Nathan R.

Sold ending

Revisado: 11-12-24

Solid ending to a fantastic saga. Commanding performance and the story did not loose quality as it progressed.

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Meh. Just a ton of pointless stories.

Revisado: 12-23-22

Struggled to finish.

3 interesting stories amid countless other pointless dull stories with a tiny jewel of interesting plot device that should have been used elsewhere.

Each story would be interesting if it was all leading somewhere. But it's hard to keep track of anyone or anything between all things going on in the universe. If any of these un-flushed out characters show up again I'll never remember them.

Even still, thae stories should all be part of a larger plot/narrative. Unfortunately/fortunately they're all above average individually. Meaning they are interesting in their own way. And they have to be in order to keep your attention. That means that an actual book that moves the 4 horsemen story (mystery) along no-longer has access to these stories.

There's no point in having a no-name merc company that I'm not invested in being a part of some amazing .001% opportunity experience. That should be one of the 4 guilds so that I'm invested.

Look, the first 4 books established two things a universe worth exploring and a mystery. I don't want to explore through anyone else's eyes or anything else. I don't care about some tiny merc company dying in a Forrest. I care about how humanity will overcome alien oppression.

At least everything is believable. I just don't care about the characters.

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Dumpster Fire of Crap

Revisado: 08-12-22

Goodness. What a deviation from the past. Author can't seem to remember what he wrote in the last 4 books or even in the last few paragraphs.

I wondered why I stopped somewhere in the middle of book 3. I'm now trying to slog through the books again. Ugh, cant do it. I can only listen to 30min at a time right now. So bad. I kinda hope the humans all die so that my torment could end.

Begin.... Spoilers.....

Riggs forgets or is clueless to the centaur people's needs of seeing the sky while in transit to the planet. Thus... an entire pod of centaur people die.

There are no consequences to any of Rigg's actions, the centaur people speak of honor. Yet this action doesn't make them distrust Rigg's actions at all? He doesn't have to account for the 'honor'?

Then after being so brazen as to send his 2nd in command home packing after disobeying orders he then doesn't attack the macros after learning they had no military presence at all just because of a little water?

Then he dismisses all of his officers' ideas and only goes with his own?
Why have officers or ask questions?

Why must Rigs always do everything himself? It would make 100x more sense to direct the ground battles from space.

Then he doesn't understand Marvin enough to realize he would want to come to the other side of the ring. Has the MC never dealt with someone who was difficult to work with and would need to be appeased regularly. No? Oh but MC is perfect at dealing with "intellectuals" so much so he can talk himself out of any situation?

It's like Col. Rigg is so sure of himself and so perfect (Mary sue anyone) that nothing ever goes wrong except 'circumstances'. At least in the other books when he went against things something happened. Look, I love a good MC is OP 95%, but that last 5% of loss shows me that the MC is at least somewhat relatable.

As someone of a computer programmer myself the entire scene where he makes spider bombs and they chase the macros is a confusing one.
Kyle Riggs tells Marvin to create spider bombs that chase after groups of macros and explode then proceeds to tell the reader that a group of spider bombs are chasing a single macro towards their group of people this isn't direct violation of the programming that Kyle Riggs gave Marvin to program the spiders and I was just about to give him the benefit of the doubt that he programmed them poorly for not including a safety feature of not exploding near humans but because Kyle Riggs is under duress due to the firefight I can see that Gap in programming knowledge I would also venture to say that Marvin should have told Kyle about that or included it as his own volition because Marvin is an extremely smart robot but I'll give it to them and say that yes the spider robots could kill people unfortunately the scenario in which Kyle Riggs depicts and by Kyle I mean the writer depicts this catastrophe of his ingenious design killing macros turning on them is completely overturned erased mitigated mutilated refuted by the fact that he told the spiders to chase after groups of macros not one macro my goodness this book can't get any stupider.

"Stand down Marines" yes Kyle repeatedly tells veteran Marines to do their job. have you ever heard about checking your fire I mean it's a requirement to know what you're shooting at even a freaking airsoft a game let alone real war I get that the author is hampered by choosing to write fully from first person but mc shoulda heard his marines yelling ceasfire.

The entiee ending scene relies on everyone doing ecactly what Kyle wants. kyle has no zero zilch nada leverage to make people. why would they? hes given them no reason to. my goodness please let this torture end.

I mean the author can write better the last three books were relatively good this book is a gigantic dumpster fire of dog doo doo

Go read lost fleet series or powder mage series. Stop reading this garbage.

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fairly good realistic look at aliens

Revisado: 06-04-22

Good narration
The radio stuff didnt really add to the immersion
A bit slow, but well done none-the-less.
No real sense of urgency or stakes or any antagonist. But that's not the point here.


mini spoiler
I wanted more of the computer and Ivan's interactions.

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Meh, not the best.

Revisado: 01-31-22

Characters are copies of old characters

Voice choice is same as old characters

There is no significant or even minimal loss to the characters at all even though they are all highly incompetent.

Just a string of coincidents and luck get the characters to a 'happy' ending; not skill or tenacity.

The other books are not like this. They are way better. Please Mr. Fox take the time to fully flush out and write the other books especially the Ibarra series as those are the characters I care about. I stopped caring for Hale when he got overly righteous when his sins are just as high as Stacy. I beg of you not to become a serial writer trying to meet deadlines and publisher demands. Don't compromise the quality for a few pennies (okay a lot of pennies). We (readers/fans) can be patient.


