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aeculley's review
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
nanceoir's review
1.0
When I started reading the B5 novels, I figured they'd all earn at least three stars from me simply by being B5 novels. This was not to be.
Admittedly, part of the reason this was such a slow read for me was because it's a physical book rather than an ebook, it was mostly slow reading because it wasn't very good. Besides some irritating errors, including introducing an original character by one name and calling him a different name on the next page, several of the characters were off; for example, more often than not, Sheridan sounded more like Sinclair.
The worst thing, though, was that the author didn't do very well with the women characters. An original character for this story has an intense hatred of aliens, and the cause? Sexual trauma. Both Ivanova and Delenn are repeatedly described in ways that diminish their strength and power; e.g., in the midst of a station crisis, while Sheridan and Garibaldi both sacrificed a tool to help them get through everything, Ivanova did not, and she doesn't handle the stress as well as the men who then had half the help she did (her hands "trembled" while the men's didn't), while Delenn flees from an intense scene with Sheridan, who finally leaves.
Also, the entire story felt disjointed and plodding. There didn't seem to be a strong narrative thread; instead, we just jump around to the different main characters because they're the main characters and we want to see what they're doing, even if there's little that really intertwines the vignettes. Part of that is due to the story being told, but that just tells me one of two things: either this wasn't a good story to be told, or the author wasn't good enough to tell that story well.
I don't think I'm that hard to please with these Babylon 5 novels, but this one was not very good. In fact, I wouldn't recommend this to anyone except the most completionist of hard-core fans, and maybe not even then. This leaves me simultaneously wanting to take a really long break from the B5 novels because ugh, this was so bad, and wanting to read another one to get the taste of this weird, unpleasant version of B5 out of my head.
Admittedly, part of the reason this was such a slow read for me was because it's a physical book rather than an ebook, it was mostly slow reading because it wasn't very good. Besides some irritating errors, including introducing an original character by one name and calling him a different name on the next page, several of the characters were off; for example, more often than not, Sheridan sounded more like Sinclair.
The worst thing, though, was that the author didn't do very well with the women characters. An original character for this story has an intense hatred of aliens, and the cause? Sexual trauma. Both Ivanova and Delenn are repeatedly described in ways that diminish their strength and power; e.g., in the midst of a station crisis, while Sheridan and Garibaldi both sacrificed a tool to help them get through everything, Ivanova did not, and she doesn't handle the stress as well as the men who then had half the help she did (her hands "trembled" while the men's didn't), while Delenn flees from an intense scene with Sheridan, who finally leaves.
Also, the entire story felt disjointed and plodding. There didn't seem to be a strong narrative thread; instead, we just jump around to the different main characters because they're the main characters and we want to see what they're doing, even if there's little that really intertwines the vignettes. Part of that is due to the story being told, but that just tells me one of two things: either this wasn't a good story to be told, or the author wasn't good enough to tell that story well.
I don't think I'm that hard to please with these Babylon 5 novels, but this one was not very good. In fact, I wouldn't recommend this to anyone except the most completionist of hard-core fans, and maybe not even then. This leaves me simultaneously wanting to take a really long break from the B5 novels because ugh, this was so bad, and wanting to read another one to get the taste of this weird, unpleasant version of B5 out of my head.
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