Jernej Virag

I think I gave this a fair chance but I just can't get past the hugely unlikeable main character and their wish to grind the axe with the whole world.

This is a very introspective book with a lot of brooding, flashbacks and miserable regret. The characters are all horribly unlikeable and unrelatable which is a death sentence for a book that spends so much time in their heads - to read it you need to have interest and at least some sympathy for the struggles they face. Here I just hoped that they drive off the road into a pole.

The book seems like something from a USA 2020 zeitgeist I can't understand or identify with - I understand why Max may had to write this based on what was going on the news but it doesn't make it any more readable.

I had to stop about 1/3 of a way in and it was easily the most terrible thing I've attempted to read in years.

It's s very stereotypical “awesome leader comes and makes his crew the best ever and everyone is awesome and wins every time” type story. It would be just “meh” if not for a very creepy way the author keeps describing most of the women. They're obviously all hot, “dusky” (sic) and have way too many curves described way too many times.

Honestly... this read like a cheap fanfiction more than anything else. The main character (total geek, can't get a girlfriend, etc. you know the drill) meets a pretty smart princess (yeah, really - her characterization is also about as thick as a sheet of paper) and she immediately falls for him.

Even ignoring this horrible “romance” story, the rest of the book is pretty much devoid of everything that made the beginning of this series great: the acid commentary on state of Britich beaurocracy, elements of cosmic horror (the villains in this book are kinda “meh”) and even the climax at the end somehow fails to be gripping.

All in all it feels like one of those filler episodes in tv show which was made just to hit the episode count, has nothing to do with main characters of the story arc and doesn't move anything anywhere. Somehow this managed to be about as disappointing than Annihilation Score. Well at least superhero crap wasn't around this time.

I... have no idea what to think of this book and if it brought anything of value. The extreme nihilisim built on top of an interesting world is a great intro but starts grating towards the end. The book gives you the feeling of being trapped in an insane asylum where everyone is crazy and none of the characters actions make sense. I guess it's just me, but the ending did not really pull enough strings together to be satisfying or to leave a good impression.

Interesting main plot and great world building is seriously dragged down by character writing and “romance” which makes 50 shades of grey look good. It's a true pity, since there is a lot to like in the book.