Review: Did not like this book as much as the first
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 03 20, 2013
Most of the new subplots were supposed to be humorous.  Unfortunately, filling a book with dick jokes limits your audience- the jokes really seemed to be something that would appeal to 19 year old guys.  Anyway, a combination military fantasy and penis humor novel is an odd style choice.  I just didn't find it funny.So on to the writing.  It is very inconsistent.  You will finish reading a paragraph that is just silly and pointless, and then a scene will come up that is really great.  I think the book would benefit from stronger direction, and some ruthless editing.The author continues with the punishment theme, and it gets stretched quite thin.  He does pose some interesting points, but also occasionally contradicts himself.The author relies mostly on primary emotions such as happy/sad/angry and doesn't make much use of subtler emotional distinctions (pensiveness, joy, or even sensuality).  He also doesn't make use of visual emotional cues such as facial expression or body language very often.  It makes his characters seem a bit shallow and incomplete to me (the main character perhaps being the exception).The book didn't have a lot of sex in it, but what there was tended to be violent or unpleasant.  I didn't get that.  Also, everyone falls in love instantaneously and love is almost always unrequited, so there are almost no relationships except for the exceptionally dysfunctional one between the two brothers (later there is also a relationship between two boys.  But adults apparently don't get together long term).  I did not enjoy that.Overall, parts of it were good, but soured by unfunny humor subplots and shallow character development.