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bethaniekay's review against another edition
1.0
Ugh, this book was not what I thought it was going to be. The characters weren't that well developed (or that interesting) and the story was just plain weird. It flips back and forth from 666BC to 18th century Venice to present day Venice, which in itself isn't terrible -- but the stories of what was happening in the first two timelines were awful. Terrible, boring, disgusting. The present day was the only timeline I could actually follow, and even it wasn't great. It was just all a bit over the top for me, and way too much blood, gore, religion and Satanism for me. Thumbs down.
horror_han_'s review against another edition
4.0
Took a while to get going due to the multitude of storylines, but I couldn’t put it down once I got halfway through!
rashmitha_books's review against another edition
dark
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
edubb745's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
It's a good historical mystery, just feels like it wraps up too quick toward the end. The author interjects stories from hundreds of years prior to modern events which was my favorite part. Tom is a character I'd read more about. Overall, it was enough of an interesting read to keep me hooked til the end as a casual reader.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Gore, and Rape
Moderate: Forced institutionalization
dtaylorbooks's review against another edition
3.0
This is a years old BEA ARC book that I grabbed and I’m just finding out that this author has a slew of pseudonyms and that this title is actually published under a couple of them. Thanks for the confusion. That means nothing for the book; I just found it kind of annoying.
THE VENICE CONSPIRACY is told using parallel timelines from ancient Etruscan times and mid-18th century Venice to coincide with the present day plot of this unfolding conspiracy. I liked both equally but it wasn’t an overwhelming like. The stories were okay. The ancient portion drew more of my attention but all three definitely had a lot of action going on and the slight supernatural element was interesting in its own right although not wholly realized. The religious element is really what suckered me in. I find it hard to resist conspiracy and the Catholic church in the same sentence.
What didn’t work for me here was how thinly the historical and modern day elements were connected. These tablets were what was supposed to string everything together but a lot of whys were missing and I felt like I was just supposed to accept the fact that these tablets were evil and evil people wanted to do evil things with them because that’s how evil worked. The introduction of the LA death row inmate into all of this just kind of muddied the waters. That modern day plot element just seemed nonsensical and was used more as a shock factor than anything else. It all comes back to evil people doing evil things and evil must be stopped. But motivation all around was thin. Because evil.
Another thing that really bothered me was the use of the year 666 BC to coincide with the beginning of these tablets in Etruscan times. Since we currently function on a Gregorian calendar and Catholicism was the one that attached any meaning to that number and THAT existed hundreds of years after this Etruscan event, unless that specific year coincided with an equivalent premonition of evil on the Etruscan calendar it’s an otherwise irrelevant number. Ooh spooky 666 mark of the beast and the supposed first emergence of Satan as seen in Catholicism hundreds of years before the religion even came about! But it’s a fallacious attribution and one that kept nagging at me. The Gregorian year is meaningless. I understand the use in writing because see: oooo spooky devil number but the concept of monotheism and one god/one devil wasn’t an unknown concept at the time. So it was all thinly strung together on suspension of disbelief coming into play.
I did like Tom, the ex-priest with blood on his hands (DRAMA) and Valentina (the lady cop with something to prove). They were both characters I could get behind and I was rooting for them to come out on top. But amidst everything else, because I really wasn’t on board with the story as a whole, I didn’t connect with them as much as I otherwise would have. The story was exciting and all and I didn’t struggle with reading it but I wasn’t that impressed by it. The author obviously did his research when it came to history and modern Venice but too much of the plot relied on my suspension of disbelief to be running on high and it wasn’t.
Blood and action and gore is good. But if I’m poking holes in the theory it takes away from my reading experience.
3
THE VENICE CONSPIRACY is told using parallel timelines from ancient Etruscan times and mid-18th century Venice to coincide with the present day plot of this unfolding conspiracy. I liked both equally but it wasn’t an overwhelming like. The stories were okay. The ancient portion drew more of my attention but all three definitely had a lot of action going on and the slight supernatural element was interesting in its own right although not wholly realized. The religious element is really what suckered me in. I find it hard to resist conspiracy and the Catholic church in the same sentence.
What didn’t work for me here was how thinly the historical and modern day elements were connected. These tablets were what was supposed to string everything together but a lot of whys were missing and I felt like I was just supposed to accept the fact that these tablets were evil and evil people wanted to do evil things with them because that’s how evil worked. The introduction of the LA death row inmate into all of this just kind of muddied the waters. That modern day plot element just seemed nonsensical and was used more as a shock factor than anything else. It all comes back to evil people doing evil things and evil must be stopped. But motivation all around was thin. Because evil.
Another thing that really bothered me was the use of the year 666 BC to coincide with the beginning of these tablets in Etruscan times. Since we currently function on a Gregorian calendar and Catholicism was the one that attached any meaning to that number and THAT existed hundreds of years after this Etruscan event, unless that specific year coincided with an equivalent premonition of evil on the Etruscan calendar it’s an otherwise irrelevant number. Ooh spooky 666 mark of the beast and the supposed first emergence of Satan as seen in Catholicism hundreds of years before the religion even came about! But it’s a fallacious attribution and one that kept nagging at me. The Gregorian year is meaningless. I understand the use in writing because see: oooo spooky devil number but the concept of monotheism and one god/one devil wasn’t an unknown concept at the time. So it was all thinly strung together on suspension of disbelief coming into play.
I did like Tom, the ex-priest with blood on his hands (DRAMA) and Valentina (the lady cop with something to prove). They were both characters I could get behind and I was rooting for them to come out on top. But amidst everything else, because I really wasn’t on board with the story as a whole, I didn’t connect with them as much as I otherwise would have. The story was exciting and all and I didn’t struggle with reading it but I wasn’t that impressed by it. The author obviously did his research when it came to history and modern Venice but too much of the plot relied on my suspension of disbelief to be running on high and it wasn’t.
Blood and action and gore is good. But if I’m poking holes in the theory it takes away from my reading experience.
3