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Title: Breakout
Series: Fugitive Marines #1
Author: David Ryker & Douglas Scott
Rating: 2.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 244
Words: 73.5K
| Synopsis: |
From Davidryker.com
When a meteor strike unleashes an alien intelligence bent on taking over the human race, only a ragtag band of ex-Marines can stop them.
The only problem is, they’re in prison for a crime they didn’t commit. For the next 98 years.
And their prison is two and a half billion kilometers from Earth on a good day.
And their fellow inmates want them dead.
Hey, nobody ever said saving the world would be easy.
| My Thoughts: |
While this wasn’t “bad”, I did have much higher hopes that weren’t met.
The entire tone of the book was of the flip, I’m so qualified that I’m not worried about you, light humor. After a while it began to grate. Here are 4 (or was it 5? I honestly couldn’t tell you by the end of the book how many were in the group, more on that later) Marines in space jail for a crime they don’t remember committing, suddenly fighting off an alien body snatcher invasion. And they quip and one liner for the entire time?
Of course, Mr Quinn, their leader, but not Captain because he’s been stripped of that (we’re reminded by him of this constantly), is Mr Muscles from Brussels (I wanted to write muskles from bruskles to imitate Popeye, but wasn’t sure anyone would get the phrase if I mangled it that much) who is so conscientious and takes everything so seriously. But it fails, completely. He’s an idea of a person, not an actual person.
That is probably my biggest issue with this book, everyone had their place and were the idea, not the person. And that is why I couldn’t tell you if there were 4 or 5 guys in the force. There were first names, last names, possibly some nick names. They all had defining characteristics, but they weren’t people. I don’t know how to describe the lack, but it was evident. Then you had Miss Rich Love Interest Who Loves Everybody So Much that She Goes Outside Her Comfort Zone into Real Combat as a Medic. You know she and Captain Not Captain Muscles are going to fall in love, they have to. Their very character type demands it.
The background of the world was quite interesting. A world war that has seen the world divided into economic unions and space the new frontier. It had great underpinnings, just not the follow through. If you are looking for some quick Mil-SF to hoover through, you’ll probably like this series. There are 4 books currently out, but I’m done. I simply don’t care about the alien threat or how the Guys will solve their problems. They’ll solve it and laugh and beat some heads and Miss RLIWLESMSGOHCZRCB and CnC Muscles will probably smooch. But the problem won’t be fully solved, so you’ll have to read the next book.
Waiter, I’d like my check please.
★★☆☆½
You have won today’s best acronym competition! Congratulations!
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Thank you, thank you!
I’d like to thank the Academy for this great honor. And my pet rock and that tree over there and that chipmunk I killed with a bread knife in the 90’s. Oh wait, not him. But definitely everyone else!
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What? Is this a cold case, or are there charges pending? I’m getting my photo taken with the grieving chipmunk family as a political photo-op…have you no remorse?
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Very cold case. In chipmunk terms, this was like the American War for Independence. Now America and Brits are like besties. Except I’m not besties with little rats with fluffy tales.
And I’d do it again in a heartbeat! So obviously, no remorse.
😈
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I’ve got something of a rodent problem, but agree; once you’ve killed, it’s much easier to kill again! Worth getting the word out there…
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Kill and Kill Again. That would make a great title for a movie!
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Alvin and the Chipmunks5; Kill and Kill Again!
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That would be awesome. Some punks want alvin’s new car and end up killing their dad, so the trio go out on a road trip of revenge.
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Alvin 6; The Awakening. Alvin VII; A New Beginning,
Alvin vs Freddy…
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The franchise has potential. Invest now….
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Check please!
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The author wasn’t bad, per se, but it just wasn’t good enough for me to continue on with. Hopefully, for his sake, he improves over time.
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Lol. This reminds me a bit of the last Predator movie…those guys were cracking jokes too, and it became seriously infuriating. That said, while I love alien invasion stories, and this one honestly doesn’t sound really bad, I’m going to give it a pass. Or maybe I should say…get to the choppaaa!😊
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Humor is a touchy thing, that is for sure. I haven’t watched the latest Predator movie just because I’d heard that issue.
Love that last line! 😀
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Yep…well by sheer coincidence I have a review for that one coming up next week, but erm spoiler alert: it won’t be a positive review😂
Haha…me too….classic Arnold! 😀
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Yeah, better to end things early with the series! Hopefully your next read will be more enjoyable! 🙂
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I’ve got over 200 more books in my calibre library just waiting to be read, so I’d rather take my chances on a new series than continue with some utter mediocrity.
Thanks. Thankfully, the rest of the month seems to be shaping up a bit better 😀
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Your issues in this book with ideas of characters not being characters feels like what I have with the review of Battle for Abyss I still need to write up… Great review even if it was a two star book, I’ll stay away from this one.
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too many writers can’t write convincing characters. Sometimes that isn’t a problem, but most of the time it is.
Hope writing that review goes well.
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Havent even started. Had enough time for only two posts that went up tonight
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The synopsis for this book reminds me of those B-movies (or rather, C- and D-movies) that can be found looking for SF in the Netflix or Amazon catalog: really bad movies, all shootings and explosions and no substance. And your description of the characters (or lack thereof…) reinforces my impression…
Thanks for the warning! 😉
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The authors need a lot more practice to get some believable characters.
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Finding that balance between enough and not too much humor can be hard, but it sounds like this one didn’t even come close. Oh well.
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Oh well indeed 🙂
The positive is that I was able to dump the whole series and add a new one to my kindle. I always like when I can add a new series to my reading rotation!
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I do enjoy the feeling I get when I’m done with a series, whether I’m “done” because I read all the books, or because I abandoned the series entirely!
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😀
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I have a pet hate for books changing the name the character goes by all through the book. If he is John Smith, tell us he goes by John, Johnny, Smith, Smithy, whatever but stick with it! I hate when John becomes Smithy then is suddenly called a new nickname like ‘Dave’ and it gets so annoying!
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And it didn’t help that all the characters were cardboard and had zero personality 😦
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Characters being ideas instead of people sure does make for a long, arduous adventure! I don’t think I could handle it. 😛
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At least in Atlas Shrugged, the personification of ideas still had some personality 😀
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