Don't be put off by the cover, it really doesn't do the book justice. I don't tend to read this genre of book as I have it in my head that it is a "man's" book. I don't know why but anything vaguely military in tone has always seemed to me to be for the male populace and not the female - terribly misogynistic I know. In this case I have been proved wrong as I was completely absorbed in this book. Set in the near future (we only know that it is post 2027) the world isn't so different from the one we are experiencing now but there have been some technological advancements and the book is stuffed full of them.
The book centres around Marshall Hail, a vigilante kazillionaire who is determined to avenge the death of his wife and twin daughters during The Five. Having money, and intellect, to burn he had made his mark in Nuclear Technology and now he can give people power for pennies - if their governments will pay the price, he has started converting his cargo ships into floating hotels and battle stations for his handpicked staff. I have to say the living and working conditions on board the Hail Nucleus (we are told that Hail Proton and Hail Laser and all his other fleet are identicial) sound exceptionally luxurious and I wouldn't want to leave ship either. The bulk of his technological efforts are now spent in building military-grade drones that are beyond anything a regular army has available to them. These drones are remotely deployed, can carry other drones in to secluded areas and can deliver poisonous death, cut through galvanised steel, provide audio and video surveillance or simply rain bullets down on you.
There is a lot of technological speak here but it is well explained without too much dumbing down. The action is well constructed and believable, even if we aren't quite there yet it is based in sound fact - drones are starting to be used in theatres of conflict and their pilots are recruited from the gaming community. There is a certain wry humour in the writing, especially the dialogue, and this helps the whole tale gel and move along at a clipping pace. Even though Hail's heart is in the right place for now you can't help but wonder if the US Political system's wariness of him is well-founded as a private army can turn against you at any time and Madame President is all too aware of that fact.
Apart from Hail and Kara Ramey there is little overt characterisation within the book and yet you still have a sense of the different people aboard the Hail Nucleus. This mainly comes from brief conversations during deployments but everyone seems to have their own personality rather than being simply a device to move a bit more of the technology from Point A to B.
There were a couple of niggles for me though. In Act 1 we are introduced to the main team on board the Hail Nucleus and then about 15 pages later (my best guess I didn't count) they are all recapped - I do have an attention span somewhat greater than a gnat and could remember who everyone was thanks. In Act 3 there is a needless chunk of Wiki-text explaining the Situation Room at the White House, if anyone didn't know what it was they could have googled it rather than slapping unnecessary text down. The ship names are italicised throughout the text and this irked me increasingly through the book, this could have been a typesetting decision rather than the author's but it really is not necessary. Finally in the Kindle version there are strange line breaks in the middle of sentences where you will have 2 words on a line and then it jumps to the next - disturbs the flow of the eye across the page and temporarily jolts you out of the story - not the athor's fault but could do with fixing IMHO.
If you are looking for a read with a LOT of action and some very believable tech them this is for you. There are some good personal interactions within the tale so it isn't all "gung-ho" and there are the first stirrings of romance but not overtly so and certainly not enough to offend. A great read and one that has gone some way to proving to me that when written right this is a genre for ANYONE.
I RECEIVED A FREE COPY OF THIS BOOK FROM THE AUTHOR IN EXCHANGE FOR AN HONEST REVIEW.
Thursday, 8 March 2018
Wednesday, 7 March 2018
The Desperate Bride's Diet Club by Alison Sherlock
Such a shame that the writing is actually quite good for the genre. Full of wit and moves the tale along at a good pace without feeling rushed. Why is this a shame? Simply because the underlying "message" in this tale is that unless you are slim then you cannot be attractive, unless you are slim you cannot have a valid emotional attachment with people, unless you are slim you cannot enjoy life, unless you are slim you can never be truly happy - it is all just a front, the curse of the jolly fat person if you will. The members of the diet club (Violet, Maggie, Lucy, Kathy and Edward) don't really start getting their lives together until they start shedding those pesky pounds and this irritated me beyond belief as it is such a superficial expression of Humanity.
