Friday, March 22, 2013

The Second Ship by Richard Phillips



Book:  The Second Ship 

Author:  Richard Phillips 

Grade:  D+  to B -   (I'll explain, I promise) 

Recommended to:  God.  Knows. 

Life has been crazy.  The hubs and I bought a new house and we move into that house in one short week.  Our apartment is in shambles and we have not achieved nearly enough packing. Plus, I started a new job this week and although the new job has started slowly, my prior employment was a crazed whirlwind in the last two weeks.  So, I haven't had that much time to read.  It doesn't help that The Second Ship is alternately a wretched mess of WTF and a fairly good story probably written for teenagers.

This book probably clocks in at about 500 pages - but I got it on my kindle for 2 bucks along with the other two books in the "Rho Ship Series."  I had never heard of this, but it was cheap and Goodreads gave it some decent reviews, which is usually a winning combination.

This book is about three teenagers who discover a spaceship in the Los Alamos desert.  Naturally, they explore, have huge changes in their abilities, and blah blah blah.

Unfortunately, this book feels like it was written by three or four different authors and then mashed together in a rotten mess.  The dialogue is some of the worst that I've read in a long time.  And I can't figure out if this book is written for teenagers or not.  There are some very adult themes, like a creepy dude named Priest, who kidnaps women and then rapes them.  There is an enormous cast of characters with lots of different story lines and plot points that don't necessarily make sense.  Many of the characters are flat and one-dimensional and often plot points happen with little to no explanation.

Fortunately, there are some (few) good bits.  And they are enough to keep my attention for the nearly two weeks it has taken me to finish this book.  I don't know if I will be reading the next two in the series, but I can't in good conscious recommend this book as a good read to anyone.

Goodreads failed me on this one.

Happy Reading!


No comments:

Post a Comment