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My rating is generous

Revisado: 02-23-25

I almost stopped listening to this book multiple times due to the incessant rambling on and on about.. pretty anything not involving the action of the story.

I find the bloated descriptions of characters to drag on and on, while serving only to reduce them to very shallow caricatures and stereotypes. While the point of the book seemed to be judging those who do precisely that.

The amount of time spent on the actual action and movement of the story seemed very little by comparison.

I don’t want to reveal any plot details, so I won’t elaborate very much.

Evan’s character also continues to approach targets woefully unprepared, and without sound principles. From which sound tactics are derived.

For example, if your ambush permits the target to think, then it’s not really an ambush - it’s a friendly greeting.

And if the targets begin the ambush all crammed together in a single vehicle - then they’d better end the ambush all dead in the same single vehicle. Or your ambush really, really sucked.

I find Evan’s arrogant yapping to his targets to be maddening as well. Just handle your business.

Yapping is the general thing I most dislike about these novels.

Even the most well intentioned kid is a moron. Fine. Do we need to dwell on it?

Tommy’s voice and manner of speaking is cute in small doses, but it feels like what Evan did to Janus having to listen to Tommy for more than five minutes. Although the narrator is awesome at what he does - but he’s just reading what’s already there.

Evan still does not appear to carry any backup weapons. And this guy actually gets captured in the middle of a.. magazine change - while on assignment.

The author’s writing of the actual action I did find to be very good and suspenseful - even if the main character was making nonsensical choices and violating basic principles.

Action is fun and entertaining. Lecturing the reader is irritating. I get it - murdering innocent families is something we should all try to avoid. Fine. Noted. Unless they’re the wrong color of crayon.. wait - that’s not good either. Ok. Also noted.

One of my irritations with authors is writing characters as if all the characters aren’t just aspects of the author. Essentially meaning that all the characters are just saying what the author is thinking - not what the “characters” are thinking.

In this way, the author just indulges his own stereotypes, while pretending they’re different characters. The characters in this book were extremely shallow caricatures, while being presented as deep psychological studies or something.

I’ve always said that empathy is a mental illness. A projection. A delusion. You will never understand people. You don’t even understand yourself.

Much better to let your characters be mysteries. Like real people. Not media stereotypes or author caricatures. Not propaganda puppets.

Two benefits to only writing action, with minimal sermonizing and psych analysis:

(1) Action is a hell of a lot more fun and entertaining
(2) The action ITSELF will give you a glimpse into the character of the characters, WHILE leaving a bit of mystery as to the full scope of their inner motivations - thus presenting them as real people and not as psychological stereotypes and circus caricatures.

This one mistake is most common among authors, and the one I find most irritating. I’ll take nonsensical action in trade for psycho gibberish all day every day.

You CAN’T go wrong with action that keeps moving. Just like in your own life. Do you ideally want to sit around whining to yourself endlessly - or do something else?

Reading a book is no different to me. Less self righteous ruminating, any more action.

The action is itself the explanation. An explanation that will never be fully explained. Just like real life. And the mystery itself adds to the suspense and intrigue. To the fun.

Do you even understand why you do most of what YOU do? Of course not. So the idea that an author’s going to perfectly explain the psychological makeups of his characters is futile. It’s really a reflection of the author’s desperation.. Just let it go, brother..

Of course, if one of the author’s objectives is propaganda, while pretending to hate propaganda - thus implying credibility to his own propaganda - then he has no choice but to use stereotypes and caricatures. This is how you brainwash.

Regardless of motivation - it’s gotdamn annoying. I almost quit listening entirely many times, but instead just keep fast forwarding to get back to the action.

The action was fun and suspenseful. I do feel that as an assassin, Evan is incompetent though. But, heh, that’s real life too. It’s still suspenseful.

I’d just rather listen to incompetent action, then shallow, stereotypical, self righteous sermons and descriptions of people.

I myself practice what I call the “neutral mind”. Not to be confused with the way this phrase may be applied by others, since the phrase itself isn’t unique.

By neutral mind, I mean that I practice observing people and things without forming conclusions or judgments. This is actually very difficult. It’s also the way I’d prefer to read a book. You let things unfold rather than trying to box them in.

I will say that, in a way, the author was also making the statement that people are not as they may first appear. I’m just saying that he did it in the most annoying way possible.

Better way to do it: A character does something horrible. Then the same character does something awesome. But it’s never really explained why the character did either. You may have some idea. Or no idea. Based on the.. action.

