Elitist Book Reviews

I found A SHADE OF VAMPIRE thanks to Amazon recommendations, it had over 600 five-star ratings, and it was a mere $.99 for Kindle. I was kinda excited to find something new.

It was a trap.

Our main POV first-person narrators are Sofia and Derek. Sofia is our red-haired, green-eyed young woman vacationing with a friend's family when she's abducted on the night of her 17th birthday. Derek is the 500 year old vampire prince just woken from a four century slumber and given his own harem of beautiful human women, of whom Sofia is included.

If I could go deeper into plot and character, I would. If I could. A SHADE OF VAMPIRE is exactly what it sounds like: an unimaginative wish fulfillment fantasy with amateur prose and trite dialogue. The story is predictable simply because there isn't anything more to it than what I mentioned above.

So Derek and Sofia are thrown together and for some unknown reason they intrigue each other. No reason, really. Even though we do get a lot of sappy contrived interactions between them. Sofia doesn't seem afraid for her life, even if she does make a token escape attempt. She adjusts to her new role as slave pretty easily.

Derek doesn't seem like a vampire other than he craves blood and is strong, which makes the vampire culture really bland. Why is Derek a vampire prince? Because of some vaguely explained thing he did five hundred years ago. So who's been in charge for the 400 years he's been asleep? Why does Derek not seem to have an occupation although they talk about getting rid of those pesky hunters? And why are vampires holding so much stock in a prophecy? (Why do fantasy writers still use such contrived methods to create tension?) I don't know.

They spend the book at this vampire sanctuary Derek's family built while he was sleeping. It's some island (no idea where) with beautiful forests, and because of a witch it exists in perpetual night. How do the trees stay living after 400 years of perpetual night? Why would vampires feel the need to build penthouse apartments in redwood and sequoia trees? Why mention that there are no ladders/stairs to the penthouses but Sofia can get to the ground somehow? Why end it with a confusing cliffhanger? I don't know.

Why are there no answers to these questions? Because I don't think the author knows the answers to them, either. The prose is amateurish, the dialogue is expositional yet tells me nothing, the descriptions are ham-handed and lack originality. If anything, A SHADE OF VAMPIRE is a warning lesson to all you wannabe authors out there: please, no more novels like this to waste my time.

Recommended Age: Um, I suppose it's aimed at a teenage audience who are fans of TWILIGHT, but you don't want your kids rotting their brains by reading this drek
Language: None
Violence: So lame it's a comedy
Sex: Referenced

Find it here to provide warning material for members of your writing group:

A SHADE OF VAMPIRE

I'm not usually a proponent of breaking the rules, but very occasionally allow myself an indulgence. When I first picked this book up, I knew I was asking for trouble. My wife actually accused me of choosing it because I wanted something to pick to pieces, and that might have been slightly true. But only a little. It's more likely that I chose it because occasionally I'm just a glutton for punishment.

THE NIGHT CIRCUS is Erin Morgenstern's debut novel, and I actually felt kind of bad for a bit when I found that out after structuring this entire review. I really don't like knocking down newbies. Even ones that are getting a ludicrous number of places--including People and USA Today--to lavish her with laud, and praise, and honor.

The “story”, such as it is, surrounds a very particular kind of circus that is only open during nighttime hours and contains all sorts of fantastical tents and acts. Within this backdrop, two very old men with a high level of magical prowess each train a student to participate in a game of skill where there will only be one winner. This is complicated though, when the two students fall in love. However...

Describing this book with that summary (one that is very similar in content to the one used to promote the book) is almost as large a travesty as me deciding to list the book as being within the fantasy genre. Because although the concept of the game is probably the most prevalent of the few ideas in the book, very little time at all is actually spent on it.

Instead, the chapters revolve around two things: giving background information on the multitude of characters and waxing verbose through descriptive surroundings (including all of the circus tents). The students don't even know who each other are. Neither of them knows the rules. They just do their thing with regard to the circus and hope that they come out well for them. Finding any kind of actual plot line was incredibly difficult. I really had to laugh though, when I read one part of the Q&A on the NIGHT CIRCUS Amazon page:

Q. What was the most challenging aspect of developing this story?
A. It didn't have a plot for a very long time. (Read more...)

Yes, there's more to that quote (and feel free to follow the link and read the rest. It's about a third of the way down the page), but this portion not only contains the crux of the entire response, it succinctly wraps up my thoughts on the story as a whole: there was no plot. It was simply an idea. An idea that was avoided and disregarded and talked around. There was no point to the novel. No excitement. No anticipation. Instead, it was a very pretty, empty shell of a book that absolutely stymies the logical portions of my brain that say, “Honestly. How can anyone find this stuff good?”

Readers who like to read pages and pages of descriptions and character history (but mostly descriptions), dig in. You'll love this one. Those that like actual story, like us, will find this book a great waste of their time.

Recommended Age: 15+
Violence:  Someone dies after being stabbed
Profanity:  One F-word, just like the obligatory single offering in nearly every PG-13 movie of the 90's -- otherwise, I can't remember any at all
Sex:  One short scene with moderate detail

The Night Circus

I think Steve was giggling maniacally to himself as he added this book to my review stack. He probably took one look at the cover and assumed it would be bad. Go ahead, take a look at it again. You might make that assumption, as well. And would you be wrong?

OK, who am I kidding...yeah, Steve's unerring taste runs true, even without having read it. Unfortunately I did have to read it.

The title character is Angela, who was pulled from the Hudson River after a plane crash--with her and the baby she saves as the only survivors.  For her heroism she becomes known as the Angel of the Hudson. But she suffers from amnesia and only after the airline works through the manifest are they able to discover her name. An important question the doctors never ask her is when her amnesia began, and that answer is: before the plane wrecked. Yeah, it's important later on. Kind of.

Then she begins hearing things and she thinks she's going crazy. There are voices in her head, and they match the behavior and personalities of the people around her. No, wait, it's just the men. Why is it just the men? I don't know. No, wait again, it's all men, except one: Dante (get it? Angel...Dante?). Dante is the ambitious reporter for a 24-hour online news agency who happens to be in the right place at the right time when the plane goes down and involves himself in Angela's story.

At this point you should be wishing that the plane crashed and everyone died, end of story. Alas.

Morrow takes her sweet time unraveling Angela's mystery. Who she is. Where she gets her magic-like abilities--which are a strange and unexplainable assortment. Why she has these abilities. Why an ability works one time and not another. It never makes sense. And then and BAM in the last two pages there's an explanation for her abilities...but then they're twisted on their head mere paragraphs later. I really don't know how to explain this to you.

As for the plot--well, it moved forward. In a drunken, crazed sort of way, with Angela and Dante eventually teaming up to figure out what happened to her and why she can do the things she can. A problem will crop up, only to have it resolved by the end of the chapter. Characters come and go. It was impossible to tell where this story was headed. I mean, it's supposed to be a thriller, so I suspected something exciting to happen by the end.

They kind of "solve" the mystery. Convenient information appears and they use their convenient resources and new-found colleagues who conveniently believe them so they can help conveniently find what Angela and Dante need to know. There's some shooting and blood and stuff in the last chapter. Angela and Dante get together in the epilogue. But it was really hard to care from all the brain-squeezing I endured.

