Review: Exciting book for caper lovers, disappointing for others
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 01 11, 2014
I was very undecided on how to rate the book.  I almost agreed with S.Emoto, that this was a "fun book with misleading book description."  It felt like that to me, but on rereading the description, it was only partly misleading.  I rated this 3 stars.  But that was for my taste.  I found it okay, somewhat interesting, but, on the whole a bit boring.  But that is because I am much less into the caper type plot than the horror, supernatural, ancient gods, ancient secrets, etc. that the book seemed to promise.  Granted that in rereading the plot summary, it does say "the wrong people will show up: criminals, mercenaries, treasure hunters."  Maybe that should have clued me in on what type of book to expect.  But the cover says, "The old gods have returned and they demand human sacrifice."  That sounds like more up my alley than this book turned out to be.  As S.Emoto says, this is really like a "caper" plot.  If you enjoy car chase scenes in movies, or human chase scenes in books, along with complicated intrigues and different groups of people battling for treasures and secrets, then give this book five stars.  But if you get bored with a lot of chasing and fighting, different groups of people with questionable motives, figuring out which people are good and which are bad, and are more into the ancient secrets and the possibility of the ancient gods returning, then you might be a bit disappointed, as I was.  I think the premise was good, but the book could have been a lot better.  I enjoyed the Dan Brown books and disagree with the reader who said this was like those.  With Dan Brown, as the hero is running around, following clues, the bad guys chasing behind him, you still get secrets divulged and ideas thrown about.  This book is mostly one big chase scene, with some ancient natural and man-made secrets intervening.  The big revelation comes at the end, in the last few pages.  By the way, I didn't notice the typos and mistakes that S.Emoto mentions.  Either they were fixed, or I just wasn't discerning.  I would have liked this book a lot more if there was a lot less chasing and fighting.  The book was worth the read, either way.  But I felt it could have been a lot better.  So it boils down to taste and I hope I've explained enough to give you a sense of what to expect.  (I apologize if this review was somewhat redundant. I just wanted to hammer the point home.)