Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
Don't get me wrong - I'm not for an instant suggesting that an author doesn't have the absolute right to put anything they want in a book; just that I personally found this particular book distasteful and didn't wish to read it.
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Understood. Been there, done that.
But, as an aside, if you had (ahem) soldiered on you would've found the character has major psychological issues and Ringo is, apparently, satirizing the stereotypical loner action heroes of modern bestsellers. Because the protagonist's superhuman combat prowess comes from repressing his (decidedly unacceptable) sexual urges into a talent for violence.
A common feature of Ringo's latter (non-aldenata) stories is that while they can be read as straight dead serious action stories, they can also be read as sly spoofs in the "you do realize this isn't totally serious" vein. It applies to his Paladin of Shadows series, as well as the Troy Rising, Special Circumstances, and Black Tide Rising series. That it doesn't apply to the ALDENATA books is why I dropped that series after the third volume. And he himself admits he got tired of trying to keep it going; there are only so many ways to kill mindless alien hordes, after all.
In general, I've found that most competent writers have a reason for focusing on challenging ideas in their stories. Sometimes it doesn't work but more often than not it pays to hang around to see where they're headed if you're curious enough and give them the benefit of the doubt.
Which, come to think of it, may be harder to do in these KINDLE UNLIMITED days... After all, in earlier times, by the time you found out just how sick Thomas Covenant (for one) truly is, you'd already bought the book and had an incentive to wait for a payoff. In KU it may be easier to ditch the book at the first rough patch...
