Helpful Score: 1
Enormously disappointing. There were so many problems, I figured I might as well make a list.
1) Tons of extraneous detail. Usually a positive in Jennings' writing, it's taken to the nth degree here.
2) Way. Way. Way. Too many different POV. We get to hear about the inner musings of some 15 odd different characters and I spent half the time thinking "WHY should I care about this person's thoughts right now? This is boring - why is it here?"
3) Genre confusion. Because both the problem and obvious solution were made clear almost immediately it wasn't a good thriller or very suspenseful and there was minimal romance/erotic aspects. The hero thought a lot about how attractive the heroine was but nothing was acted on except once, towards the end.
4) What's more, any relationship between them was totally unconvincing because the author went to no effort to try and create one. The heroine was always wan and stressed and stoically brave or justly outraged - never in the process of trying to create a relationship of ANY kind.
5) The author tries to sell a really heavy-handed political POV. Several times early on in the book she has different characters mull that the nefarious plot is like so totally Arab, invented by Arabs funded by Arabs oh these Arabs. She has a lot of musings about Israel for some reason including how brave and tough they are and how they have been surrounded by a sea of crazed fundamentalists and etc. She also has a pretty huge screw-up when she has a character reflect ominously on the evil terrorist threat off the coast of Libya the Palestinian Authority was "doing nothing" to prevent. Wha-wha-what? The PA don't have control over their own airspace or borders HOW could they POSSIBLY have any say on what goes on off the coast of Libya? There's a time and a place for politics and a failed thriller/suspense/almost romance ain't it.
I'm taking Elizabeth Jennings and her other pen name Lisa Marie Rice off my autobuy list for sure.
1) Tons of extraneous detail. Usually a positive in Jennings' writing, it's taken to the nth degree here.
2) Way. Way. Way. Too many different POV. We get to hear about the inner musings of some 15 odd different characters and I spent half the time thinking "WHY should I care about this person's thoughts right now? This is boring - why is it here?"
3) Genre confusion. Because both the problem and obvious solution were made clear almost immediately it wasn't a good thriller or very suspenseful and there was minimal romance/erotic aspects. The hero thought a lot about how attractive the heroine was but nothing was acted on except once, towards the end.
4) What's more, any relationship between them was totally unconvincing because the author went to no effort to try and create one. The heroine was always wan and stressed and stoically brave or justly outraged - never in the process of trying to create a relationship of ANY kind.
5) The author tries to sell a really heavy-handed political POV. Several times early on in the book she has different characters mull that the nefarious plot is like so totally Arab, invented by Arabs funded by Arabs oh these Arabs. She has a lot of musings about Israel for some reason including how brave and tough they are and how they have been surrounded by a sea of crazed fundamentalists and etc. She also has a pretty huge screw-up when she has a character reflect ominously on the evil terrorist threat off the coast of Libya the Palestinian Authority was "doing nothing" to prevent. Wha-wha-what? The PA don't have control over their own airspace or borders HOW could they POSSIBLY have any say on what goes on off the coast of Libya? There's a time and a place for politics and a failed thriller/suspense/almost romance ain't it.
I'm taking Elizabeth Jennings and her other pen name Lisa Marie Rice off my autobuy list for sure.
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