So when I gave thes books a chance, I was immediately drawn in by the whimsical narration and the silliness of the world, its gods and all their fumbling creations. it reminded me so much of Hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy and if you’re a fan of those, you’ll understand what I mean.
Raccoon empire indeed. *giggle/snort*
The author does an excellent job of painting the landscape of their world, the factions in it, and how much they all hate each other.
the protagonist, Johnathan, who I wish we’d gotten a bit more time with, feels like the Bilbo Baggins of vampires, which was an amusing twist you don’t see to often in vampire stories. his butler, Miles is also an interesting character with a mysterious past, which tragically is revealed too soon.
Even the rest of the supporting characters are great.
but here’s the rub. while the missions they go on can be exciting, that Bilbo reference I made earlier starts to make more and sense. I won’t spoil anything, but if you’ve read Tolkien, you’ll detect more than a few similarities.
but the worst thing. The. Absolute. WORST. thing about this story is the abusive Over-use of the word: powerful.
every other description of a character of prominence, or even one of our heros is filled to the brim with how powerful they are.
over and over and over and over again.
Even the Raccoon is powerful!
It’s used so many times that the word lost all meaning by the end of the books.
I can’t blame the writer so much as the editor for letting that slide time and time again. but it did reach a point where I would grit my teeth
every time someone was mentioned how beyond powerful they were.
the books loses points just for that.