Review: Hetero Soap Opera Trumps Third World War
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 11 13, 2013
"Seawolf End Game" by Cliff Happy is the sequel to his first book with the same characters "Seawolf Mask of Command." It's a modern day nuclear submarine story starring the first woman to be assigned to a US Navy Submarine, Lt. Kristen Whitaker.  The international "almost-World-War-III" aspect of the book is a really good story, but the soap opera backdrop of the personal lives of the sub's Captain Sean Brodie and Lt. Whitaker unfortunately torpedoes the story into the murky waters of -- not the Persian Gulf -- but of a purely awful Hollywood B- movie.Let's reprogram the 2 main characters' genetic make-up a bit and see exactly how this story might have otherwise unfolded. Let's assume Captain Brodie is exactly the same person he is in Mr. Happy's story, but he is a closeted gay man, having failed once at marriage, as did Mr. Happy's Brodie and as so many gay men have who finally come out later in life.  And let's say that Lt. Chris Whitaker is a still-closeted younger gay male officer on his first submarine assignment -- but with all the brave and intellectual attributes that Mr. Happy's heterosexual female Kristen Whitaker has.  Let's say the same magnetism happens, and Whitaker and Brodie (now as two gay men, both officers on a US Navy nuclear sub) fall in love but keep their feelings from the crew (and essentially from themselves too) for most of the 2-book tale. Now, let's see a publisher deal with that!  It would never have been written, right?  Or, published. While we might (barely) survive a heterosexual navy love-story on board a nuclear submarine, we never would get past page 25 in Book 1 in the alternate scenario with 2 gay men in the same love story. The shower scenes, the tight cramped quarters, the chance shy and embarrassed meetings in passageways, the passionate couple of stolen kisses in the Captain's quarters, the mental musings of Whitaker trying to deny her/his love for the Captain. Nope, never happen. And that dear readers is the fatal flaw in this story.  It's heterosexual made-for-TV soap opera blather, through and through (with none of the good parts left in).What a bloody disappointment this second book is -- due to the unrestrained and hopeless overpowering of what is really a good submarine story (including high very contemporary international tension and near-destruction of the US high tech sub) with what becomes an extremely low-level soap opera with, of course, a necessary happy-sappy maudlin picket-fence ending/epilogue. Arrrrrgh!!It's predictable, ridiculous and sad. Don't even bother. The hetero "love story" kills the book -- dead. John Le Carre, were he dead, would be turning over in his grave.So "Seawolf End Game" falls to a lowly 2.0 rating from the rather good 4.0 that the first book enjoyed from me The only thing saving it from a 1.0 is the combat, on-board, under water excellent high tech Navy aspects of the story. Those parts are excellent. Just one question though: how are drones launched and retrieved from a submerged sub? Asking because such launched and retrieved drones play an important role in the success of the submarine's tricky passage through 2 mine fields.