Awakening

Stories of Singularity #4

by Susan Kaye Quinn

Sister Amara prays she won’t be the last of her twelve sisters to reach the awakening—after all, the salvation of their Masters depends on them. But with the interrogations growing more deadly, being last may be best... especially when you’ve been created to touch the face of God.

Awakening  is a standalone short novella that takes place in the world of the Singularity novels.

Start the novel series with The Legacy Human (Singularity 1).

Genres: Science Fiction, Dystopia

Unknown Binding

About the author

CLICK HERE for a FREE STORY

Susan Kaye Quinn has designed aircraft engines and researched global warming, but now she uses her PhD to invent cool stuff in books. Her works range from hopeful climate fiction to gritty cyberpunk. Sue believes being gentle and healing is radical and disruptive. Her short fiction can be found in Grist, Solarpunk Magazine, Reckoning, and all her novels and short stories can be found on her website. She is the host of the Bright Green Futures podcast.

SOLARPUNK
collections
Bright Green Futures: 2024 (edited by SKQ)
Halfway to Better

novels
Nothing is Promised series
When You Had Power
You Knew The Price
Of Kindness and Kilowatts
Yet You Cry When It Hurts

short stories
A Moon Goddess to Watch Over Me (Luna Station Quarterly) (hopepunk)
It's in the Blood (Reckoning 8)
Once and Future Kilowatts (Solarpunk Magazine)
Rewilding Indiana (Little Blue Marble)
Seven Sisters (Grist)
The Joy Fund (DreamForge Magazine)

SCI-FI
Singularity Novel Series
The Legacy Human
The Duality Bridge
The Illusory Prophet
The Last Mystic

Stories of Singularity
Restore
Containment
Augment
Awakening
Harvest
Defiance
Resistance

YA SF
Mindjack Series
Open Minds
Closed Hearts
Free Souls
Locked Tight
Cracked Open
Broken Wide
Mindjack Short Story Collection

WATCH the award-winning live-action Mindjack Book Trailer!

STEAMPUNK ROMANCE
Royals of Dharia
Third Daughter
Second Daughter
First Daughter

CYBERPUNK
Debt Collector
LIRIUM (Season One)
WRAITH (Season Two)

WATCH the Debt Collector Book Trailer

ANTHOLOGIES
Synchronic
Telepath Chronicles
AI Chronicles
Dark Beyond The Stars
Future Chronicles
Cyborg Chronicles
CLONES: The Anthology

MIDDLE GRADE FANTASY
Faery Swap

WATCH the Faery Swap Book Trailer

CONTACT SUSAN
Susan's Website | Sue on Bluesky | Sue on Mastodon
Susan's Email: sue@twistedspacepub.com

Reviews

[Sandy S · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 stars--

ABOUT THE BOOK: Release Date January 2, 2017

Sister Amara prays she won’t be the last of the twelve sisters to reach her awakening—after all, the salvation of their Masters depends on them. But with the interrogations growing more deadly, being last may be best... especially when you’ve been created to touch the face of God.

Awakening is a standalone novella that provides a glimpse into a dark corner of the Singularity novel series.

The Stories of Singularity can be read independently from the Singularity novel series.

READING ORDER
Singularity Series
The Legacy Human (Book 1)
The Duality Bridge (Book 2)
The Stories of Singularity #1-4 (Novella Box Set)
The Illusory Prophet (Book 3)

Stories of Singularity
(novellas)
Restore (Story 1)
Containment (Story 2)
Defiance (Story 3)
Augment (Story 4)
Awakening (Story 5)

•••••••

REVIEW: AWAKENING is the fifth novella in Susan Kaye Quinn’s young adult Stories of Singularity dystopian, sci-fic series- a companion series to Quinn’s Singularity Series. AWAKENING can be read as a stand alone without any difficulty.

BACKGROUND: The ‘Singularity’ resulted in most of the world’s population transforming themselves into a hybrid known as the Ascended-part man/part machine but the few remaining humans become what is known as the Legacy-the true descendants of humankind. The Singularity series looks at the struggle between the Ascended and everyone else.

Told from first person point of view (Sister Amara) AWAKENING follows Sister Amara as she ‘awakens’ to the world around her. A combination of artificial intelligence and cloistered humanoids ‘created to touch the face of God’, Sister Amara and eleven other ‘clones’ just like her are in a constant state of hyper vigilance as each approaches the famed ‘awakening’. But as the ‘experiment’s continue each sister will inevitably fail to reach her potential, and the people in charge will do anything to avoid an experimental disaster. Sister Amara is one of the few who will reach her potential (and beyond), and with it will gain her freedom from the onslaught of constant pain and strive for perfection.

