We Interupt Your Reading...

for all sorts of crap lately!  I was all stoked about this book, and suddenly real life seems to think that I shouldn't be able to read for longer than 5 minutes.  I hate this, and what I hate even more is that this book fell apart and left me less than thrilled.  Part of its failure could have been my fractured reading, but blaming it solely on that would be less than honest.

21. Boneshaker

So this book started out great.  The set up to the main action had good characters, a cool back story with just the right hint of intrigue, and a steampunk version of Seattle with pirates, zombies, and a mad inventor.  All good right?  Not so much.

In this version of history, which is only different because we are told not really shown, has a portion of Seattle sealed off due to poisonous gas that either kills you or turns you into a "rotter".  Even without being told I would assume this is a place to avoid, but our heros have to go there so that makes sense, but the people who live there willingly make zero sense and at no point is that addressed.  Why the hell are they there?  Don't know, never will...

Shifting points of view is trendy, it is the thing, I get it; but it needs to be done with skill, not just because you need to have someone else doing something to make a story.  What was particularly annoying was the fact that the two story lines start out during different times, and you never know if that changes and thus you don't know how some of the action is flowing.

Then we have the ending.  Yuck.

Here is the thing, if you write a book, take some time with it, develop the plot and characters beyond what you plan to publish, have friends and strangers read it and ask questions.  Stop trying to write the next successful movie franchise. This book had a lot of potentially successful elements that were left to languish and that is too bad.