The pity is that the characters themselves are well observed and feel all too real. They are easy to empathise with on the whole but then something jarring will happen that does not ring true. The best example of this is in the opening scene when Violet steals a 12-portion double chocolate gateau from a stranger in the local store and proceeds to eat it all herself without throwing it back up. Sorry, but that would make even the most dedicated chocolate hog throw up whether or not they were bulimic. It also somewhat misses the point that obesity is caused, more often than not, by having too many calories in each meal and being sedentary as opposed to eating between meals or stuffing yourself with chocolate and cake and biscuits - portion control is the key. But no, here the downfall for every last one of them is snacking and it irks me a great deal. Not as much as the implication that you are worth less if you are fat but enough.
Maybe this is all written from the author's personal experience in which case I would suggest some sessions with a therapist as your self-worth should not be determined by your appearence. Yes being fat is unhealthy and can cause serious medical complications but what it doesn't do is make you any less valid as a person and this was the message I came away with from this book. As thrilling as it was to see the characters all rekindle their relationships or start new ones there was always this little voice cursing away in my head at the message being given.
I have given this 2 stars because the writing itself is good and the characters are wonderfully drawn but I can't give it anymore due to the handling of the subject matter.
The pity is that the characters themselves are well observed and feel all too real. They are easy to empathise with on the whole but then something jarring will happen that does not ring true. The best example of this is in the opening scene when Violet steals a 12-portion double chocolate gateau from a stranger in the local store and proceeds to eat it all herself without throwing it back up. Sorry, but that would make even the most dedicated chocolate hog throw up whether or not they were bulimic. It also somewhat misses the point that obesity is caused, more often than not, by having too many calories in each meal and being sedentary as opposed to eating between meals or stuffing yourself with chocolate and cake and biscuits - portion control is the key. But no, here the downfall for every last one of them is snacking and it irks me a great deal. Not as much as the implication that you are worth less if you are fat but enough.
Maybe this is all written from the author's personal experience in which case I would suggest some sessions with a therapist as your self-worth should not be determined by your appearence. Yes being fat is unhealthy and can cause serious medical complications but what it doesn't do is make you any less valid as a person and this was the message I came away with from this book. As thrilling as it was to see the characters all rekindle their relationships or start new ones there was always this little voice cursing away in my head at the message being given.
I have given this 2 stars because the writing itself is good and the characters are wonderfully drawn but I can't give it anymore due to the handling of the subject matter.
Tuesday, 6 March 2018
Defy The Stars by Claudia Gray
This is not a bad book but I did find it a disappointing book. I felt as though it touched on so many themes and locations without ever really exploring anything other than the "super-mech" that is Abel and his enforced isolation leading to the development of his Humanity. I did feel that rather than being a science fiction novel it was more of a romance between Noemi and Abel that just happened to take place in the 23rd Century.
There is plenty of action to be had and different world's to explore but the action is very linear and the worlds are never really explored in any depth. Kismet is the party planet, Cray is the technology hotbed, Stronghold the resource heavy one and they are all sandwiched between the failing Earth and the verdant and idyllic Genesis. For some reason the planets reminded me of H2G2 when Ford and Arthur meet with Slartibartfast and he explains how they tailor planets to the purchasers needs and the technology of the Gates used for travel between the planets reminded me of Stargate.
After reading the first few chapters of Defy The World I was compelled to purchase this book as it felt like this would be a great Science Fiction series and now I am not really that invested in reading the second one. It all felt a little too formulaic and as though it borrowed too much from earlier outings in the genre to be great. Maybe I have just read too much and am too old for this series, after all it is for a YA audience who probably have no idea what H2G2 is - although I suspect they will know Stargate from the multiple TV series rather than the original movie.
The characters had no real depth for me and I never felt like I got to know Noemi at all. I knew the bare bones of her history and that she was a determined soldier for her home planet but beyond that she just seems to lurch from one crisis of confidence to the next. Abel is much more rounded as we get to see the emergence of his personality triumphing over his coding. Even then I never felt like I got to know him as more than words on a page.
