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A review by reanne
The King of Plagues by Jonathan Maberry
2.0
I have mixed feelings about this series. I keep thinking I'll stop listening, and then the books have just enough going for them to keep me going. After a disappointing book 2, I listened to this one because I saw that Toys was back, and I found him to be a really interesting character. His parts of the book did not disappoint. I also thought that the new character Circe was somewhat interesting, and I'm curious to see where her storyline goes.
I wish there was more character development with the characters we already knew. We got a bit more with Church in this one, and that was nice. But there isn't really any development going on with Rudy or Hu or Bunny or Top... They're just kind of there, doing the same thing they always do, and we're not even getting to know them any better than we did in the first book. Even Joe doesn't really seem to be really developing as a character. He goes through traumatic things, but he pretty much remains the same. I don't know; I just don't feel very drawn to the characters. I think it's because they read kind of flat to me. With the occasional exception, we're not really learning more about them or getting new insight into them or seeing them change and develop. Meh.
Like others have said, this book has a crazy amount of name-dropping. It got annoying. It was so much, it was actually kind of sad. There's a major character that's described as looking exactly like Whoopi Goldberg (as if Maberry desperately hopes she'll play her in the show). Joe has tea with Bono. And there's an endless string of name-dropping of authors, musicians, actors, and such. Not to mention the more significant characters who aren't named but bear very striking resemblance to real-life people (like the Saudi "king" and the president who's a democrat and came after Bush and has two daughters). I always find it a bit icky when authors put real people in their stories, particularly recent or still-living people. I know it's a normal thing that has been done in fiction for centuries or more, but it still rubs me wrong. Just seems creepy, like the author's putting words in their mouths and making them into people they're demonstrably not. It's the same creepy feeling I get from real-person fanfic (which this basically is).
I also don't care for the political elements of these books; that is, when the author's political views seem to be invading the story. And I don't particularly like how the characters had kind of a desperate need to explain the Biblical plagues of Egypt as natural occurrences. Like, if you believe the Bible enough to believe the plagues happened, what's wrong with also believing that God caused them, as the Bible says? Seems like a weird place to draw the skeptic line.
So I'll probably keep going with this series a bit longer. I'd thought, with the zombies in the first one, that there'd be a lot more fantasy/horror elements than it turns out there are in the rest of the series, which is disappointing. But I'll give it a bit more and see how it goes.
Really, I think the main reason I'm still listening is the narrator. I just love Ray Porter as a narrator, and he does a great job with these books.
I wish there was more character development with the characters we already knew. We got a bit more with Church in this one, and that was nice. But there isn't really any development going on with Rudy or Hu or Bunny or Top... They're just kind of there, doing the same thing they always do, and we're not even getting to know them any better than we did in the first book. Even Joe doesn't really seem to be really developing as a character. He goes through traumatic things, but he pretty much remains the same. I don't know; I just don't feel very drawn to the characters. I think it's because they read kind of flat to me. With the occasional exception, we're not really learning more about them or getting new insight into them or seeing them change and develop. Meh.
Like others have said, this book has a crazy amount of name-dropping. It got annoying. It was so much, it was actually kind of sad. There's a major character that's described as looking exactly like Whoopi Goldberg (as if Maberry desperately hopes she'll play her in the show). Joe has tea with Bono. And there's an endless string of name-dropping of authors, musicians, actors, and such. Not to mention the more significant characters who aren't named but bear very striking resemblance to real-life people (like the Saudi "king" and the president who's a democrat and came after Bush and has two daughters). I always find it a bit icky when authors put real people in their stories, particularly recent or still-living people. I know it's a normal thing that has been done in fiction for centuries or more, but it still rubs me wrong. Just seems creepy, like the author's putting words in their mouths and making them into people they're demonstrably not. It's the same creepy feeling I get from real-person fanfic (which this basically is).
I also don't care for the political elements of these books; that is, when the author's political views seem to be invading the story. And I don't particularly like how the characters had kind of a desperate need to explain the Biblical plagues of Egypt as natural occurrences. Like, if you believe the Bible enough to believe the plagues happened, what's wrong with also believing that God caused them, as the Bible says? Seems like a weird place to draw the skeptic line.
So I'll probably keep going with this series a bit longer. I'd thought, with the zombies in the first one, that there'd be a lot more fantasy/horror elements than it turns out there are in the rest of the series, which is disappointing. But I'll give it a bit more and see how it goes.
Really, I think the main reason I'm still listening is the narrator. I just love Ray Porter as a narrator, and he does a great job with these books.