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jakekilroy 's review for:
Gideon's Sword
by Douglas Preston, Lincoln Child
Holy shit, not even a Dan Brown book has this many cliches. Also, a Dan Brown book is actually written better. I don't what the shit happened here. This was like a rough draft of a thriller novel.
I'm a huge fan of Preston and Child's Pendergast series, as is the majority of people reviewing this book, I imagine. Even when those books are at their most action-based, there's still a beating heart of patience, virtue and intelligence with the central character of Pendergast. In fact, I'd list Aloysius X. L. Pendergast as one of my favorite characters of fiction. And his stories are perfectly paced while staying grounded in a reality of empathy and concern, even when the supernatural is goddamn nutsy. It's a fantastic character in a wonderful series, so I have no idea what the hell went wrong with their new series of Gideon Crew.
Unlike Pendergast, with his rich history and balanced affection, Crew is such a pompous shred of a thin character. He's reactionary to things that haven't even occurred, making him more of a plot point instead of a character. He spends his whole life seeking revenge, only for it to go over incredibly easy within the first few dozen pages. Then he gets hired to do a job that you don't even really care about with the moral ambiguity of a frat boy turned art thief. It was such lazy storytelling with incredibly predictable bullshit; everything from "you're out of control" to "this is personal."
It was such a letdown. Oh man, even the ending was abrupt after dragging shit out that didn't need to be. Almost every character was weak and the closest one to being cool was the villain. If they had tried just a little harder, they could've made this a mystery-thriller parody real easy. Laaaaaaaaaaaaame.
I'm a huge fan of Preston and Child's Pendergast series, as is the majority of people reviewing this book, I imagine. Even when those books are at their most action-based, there's still a beating heart of patience, virtue and intelligence with the central character of Pendergast. In fact, I'd list Aloysius X. L. Pendergast as one of my favorite characters of fiction. And his stories are perfectly paced while staying grounded in a reality of empathy and concern, even when the supernatural is goddamn nutsy. It's a fantastic character in a wonderful series, so I have no idea what the hell went wrong with their new series of Gideon Crew.
Unlike Pendergast, with his rich history and balanced affection, Crew is such a pompous shred of a thin character. He's reactionary to things that haven't even occurred, making him more of a plot point instead of a character. He spends his whole life seeking revenge, only for it to go over incredibly easy within the first few dozen pages. Then he gets hired to do a job that you don't even really care about with the moral ambiguity of a frat boy turned art thief. It was such lazy storytelling with incredibly predictable bullshit; everything from "you're out of control" to "this is personal."
It was such a letdown. Oh man, even the ending was abrupt after dragging shit out that didn't need to be. Almost every character was weak and the closest one to being cool was the villain. If they had tried just a little harder, they could've made this a mystery-thriller parody real easy. Laaaaaaaaaaaaame.