The pacing of the tale was good but I never felt shocked by what happened next or like I had to turn the next page to find out what happened to them and how they would get out of this scrape. The universe the action takes place in is well described and you get a good feel for where the action is set but it never quite manages to spark to life in your imagination. The ending is rather rushed but does leave the way clear for the second installment but gives enough closure that if you can't be bothered to continue following the exploits of Noemi, Abel and The Remedy that you don't feel cheated.
There is plenty of action to be had and different world's to explore but the action is very linear and the worlds are never really explored in any depth. Kismet is the party planet, Cray is the technology hotbed, Stronghold the resource heavy one and they are all sandwiched between the failing Earth and the verdant and idyllic Genesis. For some reason the planets reminded me of H2G2 when Ford and Arthur meet with Slartibartfast and he explains how they tailor planets to the purchasers needs and the technology of the Gates used for travel between the planets reminded me of Stargate.
After reading the first few chapters of Defy The World I was compelled to purchase this book as it felt like this would be a great Science Fiction series and now I am not really that invested in reading the second one. It all felt a little too formulaic and as though it borrowed too much from earlier outings in the genre to be great. Maybe I have just read too much and am too old for this series, after all it is for a YA audience who probably have no idea what H2G2 is - although I suspect they will know Stargate from the multiple TV series rather than the original movie.
The characters had no real depth for me and I never felt like I got to know Noemi at all. I knew the bare bones of her history and that she was a determined soldier for her home planet but beyond that she just seems to lurch from one crisis of confidence to the next. Abel is much more rounded as we get to see the emergence of his personality triumphing over his coding. Even then I never felt like I got to know him as more than words on a page.
The pacing of the tale was good but I never felt shocked by what happened next or like I had to turn the next page to find out what happened to them and how they would get out of this scrape. The universe the action takes place in is well described and you get a good feel for where the action is set but it never quite manages to spark to life in your imagination. The ending is rather rushed but does leave the way clear for the second installment but gives enough closure that if you can't be bothered to continue following the exploits of Noemi, Abel and The Remedy that you don't feel cheated.
Monday, 5 March 2018
The Little Lady Collection by Hester Browne
I had already purchased the first book in this series and found it to be an enjoyable book in it's genre and when I saw the second two for sale in a bundle I thought it would be a sensible purchase. I had to skip past the first book as I had only recently read it but this was no problem at all. I have reviewed all the books independantly but a brief summary would be:
The Little Lady Agency - 3.5 Stars
Good solid set up to how The Little Lady Agency comes in to being and spotted by wonderfully rich characters. Only spoiled by everything being a little bit "upper middle-class English" and vaguely impenetrable in places.
Little Lady, Big Apple - 4 Stars
Much more polished storytelling this time around and everything just feels more settled in this book. The wry humour and hopeless relationships are still there but in a much more pleasing way than the first book. Set, as the title suggests, mainly in New York this is the strange Melissa/Honey hybrid being brought out to play for the first time rather than as separate individuals.
What The Lady Wants - 3 Stars
The weakest of the 3 books but still entertaining once you get past the plot holes. Less of the "fixing" people in this one though and more of the romantic entanglements and boorish family.
Overall this is a middle of the road trilogy. Ideal for curling up on bad weather days with a glass of wine and a box of chocolates to just enjoy a little bit of escapism.
The Little Lady Agency - 3.5 Stars
Good solid set up to how The Little Lady Agency comes in to being and spotted by wonderfully rich characters. Only spoiled by everything being a little bit "upper middle-class English" and vaguely impenetrable in places.
Little Lady, Big Apple - 4 Stars
Much more polished storytelling this time around and everything just feels more settled in this book. The wry humour and hopeless relationships are still there but in a much more pleasing way than the first book. Set, as the title suggests, mainly in New York this is the strange Melissa/Honey hybrid being brought out to play for the first time rather than as separate individuals.
What The Lady Wants - 3 Stars
The weakest of the 3 books but still entertaining once you get past the plot holes. Less of the "fixing" people in this one though and more of the romantic entanglements and boorish family.