I know I'm not supposed to include spoilers, but you aren't going to read it anyway. So I'm telling you that we never find out who Angela is or where she comes from or why she even exists. Why was she was on the plane in the first place? WHY?!? I just don't know.

Thanks, Steve. I'll never get those hours back.

Recommended Age: Just...don't.
Language: A couple handfuls of unnecessarily harsh profanity.
Violence: Explosions, bloodied lips, kneed crotches--all for the sake of making it feel like a thriller.
Sex: Angela is one randy creature. The book drips with sex. And when I say dripping I mean like an annoying bathroom faucet when you're trying to sleep.

I'm not linking it. Don't you even think about it.

Okay, so there are times when this job gets difficult, and this is one of those times. Writing stories and then putting them out into the world for people to either love to pieces or gnash between their teeth is not easy. As a reviewer though, I feel like it's my responsibility to give an honest opinion. I always try to do that. That being said, I'm sure that Mrs. Cooper is a really nice person, but this book just wasn't very good at all.

SONGS OF THE EARTH is Elspeth Cooper's debut novel and the first in The Wild Hunt trilogy, recently picked up by Tor. Wandering around the internet, I've seen this book compared to the works of David Eddings, Terry Brooks, and Gail Martin, as well as to THE NAME OF THE WIND and even THE LIES OF LOCKE LAMORA in terms of impact and goodness. For me though, it felt like old-school David Eddings with a Harry Potter-esque story line but all taken down about twelve notches.

The story revolves mostly around one main character, but toward the end really flies off the handle with the number of characters that get screen time. There was no justification for this plethora of people however, and so I'll focus on the three that played the most prominent roles.

Young Gair has been a knight-in-training for several years, hiding his song-based magical powers from his superiors, but has just been found out and sentenced to death for his abilities. Alderan is a mysterious old guy that swoops in and saves the day for Gair, freeing him from his doom and hauling him off to a group of islands where magic users train in secret. Masen is a Gate Keeper and protector of sorts, living up in the mountains where the veil between his world and the next is located.

At the beginning of the book, Masen finds out that the veil is failing and that soon the next world will flood through and destroy them all. He spends the entire book (months and months) traveling by boat, and foot, and sometimes mule, to the islands of the magic users. Meanwhile, after his narrow escape from the Knights of the church, Gair lounges around at the island's mage school, doing not much of anything that advances what little obvious plot there is. It felt just like a Harry Potter book at times--only without any classes, and without any friends, and without any mention of He-who-must-not-be-named. There was a castle though, and Gair is an orphan that's fulfilling prophecy. So my analogy works.

World-building is minimal. Fore-shadowing is nearly non-existent--sketchy and vague at the best of times. The two ideas that did pull through were that Gair's magical powers are threatening to literally tear him apart and the bad guys are threatening to break through the veil and kill them all. The ending nearly drove me insane though. Sudden bouts of undirected inspiration with regard to magical control and bad guys that just walk away from what they want are not ways to win points in my book.

This novel as a whole felt like it had been pulled out of a time capsule from the 80's. The writing style, the concepts, the characters and streamlined story. Nearly everything was there. Well, everything but one thing, and that was a relative degree of chastity. About halfway through the book, a large number of fairly explicit masturbation and sex scenes popped up (for nearly every character in the book), and I have to admit as to being completely dumbfounded to find content like that in a story that was otherwise a shining example of the highly moralistic fantasy of yesteryear.

This book was painful to read. Clichéd, aimless, slow, and lacking any real merit. It's nothing even close to the “fantasy debut of the year” that it has been touted to be. We're elitists here. We tell it like it is. Don't go near this one. Odds are you'll regret it.

Recommended Age: 18+ for sexual content
Language: Very mild
Violence: Very little
Sex: Strong and detailed scenes

Elspeth Cooper's Website

There are times when, as a reviewer, you pick up a book, get about twenty pages into it, and then say, “There’s no way I’m going to finish reading this.” This happened to my illustrious boss, Steve, when he started reading this book. So, he stopped reading it, and then pawned it off on me. [grumble, grumble] You still have to love the guy, though.

THE FALLEN BLADE is the first book of a trilogy written by Jon Courtenay Grimwood. I’d never read anything by this author before, and doubt I’ll be voluntarily going to back for another round anywhere in the near future. The story revolves mostly around a youngish boy, Tycho, that has been turned into one of The Fallen (read: Vampire) by jumping into a magical fire (read: Time Travel Portal), and ultimately gets trained as an assassini (read: assassin) by a master of such, while living in Renaissance-age Venice. Vampire assassins flying around Venice, you say? What could be bad about that? I know. The premise doesn’t sound that terrible at all. In fact, it sounds like it could be quite good. Honestly, it’s a shame how it all turned out.

Five pages in, I knew I was in trouble, and essentially nothing changed from that point until the end of the book. Thankfully, all of my issues can be boiled down to a couple, very distinct concepts.

First: Clarity

No, not the drug that Tom Cruise huffs in Minority Report. I’m talking the kind that lets you see through a glass of drinking water. The kind that lets you enjoy the beautiful blue sky soaring high above you. The kind that lets you understand, as a reader, what is going on in a story when you read the words printed across the pages of the book. There’s none of it here. And I mean none.

Right from the get-go I had no idea what was going on. There's a kid hanging from a wall where people can see him, but no one will help. He's praying, but not even the Gods deign to listen to him. Then it’s four months prior, and there are some new characters coming in, but I’m not sure which ones I’m supposed to think are important because the PoV keeps jumping around all over the place. There’s a complete lack of detail and context that makes me want to tear my eyeballs out every time I come back for more. There’s no sense of place, or history, or meaning, or anything that grabs at my interest. The prose almost feels more like slipstream, the way it jumps from one topic to the next; from one character to the next; from one place to the next. Literally every character in a given scene not only comes across as cardboard, but each of them gets the opportunity to finish the sentences of the other characters. Nowhere to be found, though, is any kind of explanation or attempt to help the reader understand what any of it means. This makes the dialogue feel more like it's full of repetitive interruption, completely destroying any ability to understand what is going on in a scene or why it matters.

Second: Suspension of disbelief

There was a whole lot that happened that just didn't make sense, thus pulling me away from the experience and leaving me confused. This issue was very intimately tied into the lack of clarity. Events take place that don't make sense, and seem to just be there to allow the plot to move along. There's also a decided lack of detail when it comes to the city itself and women. The only piece of this alternate-Venice that stood out was the large timbers that have been driven into the ground to line the canals. Then there's the fact that 95% of all the description we get about any of the women that play parts in the story are described solely by the shape and size of their thighs and breasts. The pieces that make up an engaging world and a fascinating read were just lacking in the extreme.

Now granted, the entire book wasn’t horrible. Occasionally, there were a few pages that would string together something interesting or understandable and I’d start to think that maybe the book would turn a corner. Then it’d drop right back into the mess and start floundering again. I literally had no idea what was going on, why any of it mattered, or where the story was even going until I had made it clear to the end of the book. Once there, I stepped back and looked at all the pieces that had been laid out—the named characters, the connections, the city, the political intrigue, the betrayals, the supernatural elements—and said, “Wow, this really could have been a great novel.” And it could have. It really could have. But it wasn’t. Actually, I'd rather have read TWILIGHT again, than this one. Wading through these pages was like trying to find a marshmallow at the bottom of a swamp: literally impossible and what’s the point if you can’t eat the marshmallow afterward anyhow?

