Free Book Friday - Alone by Robert J. Crane

I have said in previous posts that free books tend to be hits or misses. The first book I attempted to read for this week was a major miss. It took me almost two hours to try and get a quarter of the way through the book. It wasn't well written and couldn't hold my attention long enough to actually read it.

So I switched books and found a much better book - Alone by Robert J Crane. By my personal guidelines, this book is really more of a novella, coming in at about 180 pages (my personal cutoff for novellas/novels is 200 pages.) However it is a free book for Nook and well worth the read I thought. The later books in the series are $4.99

Sienna Nealon has been locked inside her house since she was 5, now 17 she lives by five rules her mother set in place.
#1: No one is allowed in the house other than Sienna and her mom.
#2: Sienna is never allowed to leave the house.
#3: Never open the curtains or look out the windows.
#3: Sienna must be full dressed at all times, including long sleeves and pants, always gloves and shoes.
#5: Sienna must never ask about the outside world.

Sienna lives by these rules without really knowing why she has to. Or why her mother insists on martial arts and weapons training two hours a day. Sienna is smarter, faster, and stronger than your average girl. She doesn't know why, just that its a secret. When two men enter her house late at night a week after her mother disappears  she does what she has to do to escape. She gets a ride from a man named Reed but when they are escaping they are attacked by Wolfe, a monster of a man impervious to pretty much everything.

Through a series of events Sienna ends up at the Directorate, an institute dedicated to the protection and study of so called Meta-Humans. On a more sinister side it also protects the humans from the more dangerous Meta-Humans. Meta-Humans are what they sound like, humans with a bit more than the average person. Metas are stronger, faster, smarter, and many of them have extra abilities. Sienna isn't sure she wants to be there but it is the only place safe from Wolfe and the others who are after her.

I really enjoyed this book, it was well written and I thought the world in the book was well planned. For a free book I thought it was very well done. While it was self published you could tell the author knew what he was doing unlike many of the self published today.

I would rate this book a 4 out of 5. Very recommended.

Recommendations:
Untouched by Robert J. Crane - This is the sequel to Alone, however it is not freed. It is $4.99 for the ebook.

Girl in the Box series by Robert J. Crane - This is the full series by Robert J. Crane. The first is free, the rest are $4.99 for the ebook.

Defender by Robert J. Crane - Another free ebook by Robert J Crane, this one is set in a very alternate universe. It is the first in a series.