White Sands by Nicholas Sansbury Smith

Source: ARC from author
Format: Kindle ebook
Rating: 4 Stars
Reviewer: Laurel

Jeff and his little brother David were normal kids; they loved video games, fighter planes, and learning to hunt with their Dad. Little did they know, their lives were about to change.

The boys and their father find themselves stranded in the desert when a military jet comes careening out of the sky and crashes directly into their car. Barely escaping the incident with their lives, and out of contact with the rest of the world, the trio must make the perilous journey back to civilization.

But, downed aircrafts, stalled out cars, and mysterious glowing blue orbs litter the desert landscape. Slowly they come to realize that the world is under attack and the civilization they once knew may no longer exist. Now the boys and their father are in a fight to survive across a barren landscape—a fight that not all will win.

This book is a prequel to the ORBS series. Jeff and David are two children discovered at the White Sands facility by Sophie and her team when they travel there from the Cheyenne Mountain Biosphere in Book 1 of this series. This short story provides the readers an opportunity to understand why Jeff and David happened to be in the facility – a top secret one owned and run by NTC; in other words, a place children should not be.

The story opens on Jeff’s birthday. He and David are travelling in a car with their step-mom, bound for White Sands where they will pick up the boys’ dad, Michael, a security guard at White Sands. It is revealed early on that the boys’ father plans to take Jeff to a shooting range to teach him to use a rifle, a family heirloom.

Smith’s writing is once again clear and concise, delivering an uncluttered story. The descriptions are vivid, putting me right into the action with the characters. The writing is easy to read, and the story moves at a good pace.

I only give this story four stars because it wasn’t quite the wow-blow-me-away of the other stories in the series, but it is no less important or well-written.