PRO CONNECT
David Acuff grew up the son of an Air Force Colonel and lived all over the US of A. But being the new kid every year in school taught him a certain objectivity; being the outsider gave him the best vantage point to view all of these different lives and delicious stories and how they intersected and collided with often unexpected results.
Acuff has written six novels and a comedy semi-memoir. Three of his books, including "Battle Tides", are Amazon Best Sellers. Two of his novels, "High School Masquerade" and "The Wrestling Girl" have been produced as Feature films; the latter has been released as "Restoration" by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.
Currently, Acuff is a writer and filmmaker in Los Angeles, CA and was a Producer-Editor for Walt Disney Television for 8 years. He enjoys doing voiceover work for Audible book projects as well as animated characters.
His life-motto is very simply, “What doesn’t kill you makes you funnier!”
Follow him on Instagram and Twitter: @DavidAcuff
“An inventive, fast-paced SF thriller. The narrative’s DNA is at least three-quarters action movie, with scene after scene of fistfights, shootouts, explosions, and escapes.”
– Kirkus Reviews
In Acuff’s SF novel, the first in a series, a soldier in hiding attempts to discover the secret of the ghost haunting his biosynthetic body.
The year is 2561. Human colonies have spread across the universe through the use of wormholes, and extreme genetic modification has progressed to the point where some people, like Jacques Bastille, have become very hard to kill. When Jacques wakes up in the middle of a dune-filled desert, one of his biosynthetic arms ripped from its socket, he looks up to find his spaceship wrecked and smoldering nearby. He has no idea how he got there—his mind is missing key information, and his memories seem to be spliced with those of another person, a test pilot on Earth named Dash Strouthers. Jacques’ first order of business is to fight off the reptile-like bounty hunters that shot him down. He steals their ship and heads to the edge of the settled universe to find out who wants him dead and why. There he visits Bender the Reek, the universe’s last living Reek (or Re-cycle geek), whose business is extending human life by illegally replanting consciousnesses in new bodies (or “meat-suits,” to use the industry parlance). Bender is the man who put Jacques in his current meat-suit; he’s also the one who tried to collect the bounty. Jacques forces Bender to reattach his arm but has to flee before he finds out why Bender has several tanks filled with meat-suit versions of the woman in Dash Strouthers’ visions: Dash’s beautiful, blue-haired Mizuke. As Dash’s consciousness grows stronger in Jacques’ body, the confused fugitive relies on the dead man’s piloting skills to survive on the treacherous frontier of space. As he goes, Jacques attempts to figure out his own past as a former king of the Ma’Kobi clan who retired in the midst of a conflict with an authoritarian warlord—as well as how he came to be linked with Dash Strouthers and a mysterious biosynthetic woman named Mizuke BLU.
The novel’s lore, particularly when it comes to genetic modification, is complex and jargon-heavy, but Acuff brings texture and humor to work, as well as the ability to humanize the characters, even those who aren’t recognizably human. Here a medic—who is described as looking more like a mechanic—appraises a patient: “She ain’t like us, man. She’s gentetically altercated. Total bonzai! She is stable. But inna computer terms, it’s more’n like, I dunno, sleep mode than a coma. Her skinbag is fixin’ ‘erself right up at a super high cycle, but her mind shows zippo activity.” The narrative’s DNA is at least three-quarters action movie, with scene after scene of fistfights, shootouts, explosions, and escapes. Acuff’s touch is light enough to handle the transitions between Jacques and Dash, though, and while readers will initially be pulled along by the set pieces, they will soon find themselves invested in the convoluted mystery of the protagonists’ origins. Most will return to find out what happens in the next volume.
An inventive, fast-paced SF thriller.
Pub Date: May 2, 2024
ISBN: 9798988829324
Page count: 441pp
Publisher: BravoBay Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 12, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2024
Battle Tides
Day job
Producer-Editor at Disney
Favorite author
Mickey Spillane, Eoin Colfer, C.S. Lewis, JK Rowling, Tom Clancy, Dashiell Hammett
Favorite book
I, The Jury
Favorite line from a book
What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul?
Favorite word
Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
Hometown
Raleigh, NC
Passion in life
Cheeseburgers
Unexpected skill or talent
Standup Comedy
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Hey there, book lover.
We’re glad you found a book that interests you!
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Don’t fret. We’ll find you.