u/HamMcFly

My son went through his old cards and found everything in the second picture.

This was a great example of a book I just wish someone else wrote.
By that I mean I enjoyed the idea, the story, but the execution was just not for me.
Unfortunately, I really only have complaints here.
First off, we had pieces missing.
Meaning some things were just not explained.
One part, extremely important to the story, which might have been given at least a few pages worth of description in other books, was left at assumption because the chapter ended before the reveal and then we just moved on without discussing it again.
There was also a side story that seemed to be an important part of the character’s development that was introduced immediately, but then not discussed again until the book was almost over. Never quite explaining what it was.
Both of those are problematic for me.
But my biggest problem with this book was the volume of SAT words.
Remember that Friends episode where Joey uses a thesaurus for every other word?
Holy hell. I don’t consider myself a wordsmith, but I’m not the dullest crayon in the box either.
I was looking up words on every other page.
This was written by two authors. I have read multiple Kadrey books and don’t remember this problem so I’m fairly sure Ms. Khaw is a lexicophile (yes I looked that up).
More power to her, but I may be too simple for her style.

International refractor /100

The only real problem with this book is that I’ve read 4 other Moore’s.
If this was my first Moore, I probably would have loved it.
As it is, it’s my 5th favorite.
At times, was just as funny as the other Moore’s I’ve read, but slowly became repetitive.
I feel like half the story was jokes about shagging.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of shagging jokes, but when it’s over and over and over, it’s gets sore am I right? Anywaaaaays….
Did I enjoy it? Very much.
Would I recommend it? Very much.

And the look my kids give me when I ask if they’re excited about school starting 😃

I think this falls in the do not recommend bucket.
I wanted to like it. It’s a spy book with a touch of personal issues for most of the main characters. There are a couple twists. The overall story is interesting, well written.

But there are some things I did not enjoy that were just too much for me.

Parts of it were narrated by something rather than someone.
Like the spy ghost.
Or the idea of a spy ghost.
Or just the collective conscience of spies.
I’m not sure but it was weird and referred to itself in the first person, yet was never explained.

Also there are numerous parts that don’t seem to add anything to the story. While that alone is not a bad thing, he puts so much effort into being mysterious, that you expect everything ties together somehow, so some of these random passages are just aggravating.

He also says “or something like that” a lot.
Like 4 or 5 times through the book is a running joke. 20+ times just gets annoying.

And finally, the end is incomplete.
I’m sure plenty of people will read this and think it’s perfect, but it’s not for me. Multiple characters got an almost ending, but ultimately it’s not explained what happens next. Leave it wide open for interpretation or just finish the thought. That’s my preference.

I think the most damming thing is it just didn’t hold my attention. There are three parts, but no chapters, just breaks. So every couple pages, there’s a break, and I’d put it down to check my phone or watch the ballgame some. Go back to it after a few mins. Just wasn’t excited about it

Almost a month to be delivered from China.
Of course a US one popped up for less like a week after I bought this..

Damn this was a wild ride.
Full disclosure, I’d picked up maybe 20 books not finding something to check out when I finally went with anything that included a body in the woods.
Probably sounds bad when I say it like that, but I prefer mysteries and thrillers and they usually have dead people.
Anyways, so this started as a kind of funny book. The longer it went on, the more I realized the focus was on OCD and/or PTSD and the internal struggles of that.
Though I will say, the author does a great job of adding humor within, without making light of said struggles.
The story is split between a young girl dealing with personal trauma and the journal of a hiker lost in the woods.
I’m not sure I’m clever enough to explain much more without giving away spoilers, but it goes from “hey this is funny” to “oh this is serious” to “damn this is sad”, all pretty quick.
Definitely a book I would recommend and will keep my eyes open for her next one.

Continue to be a big fan of the Davenport books.
There was a little more “luck” than usual in solving this one, but it was a unique story with some interesting new characters.
Less of the old crew than in most, which is good to mix up also.

I feel like the main character is becoming more relatable as he settles down and leans less into the topic of his wealth.
This character being very wealthy is unique (and sometimes handy plot wise), but obviously makes him less relatable.