Honestly, I’m completely in awe that this novel ever saw the light of day. Then again, I don’t know what I would have done if I’d told someone to go write a book that had this really amazing-sounding premise and then they came back with this. “Gaping fish” is the only visual I can seem to bring up. I’d be interested in any other suggestions.

A book to avoid like the black plague, which missed being included in this tale by about 50 years.

Recommended age: 16+, though why you'd want to torture them with this, I don't know
Language: Infrequent, but strong
Violence: Werewolves, assassins, a vampire—there's some
Sex: Some scenes of sensuality

Jon Courtenay Grimwood's Website

I read about this book awhile ago. It was a story about a time machine repairman, who owns a non-existent dog. It also happens that his mom is stuck in a one-hour time loop, living the same Sunday dinner over and over and over. Also the protagonist's (who just happens to be named Charles Yu just like the author) dad may have invented time travel. Oh, and Charles also killed his future self, so he's wondering when his present will catch up to the past, where he gets shot. I read that premise and thought, wow, that sounds like a book full of great fun ideas. It looked like a fun book. I need to read that.

Turns out the story, HOW TO SURVIVE SAFELY IN A SCIENCE FICTIONAL UNIVERSE(long title, I know), is really about none of those things. It was a more intimate personal story about the repairman, Charles, and his relationship with his father. I'd be OK with that too, if it worked. But it didn't. I read through the whole thing waiting for it to take off, waiting for something, anything to happen. Maybe the fun Science Fiction stuff would start happening and all kinds of wacky adventures would follow. Nope. Maybe the characters will leap off the page and I'll grow to love them and cry at the end when they reunite, or die or save the world or whatever (I'm not gonna give away the ending to you guys. There's a special punishment in the afterlife for people who give away endings). Wrong again. Instead the book was full of great promise that never reached maturity.

The book was a conundrum by all accounts. It's a short book, clocking in at a little under 250 pages, yet the author goes on as if he's writing a 1000 page door-stopper. There were paragraphs that were literally two whole pages long and seemed to repeat the same thing over and over and over again. And then it would repeat what it had said. And then it would say the same thing that it just said again. And then it would say something and it turns out you already knew what the author was saying. You see what I'm doing here, repeating myself? Now you know what HOW TO SURVIVE SAFELY IN A SCIENCE FICTIONAL UNIVERSE. Except you don't.

The other half of the book reads like stereo instructions. It was confusing to the point of total obscurity. Even with basics like how time travel works. There are plenty of books that at least give you an idea of how their theory of time travel works (for example, can you meet yourself and change your past, and if not, then why? Things like that). I'm really OK with a lot of SF mumbo jumbo to explain the quantum entanglement whatever you call it, but normally I also get a good explanation of what is happening. This book never did that. I don't know if the book was even supposed to make sense or if there were a bunch of science words in there instead of "and then something sciencey happened to make it all work". Actually come to think of it, I would have preferred that.

There were some moments of joy to be had in the book, no doubt about it. There are quite a few Star Wars and Star Trek references throughout to make me giggle. At one point the protagonist mentions a friend of his working on the Death Star and how nice the cafeteria is. Good stuff, right? Sadly those moments are few and far between. I was hoping for whimsy, something witty and clever. Instead the book was a dud. I didn't care as much as I wanted, I didn't laugh as often as I should have, and I was lost a whole lot more that was necessary.

Bummer, cause the premise sounded really cool.

Recommended Age: Not sure, cause I didn't get most of it, so uh, older than me?
Language: None that I can remember.
Violence: Dude shoots himself, but other than that nothing.
Sex: Minor innuendo.

Bob Fingerman's PARIAH has been sitting on our to-review list for a while now. We were just so thoroughly bummed out by it that after finishing it we were just too depressed to get any momentum going on a review.

Let's get the introduction out of the way. PARIAH is a zombie book. Another one. Now that alone should tell you that there were conflicting opinions on the book. Steve loves zombies and Nick thinks they have been played out. However the book didn't really satisfy either of us.

PARIAH, initially, had a lot going for it. After the initial, obligatory, "outbreak" scene we are treated to more of an examination of humanity in the worst of conditions than an actual zombie book. In fact there were really only two good "zombie" scenes in its entirety. While we know that zombie stories are only told so that we can examine the enemy in ourselves, and quit spending so much energy hating and fearing the enemy without, there still needs to be some Horror aspect. So it didn't fulfill the desire for a good Horror book for Steve. Not only that, but the examination of humanity wasn't very deep or thought provoking so it didn't fulfill that aspect for Nick. The book was more about starvation, masturbation, sex, boredom, and porn than anything else.

Oh yeah, don't forget the copious amounts of vulgarity.

One thing the book DID succeed with, was being just chock-full of twisted humor. But when this is the best thing we can say about a book you know it's got to be one you steer clear of. It also did an extremely good job of painting a very bleak picture for what a zombie apocalypse could be like. It wasn't a popcorn zombie bashing novel where resources are abundant. PARIAH's world would be a very frightening one.

An extremely common thread that ties zombie stories together is a very close examination of human nature and social issues. PARIAH makes it seem like it Bob was intending to do just that, but lost himself and the plot in the midst of all the depravity. It could be THAT is actually the idea he wanted to explore, but it never came through.

We spend a lot of time with these characters and, so, get to know them very well. This is another strength of PARIAH. These characters aren't the type you forget when you close the book. They are all unique, very well characterized, and with the lack of (with a couple exceptions) cliches the characters are all pretty original. Put a tally mark, for this category, in the painfully lonely "Win" column for PARIAH.

Most of the book is an exploration of these characters doing...well...nothing. OK maybe not nothing. They starve. Look at porn. Have sex. Want to have sex. Think about having sex. Look out the window. Think about sex some more. Cry. Get naked. You get the idea. There is no plot. At a certain point of the book some random chick is seen meandering her way through the zombies, without being noticed. When she starts interacting with the characters...let's just say she doesn't bring much to the table. For us anyway. She brings lots of food to the table for the characters, which is nice. At least they have something to do now instead of whine of about food and sex. At least we can read about them eating now instead of lamenting about sex.

This random chick is called Mona, and gets zero character development, and only serves an impetus for the group to leave the confines of their safe haven. We get no explanations or anything.

PARIAH's story, for us, is one of boredom and disappointment. At no point was the book thought-provoking, as it should have been. At no point was it an examination of social issues, or the Horror genre. The book had no real depth, or plot. It was less of a zombie book (with only 2 real zombie scenes) and more of a plot-bereft study of as we said before "...well nothing".

Recommended Age: Honestly? None. OK, in the interest of being helpful...still none. OK fine. Adults...if anyone...
Language: As we said earlier. Copious Amounts. Enough to be distracting. Of course...it didn't distract from much as there wasn't much to be distracted from.
Violence: There are a couple zombie-style violent scenes and a couple other less graphic scenes. Not much here.
Sex: TONS. The characters are either being eaten by zombies, having sex, thinking about sex, wishing they could have sex, talking about sex, looking at porn and masturbating. Etc...

Is there a worse feeling than when you've just finished a novel, and the time you spent reading feels completely wasted? You sit back, your face becoming red with hatred for a book that just kept you from reading something else that was potentially awesome. You vilify the "novel" you hold in an ever tightening grip. This so-called novel is the cause of all your problems, and is the evil force reason for war, world hunger, American Idol, and your failing Fantasy Football team (The Aints).

