great story to listen to

I liked the reader performance and the story flowed nicely. I have listened to this series several times and still like it.

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This story doesn't know what it wants to be when it grows up

To be clear on my reaction to this book, it is the first -- and will be the last -- Glynn Stewart book I have read. Starts kind of dragging but soon provides a provocative bit of crime mystery. SPOILERS.

From there it goes downhill. The 1st actual space battle is purely descriptive and utterly boring. But not the last battle in the book entirely devoid of action. Then there is a 2nd crime piece which is just a variation on the 1st, indignant male hero saves female victim. x 2. There are then long side trips into romantic navel gazing that have no relevance to or impact on the rest of book. Seems to be romantic entanglements for the sake of checking it off a to-do list. The big space war again fails to impress and the whole thing just kind of fizzle put to a ho-hum end.

I stuck with it all the way because it kept seeming like it might get good. It never does.

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Formulaic and tedious

Unclear how much the author is familiar with military organizations. One dimensional plotlines. The repeated blurb at the start of each chapter is a repeated nuisance.

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Weak story and characters, with a touch of wokeness

I struggled through books 1 to 4 and finally gave up on the series, even though the full series was included in the membership. I’m guessing the numerous high reviews are not genuine.

The series seemed to read like an encyclopedia. I found character development was weak and the author focused more on physical characteristics then who the characters were as people. I also found it odd that when romantic relationships were introduced or described in passing, at least half were same sex. Also, men and women didn’t seem to have any differences between masculine and feminine traits which really takes away from story lines. It was like every character was the same robot personality.

The space battles and soldier fighting were so over described they become hard to follow. The author seemed to have very little sense of even the simplest military strategy and listening to the descriptions was rather painful. The battles were like 1812 soldiers walking straight at each other shooting in a line and the main character becomes a genius tactician because he tells his soldiers to duck.

Also, the writer making up space swears like “oh void”, really detract from the story because they are noticeable and awkward. Also there’s no concept of linking past characters or actions to current events using callbacks, which I thought was odd. Nothing to make you think as a reader.

Overall, I suggest you try one of the numerous other space battle series that are out there.

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1 person found this helpful