Review: Juvenile writing and Deus ex machina
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 05 16, 2014
I might have liked this at age 10. First, simply has too much stuff jammed into it. Every plot device the author could think of is here, one after another. When in doubt, add in the contrived intervention of some new event, character, or object. I'd have to say the main character lead quite a life last week, and another the week after that.In spite of that it also has a bunch of holes in the plot that are not covered. Why do they have guns which must be manually "run out" with the gun deck open to space? There is a reference to digging in with entrenching tools on a nickel iron asteroid. WTF? Why are there no missiles in the fleet? The best they can do is to fire ballistic projectiles at each other? How about the use of "writer" as in CO's "writer". What is that? There is a position known as yeoman in the US Navy or Clerk (hired by the Captain) in the early British Navy. "Swain"? Boatswain or Coxswain? This is an overly familiar demeaning contraction of the actual title. In my own military experience this would be about like calling a Master Sergeant, First Sergeant, or Sergeant Major "Hey Sarge".Finally, I am sick to death of the seeming interchangeability of your and you're. Everyone makes mistakes, but I learned this in third grade!YOUR is possessive as in YOUR EDUCATION.YOU'RE is a contraction of YOU ARE as in YOU'RE ILLITERATE.In the last half dozen books I've read the authors couldn't get this straight. Apparently proofreading is also a lost art. Spell check does not do grammar check.