Words are part of action too. But overrated in large quantities.

Think of meeting a person in real life who talks about himself - or about anything - for too long, while you tuned out 30 minutes ago, while trying to be polite. That person can’t take a hint. It’s self indulgent and annoying. Whatever their reason for rambling on and on - it’s still an irritating imposition to you..

The reader.

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esto le resultó útil a 7 personas

Increasingly frustrating

Revisado: 12-25-24

This series is becoming increasingly frustrating and unsatisfying to listen to, as the storylines meander nonsensically.

The action, and with it the suspense, is constantly being ruined by the constant interruptions of the characters’ inner thoughts, which drone on and on and on. I don’t want to hear these people whining to themselves for half the story. I want to hear the actual story.

These books could be cut in half by sticking to the action. I personally despised the Game of Times series. I cannot overstate the degree to which I despised that series. This series appears to be mimicking many of the same self indulgent tendencies.

Also, I have yet to like or respect any of the characters. There is yet to be found a leader in this series who actually thinks like a leader. And not a loser. I despise Ando, for example. This guy is a paper tough guy.

The evil king was the closest, but very short sighted. Very childish. Which is what cruelty is.

I’ll probably quit after this book. I like bad ass characters who can also think more than zero steps ahead. Who don’t spend most of the time whining about the past, and whining about anything that can be whined about. It’s maddening to listen to the inner thoughts of losers.

You don’t need to hear the inner thoughts of winners, cuz they’re too busy kicking ass.

The characters who are ostensibly supposed to be the good guys in this series spend all their time walking into obvious traps, or equivalent mistakes of judgment. Once or twice, fine. But I can’t think of the last intelligent, strategic move yet made by a protagonist.

Ando is a classic example. No intelligent character should follow this loser as a leader. This guy specializes in getting his protectees killed. Supposedly this clown was the genius “high commander” of the series. Yet none of his actions or thoughts reflect a single iota of tactical or strategic competence of any kind. Following him is like following a petulant preteen.

Further, if a book is going to involve a lot of battle and violence, then intelligent strategy and tactics would make it more enjoyable. The author has zero understanding of these things, and appears to just be writing this like a soap opera, that meanders nonsensically, but with no guiding vision. I feel as if the author is as clueless as the reader as to what will happen next. Just making up mindless crap. That kind of not knowing what to expect next is not the suspenseful kind. Just annoying as hell. Like a soap opera.

Cut the books in half by removing the mindless inner dialogue. Have some kind of a plot and a vision. Then twists within this plot add suspense and not maddening annoyance.

I will likely finish this book, having paid for it, but not continue the series. This should maybe be categorized as youth fiction.

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I enjoyed the whole series

Revisado: 10-25-24

And I look forward to more from this author. Nothing really irritated me while listening to this series. I actually just enjoyed everything.

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More or less enjoyable

Revisado: 09-29-24

I like this series for the most part, and the tactics seem a lot more plausible than usual. Things like employing volume of fire, instead of perfect headshots every time.

However, The American Mercenary series is far superior to this one - it’s actually more of a fantasy series disguised as a.. whatever you call this stuff.

I really wish Rivers would have become the handler. The potential there is enormous.

Instead, he’s a lap dog for the CIA, running meaningless missions for nags who treat his team highly disrespectfully.

Trying to imagine killers permitting any level of disrespect, or micromanaging is.. impossible really. There would not be a second time.

This series, while interesting, is boring, and far more naive (propagandistic) than the American Mercenary series. The whole “terrorism” thing is for children.

Rivers as the handler, instead of a dog for the CIA. If that were the case, the CIA would be answering to him, one way or the other.

As the handler, he could still kill bad guys all the time. Much more effectively. With more guys. No rules. More money. I mean, why is he not the handler?

Plus, you could have the development of Langley into her full potential as the inheritor..

Rivers literally nuked a criminal syndicate in the last series. Now he’s being nagged and henpecked by bureaucrats.

I really miss the potential thrown away after the Mercenary series. Now it’s just the same mindless CIA nonsense.

That said, I still find the stories entertaining. If also maddening. Having your boss stalk you to a grocery store to meet you without your permission is another thing that should not end well for them.

I actually miss the original handler too. Loved that guy. You can at least respect a boss like that guy..

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My favorite author in this genre

Revisado: 09-13-24

It’s interesting reading the other reviews. The low reviews are clearly from very shallow, unreflective and self righteous.. people, I’ll call them.