Take a deep breath. Everything will be fine (except your Fantasy team).

THE FALL is Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan's follow-up to last year's, THE STRAIN. This story is about the ongoing vampire apocalypse (including a newly thrown-in almost-prophesy...*cough*lame*cough*), and the cover of THE FALL has a little blurb pimping it out as a "High-Tech Vampire Epic." This couldn't possibly be further from the truth, as last time we checked silver swords and mirrors weren't high-tech. Yeah. This is a terrible, terrible novel.

We'll start with what it does right...
...
...
...

OK, now that we are done with that, what is wrong with this novel? In short, everything. The first chapters consist of attempts to explain issues pretty much everyone had with the first novel, THE STRAIN. While it is nice to see that there are some real (if eye-roll-inducing) explanations behind many of the problems, they should have been included in book 1. Beyond that, no other effort is made to explain anything else. Look, if you are going to set a precedent for scientifically explaining away vampire myths, then you better be able to do it to all of them. Additionally, this is one of the worst novels we have ever read in terms of PoV problems. The PoV will often switch mid-paragraph. Twice. Inexcusable.

THE FALL reads a lot like a novel based on a movie. Everything is bare-minimum. Details. Character. Plot. Setting. We couldn't picture the city at all. Telling us the city looks destroyed and smokey isn't enough. It was like our characters were floating in a blank white void. When THE FALL isn't reading like a bad novel, it reads like a bad TV script. One of the characters--an ex-lucha libre and Mexican Cinema star who goes as far as to wear the typical mask that all the stars wear--even says as much towards the end by comparing the current story to one of his ridiculous movies. We aren't making this up.

Let's talk about the characters for a bit. They are all awful. THIS is the group that is supposed to save humanity? We are so screwed. Hardened military types are getting killed in mere seconds, yet the old man, the pest control guy, and two CDC members are like Spartacus in the arena. Riiiiight. All the characters expertly use silver swords and knives (they are high-tech like that) to cut a path to...uh...something yet introduced. They are all now professional sword and knife fighters (who never freeze in the face of horror) against vampires that are at least twice as fast as they are. And twice as strong. Even the kid, Zack. He cleans house with his spontaneous knife skills. In the dark. That sound you hear is us banging our heads against the wall.

The first half of the novel essentially boils down to the main characters saying, "We need to get out of here, this city is falling apart." Instead they sit around doing absolutely nothing while they wait for a magical solution to appear. And it does. Suddenly there is a book for auction that has the history, name, weakness and origin of the Master Vampire. How convenient. But it will have an enormous price associated with it! How will our heroes afford this 30+ million-dollar book? Coincidence and convenience come into play to save the day.

Eph, the main PoV, is terribly written. He says he (and everyone) needs to fight, and how this isn't about him, it's about everyone else. Yet his actions prove the direct opposite. This IS all about him. His sections can be summarized by him saying, "I hate everything. I'm going to save the world." Look, if a character is written in a way that makes the reader want to skip over his entire PoV, its a bad character. Don't tell us the "Oh, the author(s) made you FEEL, so it was done perfectly. You're just ignorant." If it looks like crap, and smells like crap, do we really need to do a taste-test to make sure?

Interspersed between sparse sections of story are flashbacks to Setrakian's days as a spry vampire hunter. They essentially repeat themselves and the ones from the prior novel. We get it, he hates vampires for all the harm they have done him. We also get blog entries (seriously) from the Fet, the pest control guy. It's all pointless filler. The novel barely clocks-in at 300 pages, 100 of which could have been cut for their pointlessness.

The writing just doesn't lend any sense of believability to these characters. For example, the gang aspect with Gus is just stupid. Man, if all gangs were completely brain-dead like the ones in this novel, the USA would have been cleaned up a long time ago. Again, THESE are the people we are relying on?

However, it was the ending itself that really ruined this novel for us. You know things are bad when you want to throw the book away, unfinished, only 30 pages from the end. We have considerable willpower--remember, we read Terry Goodkind--but THE FALL nearly killed us. It had an ending full of cliché, coincidence, predictability and soap-opera dialogue/scenarios.

If you want a good monster novel, read Larry Correia's MONSTER HUNTER INTERNATIONAL. His monsters are scarier, his science better (we know right?), his fighting more realistic, and his characters act in believable ways.

THE STRAIN and THE FALL set themselves on a pedestal as a new evolution in the vampire mythology, yet there is nothing new here. These are not the droids you are looking for, move along.

Recommended Age: Give this to teenagers as punishment. They'll never disobey you again.
Language: Swearing for the sake of swearing. Swearing without any real force behind the words.
Violence: Poorly described when the characters actually get off their butts and quit whining.
Sex: Alluded to.

What a piece of garbage.

Sorry, usually we begin with a thought provoking introduction that has you pondering the world around you in a completely different light. Jeff Lindsay's latest novel, DEXTER IS DELICIOUS, is just awful. It really is as simple as that. Seriously, is there even any sense to this series of novels anymore? Rhetorical question. No.

Just so you understand how we feel about this series of novels, here are a couple Dexter-isms:

Dexter the Decidedly Dreadful
Dull-as-Dishwater Dexter

Yeah. That about sums up the whole novel. Oh, and we didn't make those up. That's how Dexter is described in the first chapter of the novel. No, we aren't joking in the least. This Dexter novel is not Delicious as the title would have the reader believe, it is effing boring and pointless.

Jeff Lindsay's creation, Dexter Morgan, begins this novel by becoming a father. He suddenly has feelings, and has decided to no longer give in to the murderous urgings of his Dark Passenger. Yeah, Dexter no longer wants to be the killer we root for. Well, I suppose we haven't really cheered him on since part way through book 2, but still, you get the point. The issue with all of this is that you know Dexter is going to break his new resolution. You don't buy his new persona, because it isn't believable in the context of the story. You know that Dexter, predictably, is going to somehow rationalize his killing as protecting his new child. From cannibals! Get it? Delicious? Cannibals? Yeah, lame. Just like the whole novel.

Keep an eye out for that word "predictable" later on in this review. It becomes a theme.

Lindsay has a major problem with this series. The main one is that this series is now just a shallow parody of its early incarnations. Books 1 and 2 are where the magic happened. After that, Lindsay has been lost with what direction he wants to take. He tried supernatural, shock-value, and now parenting. And you know what makes these novels--especially this last one--worse? The brilliance of the TV series. You know how movies end up having a novel released that says "Based on the Motion Picture"? They are typically terrible. That is how this series of novels feels. It's like poor fan-fiction.

Lets get back to the predictability of this novel. Every freaking moment of the novel is telegraphed. From the obvious “Oh no, I’ve been trapped” moment, to the WHOLE FREAKING ENDING AND RESOLUTION, it is spelled out the whole time. This isn’t foreshadowing. It’s poor writing. Dexter's brother, Brian, shows up pretty early on in the novel. Gee, do you think he is going to play a major part in the investigations taking place in the novel? Literally our first thought when Brian showed up was, "Oh, so he will probably save the day after Dexter acts like a complete amateur." Yeah. Predictable.