Overall this is a middle of the road trilogy. Ideal for curling up on bad weather days with a glass of wine and a box of chocolates to just enjoy a little bit of escapism.
What The Lady Wants by Hester Browne
Having read the first two of The Little Lady Agency books I was expecting good things from the third installment. Unfortunately, I found that this book was particularly hit and miss and there appeared to be gaping plot chasms between this and previous books. I did find myself wondering if the author had started writing this before the other two and then abandoned it in favour of the backstory so that by the time she returned to it nothing made any real sense at all.
The wit of the writing does salvage some of the plot shortcomings and this is most apparent with Melissa's dealings with her family and Honey's dealings with P. Nicky. As with the previous books it is the sheer joy of the disfunctionality of Mel's family relationships that bring the greatest enjoyment as well as the greatest opportunity to cringe. I did miss the scattering of useless Hooray-types that need the Agency's salvation; they are referred to but nothing like the glory of male ineptitude that there was in the first book, a generous dose of in book and just a teensy smattering in this one. Sadly this one is more about places and things than people.
The romance in this book is mixed. We have a miraculously repaired marriage, a broken engagement, a proposal and a rather bewildering passion between two characters who have gone down this route previously and decided they were more brother and sister than mr and mrs.
This book passed a pleasant few hours for me and entertained sufficiently but I did feel a little let down after the previous two.
The wit of the writing does salvage some of the plot shortcomings and this is most apparent with Melissa's dealings with her family and Honey's dealings with P. Nicky. As with the previous books it is the sheer joy of the disfunctionality of Mel's family relationships that bring the greatest enjoyment as well as the greatest opportunity to cringe. I did miss the scattering of useless Hooray-types that need the Agency's salvation; they are referred to but nothing like the glory of male ineptitude that there was in the first book, a generous dose of in book and just a teensy smattering in this one. Sadly this one is more about places and things than people.
The romance in this book is mixed. We have a miraculously repaired marriage, a broken engagement, a proposal and a rather bewildering passion between two characters who have gone down this route previously and decided they were more brother and sister than mr and mrs.
This book passed a pleasant few hours for me and entertained sufficiently but I did feel a little let down after the previous two.
In Search Of Us by Ava Dellaira
On the whole I enjoyed this book but there were some writing devices used that served more to irk me than draw me in to the story. Whether the tale is told from Marilyn's 1990's standpoint or Angie's contemporary one there is the constant inserting of songs and their artists in to the tale. I know that music can be important in our lives and that certain songs become inextricably linked with personal events. However, the constant "and strains of such and such could be heard from passing cars / behind windows" throughout the book began to grate after a while. I felt it justified in the initial courtship of James and Marilyn and the use of the mix tape to link past and present but then it became, for me, an intrusion in to the story.
The tale itself is actually a really good one about finding yourself through your family and how important the history of that family is to shaping who you are as a person. Although Angie is a bit of a whiny, self-absorbed brat even her tale is relatively enjoyable. Personally, I was much more invested in Marilyn and her helicopter mother Sylvie and Marilyn's struggle to escape from what her mother wanted her to be and what she wanted for herself. I was a little dismayed that Marilyn felt going to College would be her salvation and the making of her as a person but her situation is pretty desperate in lots of ways so I suppose it makes sense in some small ways.
I would have liked more from James' perspective in this book as he is such a pivotal character in the lives of both mother and daughter and yet we see so little of him. His home life is pretty much idealised - his father may be very much a summer holiday kind of dad and his mother is dead so you would imagine that he is a doom and gloom gang type boy. But no, he is living with his grandparents who have created this harmonious sanctuary for their 2 grandsons that is filled with the love and respect that I am pretty sure only ever exists in the pages of books and on movie screens. It does serve a useful juxtaposition to Marilyn and Sylvie's almost couch surfing existence.
I really could not fully engage with either the tale or the people in it for some reason. The writing style is fairly straightforward with no showy "look what I learnt in Creative Writing class" bits but it just didn't grab me and make me care enough. It started off very strongly and I was sucked in but the longer I read the more that fell away and the less I engaged with the people and the places. Not every book is for everyone and I just know that some people will be completely in love with this book and likely for some of the reasons that I became disenchanted with it.
