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A review by qalminator
Shrouded Loyalties by Reese Hogan
2.0
See below for some in-progress thoughts. Overall? Good ideas, good plotting, but lousy writing, and every character behaves like a teenager. Basically, this is ready for beta-readers and a serious round of editing, not publication. And I would really, really hope that one of the beta-readers has armed forces experience, because career soldiers, particularly ones in positions of command, do NOT behave the way Blackwood and the Luft-colonel do (guessing at spelling, as I listened on audio). So, yeah. As much as I'd like to know what happens next, I'm not being paid as a beta-reader to go through minimally edited prose to pick out the good bits.
If I see that his has a re-edited version at some point, I may give it another look. Until then, I'm out. Yikes. On the plus side, the audibook narrator is quite good.
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I'm about three hours in, still planning to finish, but I had to blow off some steam about this one.
(1) Said Bookisms (tv tropes warning), repeatedly, to the point that I'm laughing at them.
(2) Cartoon caricature of an antagonist (possibly the eventual villain? Unclear at this point) who slaps one of his spies for daring to look at his wife (who, it must be said, was in a military briefing room despite not being military, so, yeah, anyone would look at her in surprise under the circumstances), and has a reputation for murdering his wives, and who nearly throttles said spy for no good reason. See You Have Failed Me (tv tropes warning).
(3) For a military outfit, Blackwood's submarine crew sure acts like a bunch of hotheaded high-schoolers. Possibly believable for the rawest recruits, but not for someone in service for 2 years. No wonder they're losing the war... See Mildly Military (tv tropes warning)
I'm mostly continuing to read because the shrouding idea is fascinating and has Lovecraftian overtones, but, yeah.
With 3 hours left, a few more things to kvetch about:
(4) Blackwood's utter refusal to actually listen to her brother. Fine, there are religious issues, but she's not even pretending to humor him in order to get information.
(5) The "there was a flashing light like a signal mirror in the hills in [location]! It must be the people we're looking for! One of them has a metal tin that could make such a signal!" bit. Um. Really? This leap of illogic isn't even necessary. What would have made sense is: "We investigated a possible signal light in [location], and found the people you were looking for."
(6) Constantly telling, not showing. Character X "felt pain" "felt fear"; "fear increased"; "pain increased". A little bit of that is fine, but indicating bodily cues would be better for most of it.
Still planning to finish, but the ending is going to have to wow me to convince me to buy a sequel, if one exists.
And, finished. Thank the gods. There were parts of the ending with enough promise that I'm interested in the sequel, but then it went all smarmy nonsensical revelation and ruined it.
If I see that his has a re-edited version at some point, I may give it another look. Until then, I'm out. Yikes. On the plus side, the audibook narrator is quite good.
___________________________________________________________
I'm about three hours in, still planning to finish, but I had to blow off some steam about this one.
(1) Said Bookisms (tv tropes warning), repeatedly, to the point that I'm laughing at them.
(2) Cartoon caricature of an antagonist (possibly the eventual villain? Unclear at this point) who slaps one of his spies for daring to look at his wife (who, it must be said, was in a military briefing room despite not being military, so, yeah, anyone would look at her in surprise under the circumstances), and has a reputation for murdering his wives, and who nearly throttles said spy for no good reason. See You Have Failed Me (tv tropes warning).
(3) For a military outfit, Blackwood's submarine crew sure acts like a bunch of hotheaded high-schoolers. Possibly believable for the rawest recruits, but not for someone in service for 2 years. No wonder they're losing the war... See Mildly Military (tv tropes warning)
I'm mostly continuing to read because the shrouding idea is fascinating and has Lovecraftian overtones, but, yeah.
With 3 hours left, a few more things to kvetch about:
(4) Blackwood's utter refusal to actually listen to her brother. Fine, there are religious issues, but she's not even pretending to humor him in order to get information.
(5) The "there was a flashing light like a signal mirror in the hills in [location]! It must be the people we're looking for! One of them has a metal tin that could make such a signal!" bit. Um. Really? This leap of illogic isn't even necessary. What would have made sense is: "We investigated a possible signal light in [location], and found the people you were looking for."
(6) Constantly telling, not showing. Character X "felt pain" "felt fear"; "fear increased"; "pain increased". A little bit of that is fine, but indicating bodily cues would be better for most of it.
Still planning to finish, but the ending is going to have to wow me to convince me to buy a sequel, if one exists.
And, finished. Thank the gods. There were parts of the ending with enough promise that I'm interested in the sequel, but then it went all smarmy nonsensical revelation and ruined it.