A review by julis
1634: The Bavarian Crisis by Virginia DeMarce, Eric Flint

adventurous slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

What a clusterfuck of a book.

It’s too long, it’s following too many plots, it’s trying to address too many ideas, and there is way too much detail–except for when I badly want to know how a conversation went down and then we get telling-not-showing. For idk how long cause kindle doesn’t have a useful page count.

It’s not as “holy shit Flint, you can’t say the Americans are just people like everyone else and then have them accidentally take over Europe” as, well, Flint’s books are, but it’s also…slow…very, very slow…

EDIT I CAN’T BELIEVE I FORGOT THE THING I YELLED ABOUT THE MOST: yes, Francisco is a better spouse in that he’s the same age as Maria Anna and not 40 years older (kind of the books to finally care about that) but um, inbreeding depression is not some unsubstantiated liberal idea. it’s a thing. Francisco and Maria Anna have at least (the website crashed when I tried to extend it beyond 5 generations) a COI of 10%, which is the point where dog breed clubs politely ask you to find someone else, and they’re hardly radical exogamists. yikes.