AWAKENING is an intriguing look at the world of Singularity. An interesting and powerful concept born of the mind of Susan Kaye Quinn that focuses on humanity’s desire to live forever.

Copy supplied for review

www.thereadingcafe.com

[Susan (The Book Bag) · Rating 5 out of 5]

This whole Singularity series that Susan Kaye Quinn has written has taken me down the path of a genre I typically don't read—science fiction. But I am a huge fan of hers so I just had to read the first one and I have been hooked on this series ever since.

I think Awakening is probably my favorite Singularity story so far. I loved the character of Sister Amara, most of all her strength and her compassion for the other sisters. Along with the great characters, there is a lot of action packed into this novella. It's a quick read that will leave you wanting more!

[Susan Tietjen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Disturbingly vivid and terrifying.

Unlike many a sci-fi story that makes bad guys inti greedy humans, Quinn has made an art of offering characters both divinely human and fascinatingly AI. What would our world be like if bots had both the ability and the desire to control humans, even to enjoy hurting them? What if the very scientific process with which they experiment on their subjects turns them into something that is neither human nor AI? What if the world they live in no longer honors the sanctity of life and is given free rein to spare no one in the quest for an understanding of the very life they themselves cannot enjoy?

[Ryan Vilano · Rating 4 out of 5]

Damn I'm pretty sure I wrote a review for this and accidentally deleted it. This was one of the better Stories of Singularity IIRC.

[Veronica of V's Reads · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is written to tie-into the Singularity universe. Thus, the setting is a futuristic world several centuries from now, after most of humanity died, many thousand having become mostly-cybernetic-type Ascenders who share a digital consciousness. Actual humans do exist, but they are a protected species--unable to receive high level medical interventions from their Ascender masters, because that might taint their genetic purity.

This novella is told from the perspective of Sister Amara, one of twelve clones being studied by the Reverend Mother, an Ascender, to see if they--given some type of consciousness-boosting drug--will 'awaken' and be able to speak to "God." Within this world there are very clear factions who believe that only true humans have souls, that the Ascenders lost their souls when the nanites devoured their neural pathways and rendered them virtually immortal. It soon becomes chilling apparent that Amara and her eleven sisters are an Ascender experiment to get at the heart of this lost-soul question. And Mother isn't afraid to break a few eggs to make her omelet.

As always, the writing is tight. The slower reveal of the forces at work allows the slightly macabre tone to become progressively darker as Amara recognizes her plight for what it is--potentially lethal. She tries to shield her fellow sisters in the cloister, and it all goes horribly wrong. Even still, the day is not done. Amara finds within her a new strength, one forged from the cruelty with which she was treated. I look forward to meeting Amara in a future Singularity book. She's going to be formidable. The novel series and the accompanying novellas have been getting progressively darker as the shiny edges have been peeled back from Ascender life. For all their technology and effort to built an Utopian society, there remains an undercurrent of power-hunger and corruption that's very much human.

[Anna Tan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I took a little while to get into this - not entirely sure why. It's a short read; I'd count it more in the short-story length but it's described as a novella so I guess it falls somewhere in-between. Maybe I read really fast because it ends too soon.

Awakening starts off a little slowly, easing you into the cloister where Sister Amara, the main protagonist, resides. It's reflective, contemplative, almost peaceful. The pace picks up in Chapter 2, somewhere about the 25% mark, and as you go deeper into the story, things take a strange turn, filling you with a grim, righteous anger.

Remember though that this isn't a simple Catholic cloister as it seems on the surface. This is the Singularity and as much as Sister Amara knows that the ascenders need her to awaken, she doesn't exactly know what they're looking for or why.

Note: I received a digital review copy of this ebook from the author in exchange for an honest review.

[Samantha · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awakening, a fast-paced read based in the world of Singularity, provides a unique perspective of what life in that kind of world looks like. This novella introduces the reader to Sister Amara and the experience that she shares with her sisters. Created and raised with a very specific goal in mind, Sister Amara and her sisters have a heavy burden to bear and each has their on way of coping.
As with other stories set in this world, Awakening is not a long story, but it's impact on the reader still manages to be profound long after the tale ends. The story provides more insight into what the world of Singularity has evolved into, and provokes more questions about how one connects with the soul.

[Lindsay · Rating 5 out of 5]

This *may* be my favorite of the Singularity stories. While it does enhance the series as a whole, it is able to stand on its own as an intriguing concept. It's emotional and intelligent. And no matter how foreign the science is, I felt wholly qualified to grasp the concepts. This is what great sci-fi is made of!

How am I able to care so much about these characters in such a short period of time? I can't wait to see how this piece fits into the overall puzzle!

A copy of this book was provided by the author in exchange for an honest review.