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emheld's review against another edition
3.0
3 stars is a good rating. I liked it, didn't love it, but I'll certainly read the sequel. Some parts were terrific, but there's a bit more tightening to be done to make this a definitively crowd-pleaser. Worth your time and a solid workman start to a publishing career.
packrat_ter72's review against another edition
4.0
It took me a while to get into the story, as I was not sure what was going on. Once things became a little clearer, I couldn't put it down!
glimnore's review against another edition
4.0
This book took me a while. But I loved it so very much!
Characters (4/5)
I'd say one of the selling points, the only reason I took off a star was because about three or so characters stopped being fun and interesting and started being a little two-dimensional. Rad, Nimrod, Carson, and Crater, however I pretty entertaining!
Plot (4/5)
Fun and exciting. However, to me, things did not originally make sense. But after I certain point, I was like "Oh! Now I understand!". You'll know what this moment is when you read it.
Pacing: (3/5)
Seemed a little rushed towards the end. A few scenes didn't make sense as why they existed.
Prose (5/5)
One of the selling points. Enter the nitty-gritty darkly detailed prose of Empire State. Noir and well done!
World (5/5)
Or should I say worlds.....;)
Totals: 4+4+3+5+5 = 21/5 = 4.2, rounds to 4 stars
All in all, I just bought the sequel....
Characters (4/5)
I'd say one of the selling points, the only reason I took off a star was because about three or so characters stopped being fun and interesting and started being a little two-dimensional. Rad, Nimrod, Carson, and Crater, however I pretty entertaining!
Plot (4/5)
Fun and exciting. However, to me, things did not originally make sense. But after I certain point, I was like "Oh! Now I understand!". You'll know what this moment is when you read it.
Pacing: (3/5)
Seemed a little rushed towards the end. A few scenes didn't make sense as why they existed.
Prose (5/5)
One of the selling points. Enter the nitty-gritty darkly detailed prose of Empire State. Noir and well done!
World (5/5)
Or should I say worlds.....;)
Totals: 4+4+3+5+5 = 21/5 = 4.2, rounds to 4 stars
All in all, I just bought the sequel....
aestro's review against another edition
2.0
After enjoying The Seven Wonders from Christopher, I decided to pick up Empire State, hoping for another engaging superhero story that is not about zombies (I am looking at you Ex-Heroes), I was sorely disappointed.
This book is all over the place, the story barely makes sense and the author has a hard time creating characters that are more than one dimension. The superhero aspect is lost through barely comprehensible storyline and poor world building. The Rex is not really special and mostly annoying, the most interesting characters, like Skyguard and Science Pirate, are barely glanced over. The war aspect with the other city barely makes sense and no real set of the rules that governs the pocket universe is given to us.
Overall, this book is a mess, I wouldn’t bother reading it.
This book is all over the place, the story barely makes sense and the author has a hard time creating characters that are more than one dimension. The superhero aspect is lost through barely comprehensible storyline and poor world building. The Rex is not really special and mostly annoying, the most interesting characters, like Skyguard and Science Pirate, are barely glanced over. The war aspect with the other city barely makes sense and no real set of the rules that governs the pocket universe is given to us.
Overall, this book is a mess, I wouldn’t bother reading it.
liedora's review against another edition
3.0
This is a debut novel for this Author, and despite what the cover may lead the reader to believe this book is about, once they start reading they will discover it is something more. Unfortunately, despite this book having a lot going for it, it didn’t quite reach the spot with me.
The reason for its shortcomings for me, all lie with the characters; right from the beginning they seem to be lacking something. The initial character we are introduced to is gone before the reader really has a chance to get to know him, he is replaced by the main protagonist, who is marginally more interesting, but not enough to make the reader connect with him or grab their attention fully. Many of the characters that appear in the book are never written with any real depth and, even though this is explained about halfway through the book, the reader spends much of their time surrounded by shallow characters. The characters have very little substance, not enough to carry a whole book, which is a shame in this particular novel.
Fortunately the setting of the book and the mystery contained in its pages were engrossing enough to keep me reading to the end. The setting is a parallel universe and brings a very steampunk feel to the pseudo-New York 1930’s written there with robots, prohibition, super heroes, unseen enemies and robots. This fictional universe is well written and the Author leaves it wide open to the reader’s imagination to explore and populate as they will. The overall feeling that the reader will gain from the atmosphere created in the book may well remind them of a Philip K. Dick novel, but which one will depend on how they interpret this novel.
I would recommend this book to readers of the time travel and fantasy genres.
Originally reviewed on: http://catesbooknuthut.com/2013/10/22/review-empire-state-empire-state-1-adam-christopher/
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
The reason for its shortcomings for me, all lie with the characters; right from the beginning they seem to be lacking something. The initial character we are introduced to is gone before the reader really has a chance to get to know him, he is replaced by the main protagonist, who is marginally more interesting, but not enough to make the reader connect with him or grab their attention fully. Many of the characters that appear in the book are never written with any real depth and, even though this is explained about halfway through the book, the reader spends much of their time surrounded by shallow characters. The characters have very little substance, not enough to carry a whole book, which is a shame in this particular novel.
Fortunately the setting of the book and the mystery contained in its pages were engrossing enough to keep me reading to the end. The setting is a parallel universe and brings a very steampunk feel to the pseudo-New York 1930’s written there with robots, prohibition, super heroes, unseen enemies and robots. This fictional universe is well written and the Author leaves it wide open to the reader’s imagination to explore and populate as they will. The overall feeling that the reader will gain from the atmosphere created in the book may well remind them of a Philip K. Dick novel, but which one will depend on how they interpret this novel.
I would recommend this book to readers of the time travel and fantasy genres.
Originally reviewed on: http://catesbooknuthut.com/2013/10/22/review-empire-state-empire-state-1-adam-christopher/
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
cjatkinson's review against another edition
3.0
I wanted to like this book because I think the idea is very unique, but the execution felt a little boring. I wanted the characters to be a little more developed, but everyone was just a character trope and non of their actions were all that surprising. I’m still planning on reading the next in the series so hopefully things will get a little better.
csdaley's review
5.0
I loved this book. Superheroes, noir, mystery, robots, blimps, the kitchen sink. One of my favorite books of the yer.
jonmhansen's review against another edition
3.0
Liked it, but a bit confusing at times (didn't help that I had to read it in dribs and drabs over a few weeks, rather than in large chunks). Made a clear case for never having two characters with very similar names (both starting with the same letter and the same length). I understand why, but still confusing. Rhyming would've been better, or at least different length. Nevertheless, worth the read, and I'm curious about Mr. Christopher's other work now.
fancybone's review against another edition
4.0
Read through a hundred pages in a night, and almost finished it the night after that. The ending felt a bit rushed, but overall a great book, can't wait to read the sequel.
annelyle's review against another edition
4.0
"The Rocketeer" meets Dashiel Hammett in this fun SF/steampunk/superhero/noir mashup that so needs to be turned into a movie!