Seven Deadly Wonders

Executive Summary: This book is ridiculous. I'm torn between a 2 and 3 star rating because it's a solid 2.5. I have to round down because what started off pretty fun got so over the top by the end that I was constantly rolling my eyes.Audiobook: William Dufris is a pretty good narrator that I've enjoyed from [a:John Scalzi 4763 John Scalzi https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1407277112p2/4763.jpg]'s Old Man War series. He does some voices and is easy to listen to. However, I kept waiting for the characters to start using their Brain Pals. It was a bit hard to separate Mr. Dufris from that series as I listened.Full ReviewAs 2015 came to a close, I realized just how much fantasy I read last year. Now that's not unusual for me but I used to read a lot more mysteries and thrillers and didn't really get too heavy into fantasy until college.I solicited some recommendations for non-SFF books to check out with the main criteria being light and fun. Apparently I picked the most ridiculous book to start with first. For me the main attraction was the Indiana Jones vibe/the mentions of Ancient Egypt. I loved Ancient Egypt as a kid. One of the main reasons I got in Stargate was its basis in Ancient Egypt.This book is fun, don't get me wrong. However the writing was pretty bad. I also had believability issues. Not only in the “military” actions of some of the characters, but the politics. I get America is not everyone's favorite country. It's totally understandable. Still I have a really hard time believing that Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and Ireland (not the UK) will team up with Spain and the United Arab Emirates against the US. First off that seems a bit random. Second it shows a lack of understanding on the author's part about the nature of the relationship between the major English speaking nations.Even that aside, I have a really hard time believing any nation, will just casually use soldiers as expendable test subjects for ancient traps. It just seemed silly. It wasn't just the Americans either. There was also the evil Europeans made up of France, Germany and the Vatican. What!? I know this is fiction, but seriously..did this guy not learn any world history growing up? I feel like he made his factions by using darts on a map or something.Anyways in addition to the bad writing/unbelievable parts, most of the characters felt paper-thin and cartoonish. By the end I just wanted to be done. It's probably why after long thought I'm rounding my rating down.That said, I did enjoy good chunks of this book. I liked the general premise of the plot, the exploration of ancient tombs/wonders and the various traps they encountered and had to overcome. I bet a better author could have made a really good story out of it.It's too bad because I had pretty high hopes for this one, and since it's book 1 in a series, I figured I'd have a few to read. I just can't though. This author just apparently isn't for me. Still I'm glad I read the book. It's definitely the type of book I was looking to read. Hopefully the next non-SFF pick will go a little better.