Another thing that bothered us was the portrayal of the cops. We've been around law enforcement nearly our whole lives. Steve's dad is a high-ranking officer. So, when Lindsay makes every cop he writes stupid, we just can’s suspend our disbelief any more. Really? These people can actually catch killers? They don’t even know their own police procedures for Pete’s sake. Pro tip: if you have to rely on your main characters and supporting cast being completely idiotic to move your plot, you're doing it wrong. Along with ALL of the Brian moments, this all just screams laziness.

Our personal favorite was when Jeff Lindsay pokes fun at CSI: Miami by having Dexter imitate the main, pathetic character from that how. The thing is, by Lindsay putting that thought in our heads, all we could think was, "Man, this is like on of the REALLY bad episodes of that show."

The characters in DEXTER IS DELICIOUS are all idiots, and/or completely useless to the story. For example, why is Doakes still even around? He isn’t funny. He just takes up a couple thousand words of story for no reason. Rita? Yeah, the TV series did this right by getting rid of her. In the series we have to be subjected to her idiocy. Deb? Speaking of Deb, this novel is actually about her as Dexter watches her piss-poor detective skills. Even when she isn't "on screen" Dexter ponders her existence, and the way she wants a family. Blah. Blah. Blah. Go kill someone, already, we are bored.

Issue #9-bajillion: everyone knows Dexter's secret. The more people that know, the less interesting his dilemma becomes. It's like any costumed super hero. The fewer people that know the true identity, the more potential internal conflict we have.

Problem #86-bajillion & 2: Lindsay we get it, traffic in Miami is bad. But do you have to make a big deal about it in EVERY EFFING CHAPTER? How about you write an actual story that makes sense rather than telling us the traffic patterns of Miami?

There really isn’t any way for Lindsay to fix this series. He has made so many mistakes in these novels--particularly these last three, and specifically DELICIOUS--that there isn’t any redemption possible for the characters in these novels. No effort is made in this latest novel to push the series in a believable direction. No effort is made to get into the motivations of the main "villains" of the novel. What happened to the Dexter who was brilliant, and who was extremely proficient in martial arts? All prior character traits and development has been abandoned to make the characters of the series easy to manipulate through their new and improved stupidity. DEXTER IS(n't) DELICIOUS isn't worth anyone's time or money.

Move on to a new creation, Jeff.

No, we won't be reading the next novel in this series. We will stick to the REAL and superior Dexter series on TV, and reading truly excellent novels by Dan Wells.

What a piece of crap. We felt like we were in Billy Madison. "Mr. [Lindsay], what you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things [we] have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. [We] award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul."

Recommended Age: We're sorry, but what part of "isn't worth anyone's time" wasn't understood?
Language: Yep. Swearing for the sake of swearing. This novel was written THAT well.
Violence: Oddly, considering the story was about canabalism, it was all fairly tame and boring (and predictable).
Sex: Yep, though not described. The one scene was so contrary to the unbelievable "progression" Dexter was making, that it almost made us throw the ARC we were reading away.

We are going to be honest here (stop laughing). We try to read a lot of Horror, but there is a lot of it that we miss. Mostly on purpose. We managed to mostly avoid John Saul, even though he seems to be one of the huge names in the Horror genre. Why did we avoid him? All his books, from the outside, look the same (this is foreshadowing of event to come late in this review). It’s just a picture of a house under a different color tone. John Saul’s latest novel, HOUSE OF RECKONING, follows this theme by using a house with a green tint. Creepy. Yes, that was sarcasm.

HOUSE OF RECKONING begins by showing two different teens in their respective broken-homes. Sarah Crane just lost her mother. Her father, Ed, has become a drunk, and while driving home from a bar he hits Sarah with his car, shattering her hip. Nick Dunnigan hears voices in his head and sees violent visions. Predictably, his father resents him for it. These two teens end up meeting in the town where Sarah is sent as a foster child when her father is put in prison. Sarah’s foster family, again predictably, treat her like a slave. Nick and Sarah and up befriending a teacher, Bettina Philips who has a mysterious past, and who everyone in town calls a witch. Sarah and Nick then discover they can do mysterious things…almost like magic.

It sounds like an OK setup on the surface. Here’s the problem. The only other John Saul book we have read is BLACK CREEK CROSSING. It is a book about two different kids who come from broken homes. They meet at school after the girl moves into town. They are picked on at school. Then they can mysteriously do things…like magic. Seriously? Let us repeat that. SERIOUSLY? It is nearly the same plot. Almost exactly. We both knew, within ten pages (TEN PAGES!) how the book was going to end. So, not only do his covers look the same, but his stories follow the same pattern? How terrible is that? Is Saul running out of ideas? This guy is supposed to be one of the main players in the Horror genre, but it seems to us that he only writes one story. Like a Harlequin Romance novel. Just change the names and location. No one will notice right?

Yeah. We are angry. Because, you know, we get paid to notice these things. OK, we don’t get paid. But we do notice this stuff.

It’s not that Saul is a poor writer. He isn’t. He is good at making the strange and paranormal very visual and accessible. And this story was fine when we read it in BLACK CREEK CROSSING. Second helpings are good with pizza, steak, and Mexican food (crap, now we are hungry…). Not novels. The other problem Saul has is his inability to make characters that are anything but completely good, or completely bad. This is extremely evident with nearly all of the characters in HOUSE OF RECKONING. Sarah’s foster family, while spouting religion, are completely bad. Nick’s (Nick in the story, not EBR’s Nick) dad is completely bad. Everyone at school is completely bad. It just gets old. Luckily, the novel is short. 3 hours, and it is a done deal.

Look, had we not already read BLACK CREEK CROSSING, this novel would have been OK. However, since we know HOUSE OF RECKONING is exactly-the-freaking-same as at least one other John Saul novel, we hate it. Pisses us off. A lot.

If you must read this novel, do it through your local library. Don’t pay money for it.

Recommended Age: 15 and up. The reality is that John Saul is almost writing YA novels. Maybe he should do that and leave the Horror genre to people who won’t repeat the same story over and over.
Language: Just a bit. Nothing major.
Violence: Some. Again, nothing major.
Sex: A few references. A borderline graphic flashback.

When talking to authors I know, I hear frequently of that moment when several seemingly unrelated ideas come together. They become a “perfect storm” of sorts, and often lead to an amazing novel.

Unfortunately, BREATHLESS, by Dean Koontz, doesn’t meld separate ideas into a perfect storm. The result is more like…a perfect train wreck.

Let me state, for the record, that I actually enjoy some the stories that Koontz writes. I can appreciate the transition he made into straight-forward thrillers that he has published recently (VELOCITY, THE GOOD GUY, THE HUSBAND). Personally, I enjoyed ODD THOMAS. Are they the best novels? No. Do they serve a purpose in my reading schedule? Definitely. Every now-and-again I need light reading. Dean Koontz usually can usually fill that role.

But BREATHLESS? Man. It was just bad.

Surely you can hear the built-in marketing campaign that comes with the title of the novel? The new Dean Koontz novel will leave you…BREATHLESS! How I wish that were true. Bored? Check. Bewildered (in the bad way)? Check. Disappointed? Double-check. Breathless? Not even close…unless you count the aftermath of my screaming in frustration at having to finish this book.

