Forged in the Storm

RE Houser wrote a charming story in Forged in the Storm. The Resouh (Russo? Not sure how to pronounce this name) family is cute and unremarkable. Completely ordinary white picket fence Nebraska family regular. I have a feeling that some of these characters were written from life, Houser seems very comfortable in them. The family consists of the parents, Rus and Nichole. The kids: James, Elijah, and Jade. All of various ages. Each of the chapters in this too short story is written from the perspective of whomever that section is talking about. This type of writing can be a challenging task, and for the most part, Houser does well with it. One of the fallbacks of doing this sort of narrative, and I think he runs into trouble with this, is that if you give so much “screen” time to so many characters, you end up with no lead. With no lead, the reader can feel unattached to the characters and thus cannot empathize with them. It can feel scattered.

The plot involves the Rusouh Family, a tech company creating far-reaching Earth Shaking technology, and portaling from place to place around the world. It is a little Star Trek, a little Leave it to Beaver and a little James Bond. Crazy mix but fun. I wish that Houser had fleshed out the story more instead of doing short novella like bursts. It is hard to keep a solid narrative going in this format when the book is novella length. Had it been one main character, I think it would have been a more cohesive plot. I ended up feeling unsatisfied because I wanted more of both character, dialog, and story. I needed each chapter to explain more and show more than it did.

I know it sounds like I am complaining about this, I am not. It is a cute idea and a fun story, it just needs some editing and reformating. The love the family feels or each other is infectious and sweet. They are thrown in some insane predicaments in short succession. The science fiction elements are fun, a little cloudy at this point, but still very enjoyable — all in all a decent read hence the 3.5 stars. I am curious as to where the story is going to go and if Houser is going to flesh out things a bit more. I will read the next installment and see where the story takes us.