Review: Not worth the $0.99.
Rating: 1 out of 5
Date: 09 2, 2012
The craft of writing is well displayed in this short, but there's really so little to it that it's simply not worth the money.  In essence, the description on Amazon gets it half right.  It's short.  But it's not a story.  It's nothing more than a set of vignettes that make fun of heroic fantasy and are loosely tied together.Mr. Scalzi seems to have forgotten that the art of the short story is to tell a complete tale in as few words as possible.  To include a plot, character development, a little world building, etc.  A well crafted short story is a marvelous gem.  It would behoove the author to read some of Isaac Asimov's short works.Normally, I view a $0.99 eReader purchase - even if it turns out I dislike the work - as shrug worthy at best.  In this case, I was irritated that an author of Scalzi's stature would put this on the market and actually charge anything.  What's next?  Selling soiled handkerchiefs on eBay?