BREATHLESS starts out fine…good even. We are introduced to a few characters that are decent, and that are put in interesting situations. The main inciting event deals with Grady Adams, an ex-military type, and his dog, Merlin (it’s a Dean Koontz novel, of course the PoV has a dog), as they discover a pair of unexplainable animals in the field by their (Adams’ and his dog’s) home. I don’t want to go into it too much, because the mystery behind these animals is the driving force of the story--well, what little of it there is. We also are introduced to Camillia Rivers, a local veterinarian with a dark past (are there any other kind in a Koontz novel?), who also gets involved with these two mystery animals. For the mandatory Dean Koontz creepy character, we get Henry. His opening chapters were great. All of this stays entertaining for approximately 100 pages.

And then we meander. Endlessly.

The pasts of the characters, rather than actually adding to the story, are just there as filler. They don’t actually influence anything. Being paper-thin would be an improvement over what we get here. As we move along, we are introduced to more characters that serve no purpose in the story, and whose resolutions are solved with Deus Ex Machina. On character in particular, Tom Bigger, reminded me instantly of the characters I hated in Stephen King’s THE STAND. You know, the ones that wander endlessly. Doing nothing.

Kind of like the last two-thirds of this novel I am reviewing.

The realization I came to upon finishing the novel, is that this was just a conglomerate of unrelated novellas and short stories that are forced together through contrived, thin plot threads. Leftovers (and not in the good, Thanksgiving way). Henry’s story meets with that of Grady and Camilla for a whole paragraph. Tom’s never meets that of the main characters (his resolution is the Deus Ex). It was infuriating, to say the least.

The writing? It was your typical Dean Koontz. If you like his writing style, then you will like the writing style of BREATHLESS. The book itself will probably only be enjoyed by the most die-hard Koontz fans, and even then it’s no sure-thing.

BREATHLESS just isn’t good. The idea is marginally interesting. The characters are worse than paper-thin. The cohesion between plot-threads is absurd where it even exists at all. The ending is anti-climatic and rushed. This should have been a novel to grab new readers, but instead it will push them away.

The good news? I only paid $8 for the hardback due to the ridiculous Amazon vs. Walmart price war (huzzah!). And no, it still wasn’t worth it (booooooo!). Also, this isn’t typical of Dean Koontz. BREATHLESS is an aberration. I fully expect a new novel shortly that will get him back on-track. At least I hope this will be the case. I need my simple novels after reading guys like the awesome Erikson.

That said, don’t read BREATHLESS. It just isn’t worth it. Be grateful I read it for you.

Content: I've simplified it for you this time. There’s nothing here that would offend a reader…well, except for the book itself…

There are beliefs, of sorts, in the writing business. A good author can take the most cliché, horrible idea, and make it work. A bad author, however, could have the most amazing idea, and make it seem second-rate drivel. SANDMAN SLIM, by Richard Kadrey, takes a little of both of those. Poorly written, clichéd drivel. Awesome huh? (Yes, that was sarcasm.)

There is a blatant attempt in this novel to have a Harry Dresden-style character be super dark and gritty. The main PoV, James Stark (a magician, of course), was sent to Hell by his "friends." He fought demons "Downtown," (as the character calls it) Gladiator style for eleven years, and then managed to escape. This is where the book picks up--Stark waking up in a graveyard in L.A. after escaping Hell. Stark wants revenge on the people that sent him down to Hell. Oh, and there is a war between Heaven and Hell that Stark is in the middle of (GASP!). Were there enough clichéd archetypes and motifs in that paragraph for you? That's just scratching the surface. Oh, and the title? It comes in randomly a little over half-way through the book.

Look, the whole going (or being sent) to Hell thing has been done. A lot. Even T.V. shows have done it. A lot. This isn't to say you can't do the "going to Hell and back" thing...well actually that is exactly what we are saying. Give it a decade of rest. If you absolutely MUST do it, at least write it well enough to make us not want to gouge out our eyes.

Back to our PoV. It's OK to want to have an anti-hero character. It's OK to make him gritty and dark. It isn't OK to accomplish this by having the First-Person narrative tell you "Hey, I'm dark and gritty." He needs to SHOW us through his actions and thoughts who he is and what makes him different. And no, swearing a ton doesn't make the PoV dark and gritty, it just shows a limited vocabulary. (Except in Nick's case, because we all know he is brilliant.) As readers, we were often subjected to long metaphoric monologues and commentaries on society, followed by Stark saying, "But I don't give a ****." If he doesn't care about anything, why should we the readers give a crap about him or his revenge story? Not only that, but half the time the metaphoric language and word choices don't mean a freaking thing. It is nonsensical garbage strung together to sound intelligent to the uneducated.

There are quite a few areas, like the poor wording above, that show Kadrey didn't research much. It may seem like a quibble, but at one point Stark spots an Escalade from a distance and says something akin to, "And I decided I wanted to steal that Escalade right there." One problem. Stark was in Hell when Escalades began to be manufactured. He wouldn't know what it is from a distance. Not only that, but he alternates between calling it an SUV and a van. "SUV" has been a common term since the early 90's, so he would know the difference. It's little things like this that can really pull a reader out of the story. Either Kadrey doesn't know the difference (doubtful), or he initially wanted to have the character steal a van, and never changed it. Bad editing...though to be fair, the editor probably was busy stabbing his/her own eyes out.

Humor is a difficult element to pull off in literature. Authors like Charlaine Harris, Jim Butcher, and Terry Pratchett get it right. Kadrey misses completely. We know what you are thinking, humor can be very subjective. It's true. If you think saying "F-you" is a hysterical comeback for all situations, then you will be rolling on the ground laughing. We, however, didn't think it was particularly funny or clever the first time, much less the hundredth. Once again, the main problem here is a show vs. tell. Show us funny stuff, don't have the main PoV tell us, "Look at me, I'm funny!"

Dialogue is terrible in SANDMAN SLIM. Steve listened to the book on audio, and it was worse than listening to Megan Fox say, "I'll drive. You shoot" in the first Transformers movie. MUCH. WORSE. Nick read a physical copy, and it was just as bad sounding in his head (at least that's what his voices told him...). If you, as an author, make one of your characters say, "I think I've been waiting for you all my life," then you need to rethink your approach your dialogue creation process. Yes, that line is in SANDMAN SLIM. It's like Michael Bay writing a novel...

Unnecessary info? We got that too! The author wastes the reader's time by explaining that vampires like to kill people and drink their blood (shocker!), and that without blood they will DIE! (OH NOES!) We know what vampires are, thank you. Don't act like you are original for including them in an Urban Fantasy story (There is one line where Stark tells the readers, "Yes, there are vampires. Try to keep up." Thanks for clarifying that, chief. Have you read any Urban Fantasy in the past decade?). And don't treat readers like they are 2-year old kids in need of explanation filler.

And that's not all. After the climax of the novel, it just keeps going. It was a little reminiscent of the end of The Return of the King movie (only much, much, much, much worse) where you just kept having more and more tacked on. Kadrey wanted to make sure we all knew there would be a sequel. Essentially, the author has his main PoV tell the reader "This book is better than ALL other Urban Fantasy because I SAY SO. And I will write SEQUELS that are already the BEST EVER!" Instead, the reality is this novel won't even be worth the paperback price when it comes out, and certainly isn't worth the current $23 hardback price-tag. And no, we won't be reading the inevitable sequels. We are confidant that the writing in them will suck (in a non-vampire way) just as bad as SANDMAN SLIM.

