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reader89's review against another edition
adventurous
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
timinbc's review against another edition
1.0
Meretricious pap.
I should have stopped at "bestseller."
I stopped after 120 pages. Let me tell you why.
Early on, the table fills quickly with stock characters.
Here's Nina. She's Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum with a better degree, right down to the hunky super-soldier who's protecting her.
Here's the mega-rich, suave good guy. Here's the mega-rich, bad guy who .... you know what I'm going to say, don't you? ... will stop at nothing to defeat Good Guy.
OK, the characters are on stage. Let's turn the action up to 11.
That is, if you mean popcorn-movie action.
An explosion kills 12 men, but not Our Hero, because he ducked.
Captured characters keep talking and getting hit with gun butts, because that's what prisoners and guards HAVE to do in bad books. It's important, because we have to establish that the guards NEED killin', so our hero can get on with smashing windpipes and slashing throats and putting his gun on full auto because EXCITING and eww, more blood, and look, there's s SPINE, what a great book!!!!
Ah, this is getting boring. Let's chase our hero over a cliff. Okay, anyone who has EVER watched a cartoon knows what happens. Yep, he grabs a small bush. To no avail, but it had to go in there. So he steals a train, go Rambo, go John McClane, but that's old hat so let's have it collide with another train. Not just any train, of course, but one full of oil and stuff, BOOM! Flames everywhere, bad guy barbecue, boo-ya!!
I gave up after Brock Manly had killed maybe his 50th baddie, because I know the rest of the plot. He'll run directly away from an airplane. He'll hang from a ledge, badly hurt, and pull himself up with one arm. A van will blow up in the background and roll sideways toward us. Good guy, and he'll have The Girl with him by now, will jump toward us, pretending to have been knocked down by an explosion 200 feet away. There will be a long, dangerous trek to the Bad Guy's Lair, and a Big Showdown, with a long speech by the Bad Guy, and it will look like curtains for the Good Guys ... until .... you know the rest. Pfui.
I'm still congratulating myself on not reading the rest of this lukewarm bowl of formula.
I should have stopped at "bestseller."
I stopped after 120 pages. Let me tell you why.
Early on, the table fills quickly with stock characters.
Here's Nina. She's Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum with a better degree, right down to the hunky super-soldier who's protecting her.
Here's the mega-rich, suave good guy. Here's the mega-rich, bad guy who .... you know what I'm going to say, don't you? ... will stop at nothing to defeat Good Guy.
OK, the characters are on stage. Let's turn the action up to 11.
That is, if you mean popcorn-movie action.
An explosion kills 12 men, but not Our Hero, because he ducked.
Captured characters keep talking and getting hit with gun butts, because that's what prisoners and guards HAVE to do in bad books. It's important, because we have to establish that the guards NEED killin', so our hero can get on with smashing windpipes and slashing throats and putting his gun on full auto because EXCITING and eww, more blood, and look, there's s SPINE, what a great book!!!!
Ah, this is getting boring. Let's chase our hero over a cliff. Okay, anyone who has EVER watched a cartoon knows what happens. Yep, he grabs a small bush. To no avail, but it had to go in there. So he steals a train, go Rambo, go John McClane, but that's old hat so let's have it collide with another train. Not just any train, of course, but one full of oil and stuff, BOOM! Flames everywhere, bad guy barbecue, boo-ya!!
I gave up after Brock Manly had killed maybe his 50th baddie, because I know the rest of the plot. He'll run directly away from an airplane. He'll hang from a ledge, badly hurt, and pull himself up with one arm. A van will blow up in the background and roll sideways toward us. Good guy, and he'll have The Girl with him by now, will jump toward us, pretending to have been knocked down by an explosion 200 feet away. There will be a long, dangerous trek to the Bad Guy's Lair, and a Big Showdown, with a long speech by the Bad Guy, and it will look like curtains for the Good Guys ... until .... you know the rest. Pfui.