I RECEIVED A FREE COPY OF THIS BOOK FROM READERS FIRST IN EXCHANGE FOR AN HONEST REVIEW.
The tale itself is actually a really good one about finding yourself through your family and how important the history of that family is to shaping who you are as a person. Although Angie is a bit of a whiny, self-absorbed brat even her tale is relatively enjoyable. Personally, I was much more invested in Marilyn and her helicopter mother Sylvie and Marilyn's struggle to escape from what her mother wanted her to be and what she wanted for herself. I was a little dismayed that Marilyn felt going to College would be her salvation and the making of her as a person but her situation is pretty desperate in lots of ways so I suppose it makes sense in some small ways.
I would have liked more from James' perspective in this book as he is such a pivotal character in the lives of both mother and daughter and yet we see so little of him. His home life is pretty much idealised - his father may be very much a summer holiday kind of dad and his mother is dead so you would imagine that he is a doom and gloom gang type boy. But no, he is living with his grandparents who have created this harmonious sanctuary for their 2 grandsons that is filled with the love and respect that I am pretty sure only ever exists in the pages of books and on movie screens. It does serve a useful juxtaposition to Marilyn and Sylvie's almost couch surfing existence.
I really could not fully engage with either the tale or the people in it for some reason. The writing style is fairly straightforward with no showy "look what I learnt in Creative Writing class" bits but it just didn't grab me and make me care enough. It started off very strongly and I was sucked in but the longer I read the more that fell away and the less I engaged with the people and the places. Not every book is for everyone and I just know that some people will be completely in love with this book and likely for some of the reasons that I became disenchanted with it.
I RECEIVED A FREE COPY OF THIS BOOK FROM READERS FIRST IN EXCHANGE FOR AN HONEST REVIEW.
Dollhouse by Anya Allyn
I was not too sure about this book when I started reading it, a disparate group of teens in the woods and something was bound to happen. However, as I sunk in to the story I realised that this was not the straight-forward formulaic horror that it pretended it was going to be. As soon as Ethan, Cassie and Aisha start chasing Lacey and find themselves in the old Fiveash house you know it is going to go badly wrong.
It is testament to the writing that I can still remember their names some 6 days after finishing the book - that is almost unheard for me.
The world they are plunged in to is like none you would dream exists and yet, it is all too real and there is no fantasy dimension here. Nor are they plunged in to a hellscape. Where they find themselves is in the oversized dollhouse of the title and it is chilling in there. The descriptions are slight but telling and truly spark your imagination so that you start to live and breathe with them in the claustrophobic space. So much so I was reading this book alongside another as I found it was overloading the synapses a little - not helped by my innate distaste for clowns and dolls.
Some sections feel a little repetitive in their action and on a couple of occassions I did become impatient for it to move on with the tale but these were relatively minor niggles when set against my enjoyment of the whole. Definitely a leave the lights on kind of book though as it does cause your imagination to dwell in the dollhouse and you really do NOT want to be there.
It is testament to the writing that I can still remember their names some 6 days after finishing the book - that is almost unheard for me.
The world they are plunged in to is like none you would dream exists and yet, it is all too real and there is no fantasy dimension here. Nor are they plunged in to a hellscape. Where they find themselves is in the oversized dollhouse of the title and it is chilling in there. The descriptions are slight but telling and truly spark your imagination so that you start to live and breathe with them in the claustrophobic space. So much so I was reading this book alongside another as I found it was overloading the synapses a little - not helped by my innate distaste for clowns and dolls.
Some sections feel a little repetitive in their action and on a couple of occassions I did become impatient for it to move on with the tale but these were relatively minor niggles when set against my enjoyment of the whole. Definitely a leave the lights on kind of book though as it does cause your imagination to dwell in the dollhouse and you really do NOT want to be there.
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Lego Tony Stark's Sakaarian Iron Man 76194
I know nothing about the "What If" TV show but what I do know is that I absolutely LOVE Mechs and Lego always manage to put somet...
