Book Review and Giveaway Package: The Fear of God by B.A. Chepaitis

I enjoyed the intense suspense in this series.

The Fear of God: Jaguar Series by B.A. Chepaitis

• Paperback: 218 pages
• Publisher: Wildside Press (March 15, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1434430731
• ISBN-13: 978-1434430731

    Genre: Sci Fi
    My Rating: 4.25 of 5.0

Product Description
On Planetoid Three, Jaguar Addams enters the minds of criminals. She lives in the shadows of their fears . . . and chases them into the light. The followers of the Revelation Sect are preparing for the Second Coming. Stockpiles of weapons were found when federal agents stormed the home of the fanatical leader, Sardis Malocco. Now Jaguar must resort to using a virtual reality environment of Heaven to get to the root of Sardis's fear of God-before Revelation's zealots unleash their own apocalypse upon the world . . .

Review: The author does a grand job of building suspense through the last pages.

Jaguar is trained to work with criminals on a penal planetoid. The goal is to discover their deepest fears, make the “patient” confront them and hopefully then begin to rehabilitate them to return to society as a productive citizen.  Jaguar is also an empath and she is often able to use her skills to reach the patien” when normal means are ineffective.  Because of her success rate, Jaguar’s superiors allow her some leeway although the public sentiment does not favor using or even acknowledging empathic skills.

Jaguar is assigned to address the case of Sardis, a cult leader who has already allowed members of her ‘family’ to blow themselves up with bombs on the children. Her superiors have determined that the best way to reach Sardis’ fear of God is to place her in a virtual reality (VR) Heaven.  Jaguar doesn’t like working with religious zealots and she doesn’t like working in the VR environment. However one of Jaguar’s close friends, Rachel, has been infected with an unknown toxin by Sardis’ collaborator, Philo.  Getting Sardis to reveal her secrets may be the only chance to save Rachel.

There are a lot of threads in this short but intense story. Sardis is a hard case as she is so lost in her self made delusions.  Philo has escaped and has the ability to mold his physical aspect to appear as another person so he is slipping around the system as one guard and then another. One of the FBI agents, Claire, who brought Sardis to the planet is seducing Jaguar’s boss, Alex. Meanwhile Claire has secretly, and against Alex’s instructions, placed monitors on the VR system.  The VR program begins to have problems and Jaguar has to cope with an infuriatingly obscure retrojection version of herself in order to get clues to peeling the layers into Sardis.

This is book two in the Jaguar series.  Although it can be read as a stand alone I think you get a better picture of the primary characters and the setting if you read the first book, The Fear Principle. The reader has to wade through a small amount of techno jargon but you can catch the gist an move on with the meat of the story.  I really liked how this book reveals more of the complexities of Jaguar’s intense personality, as well as the complexities of her relationships with Alex and Rachel.  I also appreciated the twists and high level of suspense that kept me moving to find out what happens in Jaguar’s race to stop the apocalypse plagues set up by Sardis.
Again, I would like to read more about Jaguar and Alex and I look forward to more books in the series.

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Thank you to Pump up Your Book and the author for this book to read and review.  Also I am pleased to host the Giveaway of one package of both books to a lucky US commenter.

TO ENTER THIS GIVEAWAY:
1. Visit the Author's Website and tell me something of interest you found there. This is required for entry.

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3. For two entries, blog, facebook, tweet (any of those networks!) about this giveaway and tell me where you did.

It isn't necessary to use separate entries unless you want them in different chronological order.
(Four total entries possible.)

* This contest is only open to residents of US.

* No P.O. Boxes Please - for shipping reasons.

* Limit one win per household.

* This contest will close 10 PM (Central) on August 12, 2011.
The winner will be randomly selected from all entries.
WINNER WILL BE ANNOUNCED on AUGUST 13 and will have 72 hours to respond by email or the winners form linked in the announcement.