Review: An Exercise in futility
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 12 8, 2013
Pros: The book has very good editing, a fantastic premise, and some great ideas.Cons: The characters are entirely one dimensional and there is no character growth at all, not even in the characters that live.There are a number of situations that the author put in that have little to no explanation and add nothing meaningful to the story.There is no reason to invest anything emotionally in the story since it starts with a bad situation and reels drunkenly from failure to failure. Stephen's monsters, which feature prominently in the description, are almost nonexistent for most of the book. The book should really be named 'The Survival of Stephen Enchanter' since the only accomplishment of note Stephan intentionally had is his own survival.The book has lots of good ideas, but fails to accomplish even telling a compelling story. The 'bad guys' generally win, the 'good guys' drop like flies because apparently they have no worthwhile skills, and the end result is a 'hero' that should have been knocked off in the first third of the book before the reader had to witness the ignominious deaths of the real protagonists.