24 Days

24 Days
Jaden Sinclair
Mardi Gras Publishing
ISBN: 0-9787262-8-6
Fiction, Science Fiction, Erotica
Reviewed by Dave Thompson

An intriguing idea, and a well-executed story, but marred by sufficient typos that even the best writing would look amateurish if presented in this fashion- and which are all the more frustrating when you discover that the hero of the story is a computer chip and should, therefore, be above such niggling frailties.
There again, Aiden-257 is no ordinary computer chip. Rather, he (it’s safe to assume he’s a “he”, as we shall discover later) has fallen in love with Keela, a girl he met in a chatroom. Now he’s on his way to win her, armed with the best reproduction male body that technology can devise and, apparently, genitals the size of Connecticut.
In a way, 24 Days is a cold-hearted study of human sexuality. Aiden needs to learn sex in the same way a computer chip learns anything- via programming, which in this case just happens to involve some steamy goings-on with his fellow cyberfolk. Where things twist unexpectedly is when his programmers suddenly realize what his intentions are, and affect to rescue Keela. They fail dismally, and Aiden makes his escape, with an initially unwilling (but easily swayed) Keela by his side.
It’s surprises like that which keep 24 Days alive; that allow the story to win its never-ending battle against the spelling mistakes, punctuation problems and so on that scar the book itself. Likewise, some often frighteningly clunky dialogue (Aiden talks like a machine, which is fine, because he is one. But what’s Keela’s excuse?) cannot detract from some well-visualized erotic sequences; and, if chunks of the book read like extracts from an as-yet-unmade Terminator movie, then that’s nothing to complain about either.
Nevertheless, though it’s a good read, it should have been a better one, and one hopes that next time Jaden Sinclair publishes, she’ll remember that, and make sure somebody proofreads it first.