There’s multiple reasons for me to rate Zero Hour favorably. Spencer and Finn make a good team and I enjoyed their relationship and interplay immediately. The author gives just enough details, and doesn’t get bogged down. The dialogue is believable and profanity isn’t overused, I mean Spencer IS a sailor. On that note, I enjoyed the bits and bites about sailing, navigation, fishing, and general nautical discussion. For that alone, I would want to hear book two.
I found the secondary and tertiary characters interesting and look forward to seeing if the author chooses to include any of them in future participation.
However, there were a few reasons that kept me from giving it five stars. The way Marathon degrades to Dante’s Inferno almost immediately I guess I can get over. And in the plot summary, it states that Spencer wrestles with what he still perceives as his ‘duty’. And there’s at least a couple of his decisions that I simply think are utterly ridiculous, moral dilemma or not. I think it’s a bit light on word count. The abundance of AR’s is… forgivable I suppose. I guess the circles I travel in, they are not so popular.
Generally, the narrator gives a good performance but I guess there’s always a discrepancy about pronunciation for a few words. I can blame it on regional dialects. He reads with just enough enthusiasm and doesn’t go overboard.