Review: A first half of story that totally blindsided me... 5 Stars
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 04 12, 2013
"Kickass Guns & Samurai Swords" (Eredian Alliance Part 1) is a novella by author Craig Askham. This Kindle e-book was a 289 Kb download (approx. 120 printed pages) and sold for $2.99 at the time of writing this review.Please Note: the author provided me with a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.Spoilers (general theme)The Stillwater Project offers gamers that can afford it, the ultimate experience in role playing, life and death fantasy battles. Except that it's not fantasy, members are transported through a device called the Stillwater Portal to another planet that's light years away from Earth. The one caveat is that if your unfortunate enough to be killed in you game, there's no reset, no restart, no coming home... because your really dead.End SpoilersSome thoughts on "Kickass... Swords"...The Pros:1.) a well written and thought out tale.2.) there is an abrupt change in direction about 53% the way through this story that changes it from being one step above a YA thriller to a full fledged adult action tale.3.) some interesting character development of our main hero. Where this character's initial attributes really dictated his actions later on.4.) a different and unexpected ending. The last paragraph was brilliant.The Cons:1.) up to the half way point, there was just enough gratuitous swearing to take this out of YA realm but give this work a sense of annoying immaturity... and then things changed, and changed for the better.2.) the title... hmmm, yes there's an association to the story but just doesn't quite fit.3.) cover art... loved the borders but wasn't really sure what both central images were until I looked close up. Little eye-catching appeal to snag that potential reader into a second look.Impressions:I was on the verge of abandoning this work when I arrived at the point mentioned above. It seemed to be heading down the typical YA road... silly contrived adolescent conversations and mindless vulgarities.But then the author changed directions and turned this tale in a new direction: a direction that skillfully made use of the inanities that occurred early on and then seamlessly blended it with a superb end sequence. As a  result, this resulted in this book being a very intriguing adult-styled action thriller... with a surprise ending.I look forward to reading more of the Stillwater stories.As it is... 5 StarsRay Nicholsonraynicholsonsreviews@hotmail.com@ralannicholson