Major Spoilers Ahead

Carson infuriates me.
She has no training on how to deal with first contact. I get her character, but she doesn't deserve to lead any mission. She needs a brushup on her first contact protocols. She has the patience of a twit. All she had to do was say first contact protocols are in effect and she'd be ushered all the way to the main din node Nexus thingy.

Hale is annoying as always. Throwing knight into jail because he saved his wife...? What how about giving him a heros party. His precious moral stance is hypocrisy.

Seriously Marie didn't think that another culture/creature wouldn't deceive her and then try to escape? She's stupid.

The ebararas are heros as far as I'm concerned and all anyone can do is say they are traitors insanity.

What I LOVE is the expansive universe that allows many races to work together and build communities. Bastion/new bastion races are all idiots fighting for control and the new perspective is refreshing. Everyone loves a space western! :)

I really like the multifaceted factions and deep backstories and motivations. Really like that aspect. Much harder to create than 'drone army of death'. getting everyone to work together and working with an AI with ultra rules and the altari are different and fun. Love this stuff.

Seriously Carson ruins it for me. She's a moron who deserves to dig trenches. Why is her 2nd in command not leading the mission. He's way more level headed and should be in charge of the squad. I get that her character is flawed on purpose and she's supposed to act like that (impulsive) but it just makes me dislike her more. I guess it's real life. But ugh. Jeez lol at least try. But I do feel that she's stumbling through the mission too much she needs to 'loose something' for how difficult interacting with the regulus should be and how incompetent she is.

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Everyone should read.. we'd have far less hate!

Revisado: 09-06-21

Amazing book if everyone would read and apply just a few of these principles to our daily lives we would have far less hate and a good bit more understanding.

I often desire or default to a hasteful speech pattern instead of a more thoughtful approach to correction and or instruction I thought that it would increase my productivity but instead I get worse results than if I put a little effort into thinking how the other person feels.

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Great #2, w/ some shortcomings; overall pleasing

Revisado: 04-23-21

Narration is great!
Very good second book/continuation of the first book.

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Spoilers:
I realize this is a 1st POV book, so from Wade's perspective I can see how he would think this way... but Wade really doesnt do anything wrong and Samantha is a total jerk. Then she gets back with him for no real reason (other than they might die?) she acts really immature but is tauted as the mature one. meh.

it would have been better in the finale to force sam to use the headset to do the final quest with wade. Also, it was supposed to he the hardest quest but it was the easiest of all the 7 shards to find (besides the final one). Just ruins the suspension of disbelief immersion experience due to being told one thing but being shown another.

Wade is always protrayed as the childish immature kid. Id say its the opposite except for shoto. H tells W to do what she does...he does. W tells H to do what he does...H doesn't. Sam yells & ignores W for 3 years over a simple argument. humans have a short memory, shes broken psychologically.

Anyways not trying to be hyper critical, just reasonably astute to the book's shortcomings.

That said, its protrayed as a very bleak and hard fought win at the end, but thanks to Anarak not many were hurt. I liked the positive ending. It is done well enough to not make me mad at any character for doing something dumb. And is satisfying enough to be a good resolution for the main Plot.

Thanks!

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Great for most, not for me, make wise choices

Revisado: 11-18-20

Andy does a good job here explaining how to make wise choices for most people. It just doesn't apply to me though because I've been taught this stuff since a child by my amazing parents.

That said, I think most people need to read something like this because of how many poor choices people make throughout their lives.

He also spends too much time leading you on with multiple cliff-hangers to the 'big-question'. I get it in todays world of instant gratification this makes sense as it keeps you coming back to the book and is helpful for the type of person who would read this book. But for some people its not necessary (go to the end and I'll have it there).

I think he spends a bit too much time on behaving wisely when it comes to sex or marriage, but I get it there's a huge swath of society that is being hurt by poor decisions in those areas and why he would want to spend time there.

He doesn't do a great job explaining how to make good business choices (seek wise counsel is the answer).
He also doesn't do any explaining on how to make complicated decisions when it comes to God requesting or bringing you to a path that is unwise from a worldly standpoint and from every conceivable answer but God has a plan anyways; that's where I'm at and this book wasn't all that helpful in that regard.

That said, I don't have any (many?) regrets and Andy speaks a lot about regrets due to poor decisions that could have been avoided by wise choice making. I imagine a lot of people make poor choices and would benefit greatly from this book.

He has 5 questions in his extended universe of books/teachings.
1) “Why am I doing this?”
2) “What story do I want to tell?”
3) “Is there a tension that deserves my attention?”
4) “What is the wise thing to do?” (not what is the right thing to do)
5) “What does love require of me?”

And finally, the question(s) he poses in his book: "Ask It"
“In light of my past experience, what is the wise thing for me to do? In light of my current circumstances and state of mind, what is the wise thing for me to do? In light of my future hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing for me to do?”

Or more succinctly:
“In light of my past experience, in light of my current circumstances and state of mind, and my future hopes and dreams, what is the wise thing for me to do?”

I hope this helps, I hate to give a book less than 5 stars, but it's the way I feel about the book and I also think it is the most wise rating I can give it based upon my experiences and mindset. Thanks!

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my favorite series

Revisado: 08-31-20

Few can write as good as this.

It's about the interpersonal relationships, not just the tactics.

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heck yesss so freaking good

Revisado: 06-13-19

One of the best in the series!

can't wait for more oh my gosh so happy

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esto le resultó útil a 1 persona