If you want a grimmer version of the Dresden series, go read Mike Carey's Felix Castor novels, the first of which we reviewed here. If you want a gritty revenge story DONE RIGHT, read Abercrombie's BEST SERVED COLD. Avoid SANDMAN SLIM. Like. The. Plague. (To be fair to plagues everywhere, SANDMAN SLIM is worse than any plague.)

On last thing. Kadrey sets out to be irreverent towards everything religious. Angels and Demons are idiots, God is a screw-up, and Satan is inept. Aside from it being boring as Hell (lulz), there is a chance people may get offended by the made-up creation story Kadrey puts in. We found the whole religion aspect to be be very heavy-handed and forced, but others may very well be offended.

Recommended Age: If you absolutely MUST read this (into self-torture are we?), then be 18 years-old.
Language: Tons and tons. It really adds nothing of value to the story.
Violence: Yeah, but the word choices in action sequences make it all sound stupid.
Sex: Lots of innuendo and references, but no actual scenes.

Have you ever had that burning sensation in your chest? No, not heart-burn. More deadly (if possible) than that. We mean the feeling when you are reading a novel, watching a movie, or playing a video game and you get SO impatient for it to move along. You start clenching your jaw. You crack your knuckles again, even though you just cracked them two minutes earlier. And the feeling that is the perfect mix of annoyance and impatience burns in you. That's what reading THE LOST SYMBOL is like. It is excruciating. Yes. Excruciating...that is the word of choice to explain Dan Brown's latest "novel." (Dear Dan Brown: Thank you for kindly putting the words, "A Novel" on the front cover of your book. Without them, we would have mistaken this book for a slush-pile reject.)

What a terrible, terrible book.

Six years ago, Dan Brown caused all sorts of controversy with his novel THE DA VINCI CODE. It sold a bajillion copies, and forced the whole "Religious Conspiracy" sub-genre into focus. It was also a really poorly written novel. We have read all of Dan Brown's work. From DIGITAL FORTRESS to the newly printed THE LOST SYMBOL, Dan Brown manages to do one thing with remarkable consistency:

Become a worse writer with each novel.

Don't worry, this novel is totally different from the prior two Langdon novels. See, Langdon goes to a famous national building, and receives a cryptic phone call about how he needs to solve a mystery that only LANGDON can solve! He then discovers a bloody clue in the middle of the building. Following a train of interweaving clues about the Freemasons, Langdon is joined by his lovely companion Kathleen as they chase--or are they chased by?--the eeeeeevil Mal'akh. What they discover will change EVERYTHING! Nothing is as it seems...

Oh wait. Everything is exactly as it seems, because this is the same plot at ANGELS & DEMONS and THE DA VINCI CODE. America: what is wrong with you?

Robert Langdon. He marveled us with his professorial skills in, what we consider the only enjoyable Langdon book, ANGELS & DEMONS. A lot has changed since that novel. In THE LOST SYMBOL, Langdon in his third "adventure" has managed to become dense and narrow-minded. He seems incapable of putting his famed intellect to use during the novel, and is relegated to responding to ANY question or situation with a bewildered, "What?!" Now before you ask, yes, the "?!" is actually used in the novel at least two or three times per chapter (there are 133 chapters...you do the math). If you have to use more than one punctuation type at the end of a sentence, the only thing you are showing the reader is that you have no real writing ability. Young writers take note.

Amidst the the endless repetitions of descriptions, we as readers are made to suffer and endless stream of telling instead of showing. The few times Brown manages to "show" us what is going on, he immediately precedes or follows it by telling us the exactly same thing. It became so infuriating, that by Chapter 9 we wanted to gouge our eyes out. To illustrate another example of formulaic writing that Brown has become famous for, here is his Dialogue Formula:

Person 1: "Have you heard of [insert topic here]?"
Person 2: "No, what is it?"
Person 1: "[insert poorly veiled information dump here]"
Person 2: "I don't understand."
Person 1: "[insert the exact same explanation for a second time]"
Person 2: "So what you are saying is [insert 3rd identical explanation]"
Person 1: "No, you aren't listening. What I said was [insert 4th explanation-100% identical to the previous 3 explanations]"
Person 2: "Ah, I see."
Person 1: "Good. Now have you heard of [insert topic here]?"
Repeat all steps for as many filler pages as needed.

How about pacing? Brown is known for his pacing isn't he? Two things here. First, his pacing is false. In order to create this false sense of "Break-neck speed," he ends each chapter on a cliff-hanger. We felt like there should have been a voice over saying "dun-dun-DUUUN", playing as you turned the last page of every chapter. (Hey if greeting cards can do it, so can Dan Brown. Their writing abilities are about the same.) Now, when Brown finally manages to build up some sort of pace, he ruins it with a flashback.

In a particularly boring flashback early on (like the first few chapters), Langdon is RUSHING to give a speech (he only has THREE MINUTES TO GET THERE!), and he lapses into a flashback. In addition to bringing the pace to a screeching halt, we see, in an academic setting, that Langdon is supposed to be INSANELY smart. SO MUCH BETTER THAN EVERYONE! His students believe and hang on every word, no matter how ridiculous. So, if he is so smart, why is he such an idiot later, and so slow on the uptake? why does he have to be told everything like he is a mentally deficient high-school student? The answer? Dan Brown's writing is so poor that this is the only way he knows how to express himself, and serve as a vehicle for information dumps. It is also humorous that a security guard makes the exact same observation of Langdon. Pro Tip: If the characters you are writing think your main PoV is stupid, so will the readers. This will undermine your work.

Logic flaws aside (if we stop to mention all of them, we would be transcribing the full novel), and forgetting the PoV switching problems, one of the main problems is the plethora of cliches. We have the super-secret division of the CIA, and she is a four-foot tall Asian woman with a superiority complex. And she is deformed. How about the damsel in distress that is the target of a hideously disfigured super-villain? Yep, THE LOST SYMBOL has that too. Even James Bond movies have finally moved beyond these cliches.

We would be remiss if we didn't talk about the villain of the novel. Never-mind that his big reveal at the end of the novel is telegraphed from the moment certain characters are introduced. We don't want to talk about that. We want to talk about this:

How To Build a Cliché Villain the Dan Brown Way
1) Fall for every trick that the dumb hero/heroine throws at you.
2) After being outwitted somehow, point menacingly at the hero/heroine.
3) If you can manage, be a religious fanatic of some sort.
4) Tell the hero/heroine all your secret plans and/or your secret past in a dramatic moment.
5) Think--at least 3 times early in the novel--that destiny is guiding you. Feel free to think this up until the moment you are killed due to your stupidity (see point #8 below)
6) Make the hero/heroine think that they killed you years ago. It makes your entrance much more dramatic...especially when combined with point #4 above.
7) When given the opportunity, study yourself naked in a body-length mirror.
8) Don't actually kill the hero/heroine when you have the chance. Leave them to be discovered so they can come kill you later. Be sure to act surprised later when the show up.
9) Have a super-secret lair within your home--preferably hidden by a secret door. However, the key element here is to leave obvious evidence for people to find so they can enter the lair and discover all your plans in case they didn't catch them in point #4 above.

No seriously, this all happens in THE LOST SYMBOL.