I'm still congratulating myself on not reading the rest of this lukewarm bowl of formula.
chloelouise_xiv's review against another edition
adventurous
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
3.5
agentnk_'s review against another edition
5.0
very first question which popped up in my head halfway through this book was "Does Atlantis really exist?" well i think Mr Andy gave a good answer for that which hooked me to the book !
fyreprincess's review against another edition
2.0
Okay, so I grabbed this book off my sister’s shelf because it had been sitting there, unread, for ages, and since I had nothing to read, I thought ‘why not?’ The real question I should be asking is: ‘why?’ As in, ‘why did this book get published?’ ‘why is it receiving such high ratings?’ etc. Before reading it, I was interested, because you know, Atlantis. But as soon as I started reading it, I just realized that The Hunt for Atlantis by Andy McDermott is just a shitty version of a Matthew Reilly book (who I love by the way).
First of all, putting the story aside, the writing of the novel itself was pretty amateur. I probably could’ve written this book better than he did. The descriptions of the action sequences didn’t flow, they didn’t incite feelings of urgency, honestly, it just felt like McDermott chucked a bunch of ‘cool action moves’ together without actually thinking it through. The dialogue was mediocre, I found myself rolling my eyes at the author’s attempt at humour and smartass comments. Reading it, I found myself going back over what I read in order to make sense of what I was reading, and to just think about the context of their situation in accordance with the dialogue written for it – most of it just didn’t work.
Also, the first thing I noticed (and hated) while reading this book, was the fact that there was just too many exclamation marks. Like sure, put some in when someone’s yelling, or something is urgent, but pretty much all the exclamation marks used in this novel were pretty unnecessary and it got quite annoying. Another thing I noticed (and also hated) was the excessive use of ellipses. Sure it created a sense of suspense and such, but once again, most of them were not needed.
Can I just mention the fact that I don’t think referring to someone as ‘British’ is correct when they are just English. Britain encompasses England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, so unless this guy is all of those nationalities, he’s just English, not British. Okay so maybe now I’m just being annoying, but I just have to complain about the fact that there was this one character, Hugo Castille who absolutely hated helicopters, and every opportunity was taken to remind the reader of this fact. Guess how he died? A fucking helicopter. I’m pretty sure McDermott meant this as some sort of funny dramatic irony, but I didn’t laugh, I just rolled my eyes.
Story-wise, I thought that the process was a little too easy. Like, finding the lost city of Atlantis would be hella hard, and I just feel like everything came too easy to the team hunting it – and they didn’t even get to the actual hunting for Atlantis expedition until like halfway through the book. Also, what kind of bad guys just rely on their mole and the information he provides, to know where the good guys are in order to stop them? How about you work it out for yourself?
Once last thing I want to complain about, is McDermott’s shitty attempt at romance – if you could even call it that. Literally, I think this ‘romance’ was just chucked in at random intervals for the sake of it. There was nothing to lead up to this romance and it was just a shitty attempt in general.
Don’t even get me started on the characters. They all have no depth, and no development.
First of all, putting the story aside, the writing of the novel itself was pretty amateur. I probably could’ve written this book better than he did. The descriptions of the action sequences didn’t flow, they didn’t incite feelings of urgency, honestly, it just felt like McDermott chucked a bunch of ‘cool action moves’ together without actually thinking it through. The dialogue was mediocre, I found myself rolling my eyes at the author’s attempt at humour and smartass comments. Reading it, I found myself going back over what I read in order to make sense of what I was reading, and to just think about the context of their situation in accordance with the dialogue written for it – most of it just didn’t work.
Also, the first thing I noticed (and hated) while reading this book, was the fact that there was just too many exclamation marks. Like sure, put some in when someone’s yelling, or something is urgent, but pretty much all the exclamation marks used in this novel were pretty unnecessary and it got quite annoying. Another thing I noticed (and also hated) was the excessive use of ellipses. Sure it created a sense of suspense and such, but once again, most of them were not needed.
