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A review by nooralshanti
Starship Sakira by Bob Blanton
4.0
Starship Sakira is an excellently written Sci-Fi about a man, Marc, who finds a spaceship while testing out a sonar technology he was hoping to commercialize. Obviously, finding a spaceship changes his plans a little and he ends up putting together a team to help him use the spaceship's technology. It was so refreshing to see the focus being placed on using this alien tech to better humanity and trying to find ways to do that. I also found the inclusion of his (very clever!) 12 year-old daughter a refreshing and excellent choice. She adds a great dynamic to the team and stops it from being all blazing guns and espionage all the time. She's a very well-written character along with her father Marc and his brother.
The story went into a lot of detail on almost every step of their journey and at the beginning I found this good, but then eventually there were a few very lengthy and drawn-out situations like a very long chapter about a few paintball games and a few lengthy battles which I personally didn't need to see so much detail on! However, someone who's more a fan of action movies/books and thrillers and millitary-type stuff will probably really appreciate them. And even though those battles dragged a bit for me personally I still found them very well-written and the strategy in them well-thought-out.
This is the first book in a long series which I am very interested in reading the rest of. It's still it's own complete story with its own focus and a satisfying resolution to that mini-problem so even if you don't think you want to get into a whole long series I still highly recommend checking out this book!
A couple of other reviewers mentioned that this was not a character driven book or that it lacked good characterization somehow. I don't agree. I think, especially with Catie, that there were emotional stakes and character moments in the book. It doesn't focus on emotions, really, doesn't show us the characters' inner thoughts. It's not that kind of book. And I don't think it has to be. If I was writing an action scene or a book like this I would certainly focus more on the emotion, because that's the kind of style and focus that I'm interested in exploring, but I certainly don't think every book has to do that. The author sets out to tell a certain story and show us the events and strategies involved and he does so successfully in his own style.
I highly recommend this book. I'm giving it a 4 - maybe more of a 4.5 star - rating for now, but I suspect that once I read the rest of the series this rating might go up to a solid 5. So go read it and enjoy!
The story went into a lot of detail on almost every step of their journey and at the beginning I found this good, but then eventually there were a few very lengthy and drawn-out situations like a very long chapter about a few paintball games and a few lengthy battles which I personally didn't need to see so much detail on! However, someone who's more a fan of action movies/books and thrillers and millitary-type stuff will probably really appreciate them. And even though those battles dragged a bit for me personally I still found them very well-written and the strategy in them well-thought-out.
This is the first book in a long series which I am very interested in reading the rest of. It's still it's own complete story with its own focus and a satisfying resolution to that mini-problem so even if you don't think you want to get into a whole long series I still highly recommend checking out this book!
A couple of other reviewers mentioned that this was not a character driven book or that it lacked good characterization somehow. I don't agree. I think, especially with Catie, that there were emotional stakes and character moments in the book. It doesn't focus on emotions, really, doesn't show us the characters' inner thoughts. It's not that kind of book. And I don't think it has to be. If I was writing an action scene or a book like this I would certainly focus more on the emotion, because that's the kind of style and focus that I'm interested in exploring, but I certainly don't think every book has to do that. The author sets out to tell a certain story and show us the events and strategies involved and he does so successfully in his own style.
I highly recommend this book. I'm giving it a 4 - maybe more of a 4.5 star - rating for now, but I suspect that once I read the rest of the series this rating might go up to a solid 5. So go read it and enjoy!