gramps was an agent, not for a super-secret agency of the Government, but a member of an intergalactic police force? And what if his grandfather left him a starship, two snarky, self-aware, hyper intelligent AI’s, so he could follow in his grandfather’s footsteps?

That is the world created by Chaney and Maggert in “Backyard Spaceship.” The characters include the aforementioned snarky AI’s, a gorgeous heiress who can kick ass with Kung Fu, shoot off the antenna off of a spaceship from 500,000 kilometers, and pilot a spaceship like Han Solo, humans (remember all those alien abductions?) and of course, plenty of bad aliens and good aliens.

This book was fun to read and the characters and story reminded me of the many Robert Heinlein books I devoured as a kid. Humor and action galore abound in “Backyard Spaceship;” I highly recommend this book and can’t wait until the next volume, “Red Bounty,” comes out on November 28th.

175 people found this helpful

Helpful

Its...... Arrrgh!!! How do I put it.

Reviewed in the United States on September 28, 2021

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This story is just hard to review. Its an interesting idea, and the writing wasn't bad, but at the same time I never felt compelled to read the next page or chapter. This one took me far longer to read than most. I found it far too easy to put down to do anything other than read, and for me that's not normal.

It's not a bad tale, just lacking in that special something that makes one want to find out what happens next. The main character is interesting, but lacks the heart that turns a character into an audience proxy. And the world he's in is just.... rather unpleasant to think about.

It's a high three star. Good, but I can't see putting it into my "I'd recommend this to lots of people" bracket which leaves it at 3 stars. It's just missing something.

85 people found this helpful

Helpful

it’s good, but

Reviewed in the United States on September 27, 2021

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It’s competently written. Nothing that really makes me say, ‘this is *bad*’. Good grammar, well paced, solid world building, clear characters…even the handwavium is kept to acceptable levels for a light novel.

It just didn’t thrill me.

The MC has little agency, pretty much goes where he is told and does what he is told. He also thoroughly lacks skepticism, taking everything at face value with almost no questions. Astonishingly naive, he accepts a passenger without checking credentials or confirming identity. While trusting his various AIs to keep him on track is reasonable given his situation, taking strangers’ statements as true without question is just…stupid.

I haven’t finished, so it’s quite possible the MC gets taught this important lesson later. But for an adult —with his background and relative— to be so blatantly gullible and not even express a single misgiving…I’m done.

DNF

48 people found this helpful

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m. rrrogers

Excellent new sf series about.. People

Reviewed in the United States on October 10, 2021

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In the tradition of Heinlein, the tech is just background to the story about people.

The start is kind of a repeated theme..
The story starts slow, but introduces many many different threads, and only one is resolved.

Makes this universe incredibly diverse.

Reminds me of "Have space suit, will travel "
And "Have Gun, will travel "
Crossed with a computer game rules of a Quest and market based upgrades to your Hero.

Really kind of hokey, but in an excellent way.

Good fun, no gore and gratuitous stuff.

20 people found this helpful

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jjdrymiller

Well written and entertaining story.

Reviewed in the United States on September 20, 2021

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Occasionally unbelievable but 100 percent enjoyable. Enough information so as to not be left hanging with interesting characters and an intriguing storyline. Loved the epilogue and ending. Wishing I didn’t have to wait for book two.

9 people found this helpful

Helpful

The Mad Gnome #42

Very enjoyable book (series)

Reviewed in the United States on May 3, 2022

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KID SAFE* - There is violence (space battles, some hand to hand fighting with space swords) - Alcohol use (they drink a beer, or visit a bar for 1 drink at a meeting and leave) - and Sex (the smell of her hair, and a kiss on the cheek (in one book? maybe two?))
I've seen video games with far worse levels of exposure for kids.

The sex question / filter has become a pet-peeve for me. If you are going to try to make your book "safe for kids" on the subject, then do what this book does and just don't go there. Other series I've read try to keep the older readers (? I dunno their reasoning, I'm guessing) and make sex like it was told by a shy puritan preacher's wife or something. Its not believable, its awkward, it adds no value to the story the way it is presented and the book would be better without it at all (the other book series, not this one; this one handles it right and just skips it)

The characters are well written, believable and consistent. The stories are good and it keeps up the pace so you keep reading. The books don't delve into hard or fantasy physics to the point it becomes a technical manual - there is one inconsistency in the "twist drive" and "relative time" that is explained away (later - they caught it after the fact and fixed it?) as being based on the questions of mass interacting - so believable (if you believe in the twist drive to start with!)

Book 6 was a little thin - about 200 pages shorter than the other books, while being a small disappointment it was not that big of a deal (it left the overall story hanging, and most of the books come to conclusions on the main story)

Helpful

John F Vermillion

This writing team just keeps bringing the fun

Reviewed in the United States on September 22, 2021

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I read Backyard Starship prepublication, and I found the premise a fun throwback to SciFi I read as a kid in the 70's. The action is interesting, the characters are well developed, and as is a Hallmark of Chaney's work, the AI's provide a bit of levity (snark sometimes). The idea reminds me a bit of a combo of Judge Dredd, Green Lantern and and other earlier ensemble works with lots of different alien cultures. Worth the read!

13 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Nigel Frankcom

Some good yuk-yuks…

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 24, 2021

Verified Purchase

I mistook this for a series of a similar name, it turned out to be a happy mistake. While the theme may not be new this story has some significant props of its own.

There is a lot of humour, much of it dry, all of it written with an excellent turn of phrase. The characters seem to mesh better for all the badinage. Great fun and a decent sized story to get one’s teeth into.

6 people found this helpful

N. Doyle

Teen fiction?

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 17, 2022

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I love authors like Alastair Reynolds and Peter F. Hamilton. Always willing to try a new author though and the review of this book are many and very positive. I think I'm missing something. The book is shallow and formulaic. It actually feels to me like a novelisation of a computer game. I don't see any actual plot, just our main character going with the flow from one situation to the next. He's hilariously and unrealistically confident in his new role of Galactic cop. I read 35% of book one and then requested a refund. Not for me at all.

3 people found this helpful

Ron Robson

What an excellent read!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 11, 2021

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I really enjoyed this book. It was a good solid read with plenty of excitement and action. The Peacemakers are so real and the main characters are just so payback, yet I never felt they were out of context. Don't miss this one. I am just going to preorder the next book.

5 people found this helpful

john

Decent

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 27, 2022

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It's very immature. The author writes good banter and has good descriptions. The pictures painted are all very good.
The issue I find with this book is that it's just a whole bunch of stuff happening. There's not really a theme or central story. There's a lot of plot armour, Mcguffins and convenient timing to move things along. It's not bad, in fact I'd say it's ideal for anyone with a very short attention span.
I liked it, I liked the world and the characters so I've bought the sequel in the hope that this effort was a table setter that allows the rest of the books to focus more.

2 people found this helpful

Ktesis

Enjoyable

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 22, 2021

Verified Purchase

This is an excellent read with plenty of action and humour! The main character has a lighthearted attitude to his tasks as a galactic cop but with a steely determination.

4 people found this helpful

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