Till The Sun Breaks Down (Deviant Aeon Book 1) by Tom Leveen 

Amazon

Published by Tom Leveen via Amazon

Malikai awoke in the desert with nothing but a name and a sword, lacking any memory whatsoever of his identity or past. Discovering that his inhuman strength and reflexes made him a Deviant in the eyes of human society — a monster who must be identified, cataloged, and registered, or else done away with — he hid himself in an abandoned farm outside Phoenix. But driven by an unnamed and voiceless force within himself, he fights to bring justice to the criminals of Phoenix, a once vibrant city now fallen into ruin. When his zealous quest accidentally ruins one father’s pursuit of his kidnapped daughter, Malikai vows to find the girl and return her safely home. This promise takes him to the shining beacon of Los Angeles, where he uncovers a gang of human traffickers operating below the city streets. But this bloody job does more than expose the evil men do for profit — it exposes the truth of his own origin and the penalty he has yet to pay…

Review by Dani Hoots

This book follows Malikai, a Deviant monster, as he prowls the streets of Phoenix, saving strangers from common criminals. That is until he stops a father who wasn’t committing a crime but actually trying to get his daughter back from criminals who have a human trafficking operation. Malikai decides that it would be best to try and help the father since he felt it was his fault that the criminal got away.

Tom Leveen does a great job exploring an anti-hero who can’t remember his past, is treated as a monster by humans, yet does all he can to help those he finds are in trouble. The character is very believable, well-developed, and makes me want to know what happens next.

Not only was the main character interesting, but Leveen also breathed life into the secondary characters and those who Malikai ran into. I know sometimes that people around the main character can feel like stick figures, with not much personality attached, but this author did not do that. Every person feels like an individual and I really appreciated that in Leveen’s writing.

The setting was well described as well, both for Phoenix and when the character goes to California. I could picture it perfectly, but it was also not distracting and flowed with the story (as I know some authors who put a little too much description, making a reader want to just move on).

I won’t give away the ending, but it did leave me wanting to know what will happen to Malikai, a little nervous, but happy that it didn’t end on an entirely depressing note. Leveen also gives information about human trafficking at the end of the book, which I thought was really thoughtful as his story dealt with it and he wanted his readers to know the truth of what is going on and who to get in contact with if they need to.

I give this story a 5/5 as it was done very well, left me wanting more, and dealt with real world things. I will definitely be reading more from this author!