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Reviewed by Lit Amri for Readers' Favorite
The Calypsis Project (The Echo-Alpha Duology, Book 1) by Brittany M. Willows is set in the distant future in the year 2438. An ill-fated encounter on a human mining colony 10 years ago started the war between the United Nations Planetary Defense and an alien organization called the Drocain Royal Empire. However, there’s more to the war than it seems when Corporal Alana Carmen stumbles upon an encrypted communications device and the mystery of Project Calypsis. To uncover the truth, she and a Drocain soldier named Kenon decide to work together.
The plot is fast paced, has a good element of mystery, and is action packed. There’s no heavy tech jargon that would put off some readers. The space tech is easy to understand and imagine, and the world-building is vast but well-described. The story is told from both the humans' and the aliens’ perspective, so who’s good and who’s evil is not so black and white. This makes the story much more collective in perspective and gives more depth to the plot as well as the motives of both species.
Protagonist Kenon Valinquint is an interesting character and complements Alana well. Shamed at his Coming of Age ceremony, Kenon enlists in the Drocain Royal Empire and joins the war to redeem himself. His internal conflict is very human; sometimes I forgot that he’s an alien. All in all, The Calypsis Project is a solid debut for the series from Willows. I look forward to seeing how the story continues in Book 2.