Can I just mention the fact that I don’t think referring to someone as ‘British’ is correct when they are just English. Britain encompasses England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, so unless this guy is all of those nationalities, he’s just English, not British. Okay so maybe now I’m just being annoying, but I just have to complain about the fact that there was this one character, Hugo Castille who absolutely hated helicopters, and every opportunity was taken to remind the reader of this fact. Guess how he died? A fucking helicopter. I’m pretty sure McDermott meant this as some sort of funny dramatic irony, but I didn’t laugh, I just rolled my eyes.
Story-wise, I thought that the process was a little too easy. Like, finding the lost city of Atlantis would be hella hard, and I just feel like everything came too easy to the team hunting it – and they didn’t even get to the actual hunting for Atlantis expedition until like halfway through the book. Also, what kind of bad guys just rely on their mole and the information he provides, to know where the good guys are in order to stop them? How about you work it out for yourself?
Once last thing I want to complain about, is McDermott’s shitty attempt at romance – if you could even call it that. Literally, I think this ‘romance’ was just chucked in at random intervals for the sake of it. There was nothing to lead up to this romance and it was just a shitty attempt in general.
Don’t even get me started on the characters. They all have no depth, and no development.
ayami's review against another edition
2.0
The author had a good idea for a book but it was ruined by endless and pointless action sequences. Found myself skipping those parts. Boring and predictable.
duparker's review against another edition
4.0
This is an odd book to review. It want spectacularly written, had no philosophy or life lesson, but I couldn't put it down.
Is it believable? Not after page 45, is it well written, nope. Is it highly readable, of course. It is a mass market treasure hunting book with the usual characters getting into scenarios and quips with twists and turns that work and unravel as each page flips.
The sole surprise was who made it out alive at the end.
I can see devouring the rest of the series rather nicely, and probably will. This is comfort reading and mixed in between some nonfiction, or read on a plane or on a trip, this will do just what it should.
Is it believable? Not after page 45, is it well written, nope. Is it highly readable, of course. It is a mass market treasure hunting book with the usual characters getting into scenarios and quips with twists and turns that work and unravel as each page flips.
The sole surprise was who made it out alive at the end.
I can see devouring the rest of the series rather nicely, and probably will. This is comfort reading and mixed in between some nonfiction, or read on a plane or on a trip, this will do just what it should.
catsandbooksandthings_14's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
funny
inspiring
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
konain's review against another edition
2.0
Overall it was a mixed bag. The basic storyline was very good, except the end sequence which was a bit too simplistic.
The writing varied from OK to downright horrible. Characterisation was poor and seemed hurried. The dialogues were juvenile. The action sequences were well written, though. Except at places where the writer was too influenced by Hollywood flicks, imagined an intricate action scene amd tried to put it on paper. And failed miserably.
Other problem with the story is the jigsaws. A thriller of this kind ought to be well researched and shouldn't have loopholes in the story. But there were huge gaps.
Then the final expedition to the Gulf of Cadiz, and yet no security is provided despite knowing that Qorbas is sure to attack. However, in the end sequence Frost is shown to possess a veritable military of his own.....plain stupid
The writing varied from OK to downright horrible. Characterisation was poor and seemed hurried. The dialogues were juvenile. The action sequences were well written, though. Except at places where the writer was too influenced by Hollywood flicks, imagined an intricate action scene amd tried to put it on paper. And failed miserably.
Other problem with the story is the jigsaws. A thriller of this kind ought to be well researched and shouldn't have loopholes in the story. But there were huge gaps.
Spoiler
The Wildes got killed in a landslide as claimed. Jonathan/Jack was the only survivor. Frost knew that the brotherhood is after the expedition. Yet he didn't question the explanation and didn't suspect the lone survivor. And this despite the fact that Frost is shown as highly intelligent, resourceful and obscenely wealthy. Next, the expedition to Amazon is again attacked and yet nothing.Then the final expedition to the Gulf of Cadiz, and yet no security is provided despite knowing that Qorbas is sure to attack. However, in the end sequence Frost is shown to possess a veritable military of his own.....plain stupid
andrealoverke's review against another edition
5.0
as good as Reilly. Altough the characters still need to grow on me.