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yonnyan's review
3.0
Cylon's Secret Review:
This is book one of the trilogy anthology that I'm currently reading. I've decided to try and review these stories as I read before the freshness dissipates on me.
The Cylon's Secret, for me, was a wonderful read. It felt as if it had a little bit of a slow start, but it was just setting the atmosphere for the suspense that was to come, I found the characters to be exceptionally rendered, keeping true to their personalities. The thoughts and feelings portrayed as the plot unfolded made me feel like I was right beside them. I said earlier that there was suspense in the novel. There's a point in the book where I got hooked so quickly that I just couldn't put it down until I was done. The transition from the slow pace to the intrigue was very nicely done; it felt fluid and natural while I read.
I absolutely loved The Cylon's Secret. It does set you up for certain occurrences that take place in the TV show, which made it fun to analyze the hell out of. I believe this novel takes place roughly 20 years before the events of the TV series, just to give you a timeline. My rating for this specific novel is 4/5.
Sagittarius is Bleeding Review:
Where I read the first novel in a couple of days, this second novel took me quite a bit longer. I don't really know for sure if it was because the story followed that of the television series, or if the writing was just that bad, but it was quite slow and disappointingly boring for the vast majority of it. The very first BSG novel I read was a direct novelization of the first few episodes of season one, so if I to take a gander at the reason, I would say that the writing was very amateurish and lacking.
The beginning (about the first 20 pages or so) had an okay start to it, but then the pace started to dwindle for me. The focus for about 80% of the book is on Laura Roslin. I don't want to give spoilers so no specifics on how it focused on her, just know that it does, for extended periods of time. Now, this may just be a personal problem, but she's not a character that I'm very fond of at all so I had a difficult time holding on to my interest when her scenes came about. I also felt that the writing was rather bland. It took quite a bit of effort not to skip through sections of the novel. There was a severe lack of suspense, even in scenes that were made to be suspenseful. It was extremely predictable (even for those who don't have experience with the show), and whenever the pace did pick up it never lasted long enough. Left me feeling unsatisfied to say the least.
One other complaint that I have about this book are the chapter sizes. I know that it's random and probably irrelevant to the actual plot, but it bothered me. There were more than a few chapters that felt like run-on sections. Usually within this book the chapter would concentrate on one aspect of the plot and then fluidly move on to the next, however. Some of the chapters just went on and on unnecessarily, breaking the natural flow of the story. I probably sound weird describing this, and I apologize if I don't make any sense.
Anyway, the second book felt like a waste of time for me. I never truly got into it it's why I trudged through it for a couple weeks instead of days. My personal rating for this specific story would have to be 2/5.
Unity
Unity was surprisingly good. It wasn’t spectacular or special, but it was genuinely good. Unlike the other BSG novels, it didn’t have a slow beginning. It starts off with a very nice mini action scene and then continues onward without dragging the pace. That was a great change for me in regards to these books. I felt that it had an element of non-stop suspense, but on a mild level, if that makes any sense.
One of the things that I really enjoyed was the writing. Unlike the last novel, Sagittarius is Bleeding, Unity was very nicely written. The words that unfolded created lots of vivid imagery and included fairly decent moments of creative comic relief. I also felt that the author’s depiction of the characters, especially in the ways of their thought processes, was beautifully rendered. It didn’t feel as if I was reading some biased fan-made story about the characters. Whatever they were thinking and whatever they were feeling, felt very real and true to their natures.
I think that this is a great BSG story and shouldn’t be overlooked. It actually works quite nicely as a standalone piece. If you don’t want to read the novels before this, then don’t. You will not be missing out on anything at all. Unity is an original story, meaning that you won’t see it in the TV series or the movies, and I do recommend some kind of knowledge about the show to fully grasp certain details in this book, but in actuality it’s not absolutely necessary. I definitely recommend this to any fan of Battlestar Galactica! My rating for this specific story is 4/5
This is book one of the trilogy anthology that I'm currently reading. I've decided to try and review these stories as I read before the freshness dissipates on me.
The Cylon's Secret, for me, was a wonderful read. It felt as if it had a little bit of a slow start, but it was just setting the atmosphere for the suspense that was to come, I found the characters to be exceptionally rendered, keeping true to their personalities. The thoughts and feelings portrayed as the plot unfolded made me feel like I was right beside them. I said earlier that there was suspense in the novel. There's a point in the book where I got hooked so quickly that I just couldn't put it down until I was done. The transition from the slow pace to the intrigue was very nicely done; it felt fluid and natural while I read.
I absolutely loved The Cylon's Secret. It does set you up for certain occurrences that take place in the TV show, which made it fun to analyze the hell out of. I believe this novel takes place roughly 20 years before the events of the TV series, just to give you a timeline. My rating for this specific novel is 4/5.
Sagittarius is Bleeding Review:
Where I read the first novel in a couple of days, this second novel took me quite a bit longer. I don't really know for sure if it was because the story followed that of the television series, or if the writing was just that bad, but it was quite slow and disappointingly boring for the vast majority of it. The very first BSG novel I read was a direct novelization of the first few episodes of season one, so if I to take a gander at the reason, I would say that the writing was very amateurish and lacking.
The beginning (about the first 20 pages or so) had an okay start to it, but then the pace started to dwindle for me. The focus for about 80% of the book is on Laura Roslin. I don't want to give spoilers so no specifics on how it focused on her, just know that it does, for extended periods of time. Now, this may just be a personal problem, but she's not a character that I'm very fond of at all so I had a difficult time holding on to my interest when her scenes came about. I also felt that the writing was rather bland. It took quite a bit of effort not to skip through sections of the novel. There was a severe lack of suspense, even in scenes that were made to be suspenseful. It was extremely predictable (even for those who don't have experience with the show), and whenever the pace did pick up it never lasted long enough. Left me feeling unsatisfied to say the least.
One other complaint that I have about this book are the chapter sizes. I know that it's random and probably irrelevant to the actual plot, but it bothered me. There were more than a few chapters that felt like run-on sections. Usually within this book the chapter would concentrate on one aspect of the plot and then fluidly move on to the next, however. Some of the chapters just went on and on unnecessarily, breaking the natural flow of the story. I probably sound weird describing this, and I apologize if I don't make any sense.
Anyway, the second book felt like a waste of time for me. I never truly got into it it's why I trudged through it for a couple weeks instead of days. My personal rating for this specific story would have to be 2/5.
Unity
Unity was surprisingly good. It wasn’t spectacular or special, but it was genuinely good. Unlike the other BSG novels, it didn’t have a slow beginning. It starts off with a very nice mini action scene and then continues onward without dragging the pace. That was a great change for me in regards to these books. I felt that it had an element of non-stop suspense, but on a mild level, if that makes any sense.
One of the things that I really enjoyed was the writing. Unlike the last novel, Sagittarius is Bleeding, Unity was very nicely written. The words that unfolded created lots of vivid imagery and included fairly decent moments of creative comic relief. I also felt that the author’s depiction of the characters, especially in the ways of their thought processes, was beautifully rendered. It didn’t feel as if I was reading some biased fan-made story about the characters. Whatever they were thinking and whatever they were feeling, felt very real and true to their natures.
I think that this is a great BSG story and shouldn’t be overlooked. It actually works quite nicely as a standalone piece. If you don’t want to read the novels before this, then don’t. You will not be missing out on anything at all. Unity is an original story, meaning that you won’t see it in the TV series or the movies, and I do recommend some kind of knowledge about the show to fully grasp certain details in this book, but in actuality it’s not absolutely necessary. I definitely recommend this to any fan of Battlestar Galactica! My rating for this specific story is 4/5
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