Don't worry citizens, Robert Langdon is here to save the day. Will he stun us with his intellect? Of course not. He WILL however use his experiences from prior novels to solve everything with the trusty anagram. And when that fails, blind luck will do, as will an epiphany--nothing will trigger the epiphany other than Brown deciding it is time to move the story along to the next idiotic conversation (see above formula).

Are you getting the drift here? Dan Brown's THE LOST SYMBOL should never have been printed. The writing skill is sub-6th Grade level, and his story is contrived and cliché. An interesting observation: When you talk to most people who have read Brown's Robert Langdon novels, the almost always like the first one they read most. Why? Because it is the same plot over and over again. It is like the mystery version of a Harlequin Romance Novel. So, it shouldn't be any surprise that this third novel is even worse. IT'S THE SAME NOVEL...AGAIN! Of course, when you stop to think about what the "Big Problem" was that everyone in the novel was trying to prevent, you realize just how terrible the "novel" is. So. Absurd.

Don't read this book. Ever. Wait for the inevitable movie. It has NO CHOICE but to be better than the novel. If you really want to know about all the Freemason stuff, go get a non-fiction book or two about them. They will be better paced, and more entertaining than THE LOST SYMBOL.

Recommended Age: None. Remember, we don't recommend this book to ANYONE. Except maybe criminals. It may kill them or induce a coma that will save the tax-payers some dinero.
Language: Here and there. Nothing terrible.
Violence: Oh please. Just us beating our heads against a wall.
Sex: Nope.

P.S. You may have noticed the lack of links in this review. Simply put, we refuse to direct you in any way to a place where you might buy a novel that Dan Brown has written. The End.

"The world breeds no heroes now."

This line from the novel WINTERBIRTH, by Brian Ruckley, sums up our main observation after reading the novel. WINTERBIRTH is marketed as both Epic Fantasy and Heroic Fantasy. What does that mean? Well, for starters, it means we have heroes in some sort of capacity. It also means we should have blood and battle...and in high quantities. Epic Fantasy usually involves some sort of epic quest, or a huge, all-engrossing plot that the heroes must stop. Heroic Fantasy means we have heroic and tragic last-stands.

There was nothing epic about this fantasy, and as for battles...can someone please explain to us why the first battle in the novel happens more than half-way through the book? OR WHY THERE WERE NO OTHER MAJOR BATTLES AT ALL IN THE ENTIRE NOVEL? It's enough to make us think we are taking crazy-pills.

Call us bitter. Call us angry. It's ok, because we are. There are so many other novels out there that we could be reading; novels that would make us proud to review. WINTERBIRTH took us away from those novels.

It's not that the writing is poor. It is actually quite good, and it alone kept us reading. But what is Heroic Fantasy without the blood and sword? In a word: boring. Ruckley's novel is at its best when the characters (with whom we have absolutely no attachment - another problem in itself) are wading into their limited engagements of fighting. The paperback of this novel counts 688 pages - epic in length for sure, but bland as tofu. Maybe 20 pages are of Heroic Fantasy mayhem. The marketing on the novel suggests Ruckley's work is in the tradition of the late and great David Gemmell. We believe Gemmell would scoff at only 20 pages of action in a novel.

In addition, we feel a little taken advantage of. The prologue to the book mentions a race that sounds awesome, only then to tell us they were the victims of a genocidal crusade. So...no cool race. Another of the races that we have frequent contact with in the novel sound, act, and look suspiciously like elves...only they have an unpronounceable name...but don't worry, they speak a foreign language that looks like elvish, only it isn't. Look, if it's an elf, call it an elf (this is where we thank the UK author James Barclay for his honesty).

As you can tell, we are frustrated. We wanted to like this novel, but that proved an impossibility. This isn't to say that we can't enjoy a novel that doesnt have action. Take R. Scott Bakker's first novel THE DARKNESS THAT COMES BEFORE. Astonishing in its greatness, and very little action throughout. We just felt that in this particular book it's absence wasnt outweighed by other cool stuff.

Recommended Age: 13 and up...if you can stand it.
Language: Nope.
Violence: The few times we get it, it is great, and it is brutal. Too bad we rarely get any.
Sex: Alluded to, but never shown.

What's this? Two reviews in one day? Well this one was a special request from some fans, and we were more than happy to oblige.

It's time we shared the hate...

There are few things in life that we don't understand. Why do people clip their finger and toe-nails in public? Why are Utah drivers incapable of using their turn signal? Why do people think Megan Fox can actually act? But mostly, we don't understand ONE MAJOR THING:

When ON EARTH did sparkles on a VAMPIRE become cool? We just each threw up a little. Steve more than a little actually. It was gross. It was like an emetic taste test here.

Don't get us wrong, we like vampires. E.E. Knight's VAMPIRE EARTH series rocks (for Nick especially), as well as the classic style of INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE by Anne Rice. Steve goes for the Brian Lumley variant, and the kind from the show Supernatural (a guilty pleasure). While we all give two-thumbs-up to the 30 Days of Night variety. Rob is of the same general opinion. See? We like vampires!

We just don't know WHAT happened during the writing of TWILIGHT. As Stephanie said in an interview on a talk-show (we want to say it was Ellen - she's funny, we are allowed to watch her talk-show with our significant others. Let it go.), she woke up one morning with a completely original story about a girl who--wait for it--FALLS IN LOVE WITH A VAMPIRE! We know! No one has EVER done any variant of that story before.

EVAAAH!!!

The writing is, as we gamers say, terribad. The romance is heavy-handed and repetitive, with the characters repeating the most mundane asinine dialogue possible. We understand they are teenagers, but is this really how they think? If so, the Mayan calendar predicting the end of the world in 2012 might not be so off-base...

Look, if you want to read romantic vampire stories, good for you. Go read Charlaine Harris' Sookie Stackhouse novels, or pick a book at random from the romance section of your local bookstore. Don't bother with this drivel called TWILIGHT. There are no REAL vampires in it. It is a hoax. The writing is awful. There is no real plot. Cereal boxes have better characters. Real vampires would point and laugh at the lauded Edward. Bella, the heroine, can only be enjoyed while on heroin...barely. Reading how she wants to cuddle with a guy who is cold as a corpse, just once, was enough to ignore her for the rest of the book. This was very difficult as her annoying little quips and selfish whining pop up ad nauseam.

Now, it is only fair that we say a few positives. First, if we had as much dinero as Stephanie Meyer, we would be happy campers. We might feel guilty like we had swindled the world, but we would be rich. Secondly, Meyer is getting people to read. We can't stress how important this is in this day and age. We may think, like Stephen King before us, that Meyer is untalented as a writer, but hey, the more people who read, the better books they can potentially get in to.

We realize our warnings have come late, but we only pray to the literary gods that it won't go unheeded for those who are thinking of reading it. If you cannot overcome your complusion and must purchase the book, go here.

Recommended Age: Resist the urge...EVERYONE is at a higher mental age than required by this novel. As are most animals. And rocks.
Language: Ugh. The terrible writing has clouded our brains and we cant remember.
Violence: If they were real vampires, we would have violence galore. But no: bait and switch.
Sex: Nope, and all the future sex-lives of all the Twilight fanatics are drying up with each subsequent read.

Head on over to Stephanie's site and offer her a little bit of your wisdom on teenagers and vampires, two subject she apparently needs to brush up on.

http://www.blogger.com/www.stepheniemeyer.com