03-23-2019, 10:50 PM | #1 |
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David Weber, Out of the Dark, Disappointing
I’m a David Weber fan. Love the Honor Harrington and Safehold series. David is one of the best world builders, battle writers, and character builders out there. This book is a pale example of all three. It’s good writing, but nowhere near DW's normal quality. On top of that I have two HUGE objections for this book. The basic idea is a multi Alien universe uses one bad type of Alien to take on earth because neither humans nor the bad Aliens are desired. I couldn’t get John Ringo's Posleen series out of my head as I read this book.
It’s no rip off, it’s a completely different story...but the idea is the same and the execution is nowhere near as good as Ringo's when normally DW is easily just as good a writer if not better. The aliens aren’t as interesting, the drama isn’t as intense and the battles are nowhere near as good. Then DW solves the book with a Deus Ex Machina ending. How embarrassing. Without spoiling anything, it’s like taking a regular military science fiction alien story and resolve it by Harry Potter snowing up and casting a spell. If I knew DW's phone number, I would have called him up and told him how very disappointed I was. He doesn’t know me at all, btw. That said, if he writes a Harry Potter conquers the universe book follow on, I would read it. |
03-23-2019, 11:26 PM | #2 |
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Personally, I preferred the original version of Out of the Dark in the Warriors anthology. If nothing else, ending at "This is for my daughters. " was more satisfying to me.
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03-24-2019, 11:14 AM | #3 |
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It is my least favorite David Weber book. I had to force myself to finish the book. And I never have that problem with his books.
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03-24-2019, 07:33 PM | #4 |
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03-24-2019, 09:32 PM | #5 |
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Have you ever had a favorite author throw in such. “God saves by machine” type ending to a book? I mean, seriously. You are reading one type of book and at the end,along comes a magical character to save the day.
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03-25-2019, 08:48 AM | #6 | |
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Quote:
I got the impression he took on the novelization without a clear goal in mind and got caught up in the details (which he's done a lot in his most recent books--particularly SAFEHOLD, which is why I gave up on it) and was headed into full series territory. Then he decided he couldn't take on yet another series and he needed to wrap it up fast. At least with the Honorverse he finally figured out how to get Honor off the stage gracefully without killing her as he originally planned. |
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03-25-2019, 09:08 AM | #7 |
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I agree that it was a most unsatisfactory novel, that I've felt no desire to re-read.
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03-25-2019, 10:40 AM | #8 |
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It is the only Weber book I have only read once.
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03-26-2019, 10:58 AM | #9 |
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I enjoyed it in its original short-story incarnation as well. By the sound of things, I'm glad I never read the "fleshed out" novelized version.
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05-23-2019, 07:38 AM | #10 |
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I actually remember quite liking it if I'm honest but admit I can only remember it vaguely.
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