David Rivers is a great character. The writing is great, although I dropped one star only because, like all writers at first, the books are over-written. But that gradually starts going away, and I think the author finds his groove.

Still, these books are unique. Dark, maybe. Honest, a better description.

Heh, start listing your own thoughts and tell me most of em ain’t dark. Otherwise you’d be floating on clouds 24/7. That’s the battle. It’s inside.

These idiotic low reviewers do the same thing as Rivers, in their own self righteous particular way, yet fixate on his suicidal musings.

Rivers, by the way, ain’t really suicidal. Just bored. Just like you, at your useless job you hate, after which you medicate with your particular brand of escape. Or maybe the job is the escape.

Whatever. These books are better enjoyed by those capable of honest self reflection. I enjoy the philosophical as well as the violent. Really, they’re inseparable. After all, what is more violent than one’s inner battle with themself?

“Mightier is the man who can conquer himself than one who can take an entire city.” But there is not yet the man who can conquer himself, is there?

Of course there is - every clown leaving a low review because all this sailing far over their heads. Their virtue is surrender, and submission, and compliance. Everything that makes the sheep the sheep.

While they escape in ridiculous fantasies of violence that they consider “realistic “ because it’s all clinical and precisely choreographed, which is entertaining. Then they compare this “realism” to books like these, and call these books “unrealistic.”

Every book is a fantasy, obviously, but the violence in these books is far more realistic than the clinical nonsense in most of the books in the genre.

Particularly those by the never ending deluge of Navy SEALS who I’ve come to despise as frauds and actors. Which is clear from their writing.

These books, however, have more of the ring of truth. Yes, they’re made up, being fiction. But the tactics actually make sense. Violence isn’t clean precision. Actual violence isn’t entertaining, but a chaotic bloodbath, where time and chance play a huge role as well.

As an example, the way Rivers took on and took out 4 out of 5 skilled operatives coming for him at one point. He didn’t do it with fancy double taps to all their foreheads.

Initial ambush position from a sniper hide. Immediately changing locations. Emptying a magazine thru a ceiling. Shotgun up a ladder. Grenade down a stairway. Not pretty. But that’s about the best shot he was going to get.

So, action and tactic-wise, I enjoyed these books, because it’s better to me when the actions make sense, since I’m a reflective and considerate thinker. I enjoy the philosophical. I enjoy tactical thinking as well, but not when most books in this genre merely obsess with tactical gear.

Tactical thinking makes literally everything tactical gear.

Rivers really suffers from boredom, not suicidal whatever. Psychologists are losers. If they weren’t, then they themselves would be floating on clouds 24/7. They specialize in passing judgment on others, yet they will never find peace themselves. The professionally self righteous.

Boredom may sound like nothing. But really, is there anything worse than boredom in life?

Life must be intended for the purpose of full enjoyment. Boredom is the opposite.

Boredom is like that abyss you stare into. It IS the abyss you stare into. It’s a void.

Into that void then comes the things you think of as the negatives: guilt, fear, etc. Suicidal or homicidal whatever.

If Rivers was actually suicidal then he’d already be dead. That’s how you know someone is actually suicidal - cuz they’re dead.

Suicide is just an interesting thing to think about. But not interesting to actually do - cuz then you can’t think about any other interesting things.

The majority of people - are the majority of people for a reason. Read the low reviews. They’ll tell on themselves.

For any honest, reflective person, these books are quite good. A bit over-written initially - but still better than any of the garbage involving Navy SEALS in any form - and they find their groove.

As if America isn’t already a huge embarrassment to itself - because of its mindless citizens - Navy SEALS seem determined to finish the job. So just the lack of Navy SEALS in any form - I don’t even think any of the characters were ex Navy SEALS - was so refreshing.

I’ll take suicide over Navy SEALS all day every day. Only thing better would be the suicide of.. um…

Lost my train of thought there, staring into my coffee, as it swirled into a giant abyss..

I enjoyed these books, and anything I enjoy is worth enjoying. Because I’m honest.

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Entertaining, with cautionary note

Revisado: 09-09-24

This was pretty entertaining. I rate it high despite the usual load of things that don’t make sense, like carrying a computer with your entire strategy on it into battle.

The cautionary note is the reminder that anything you say can and will be used against you.

The protagonist is single handedly responsible for an incredible amount of additional casualties - including two downed choppers. Because he felt the need to chat and run his mouth to the antagonist. Thereby revealing critical information that created a change of focus for the bad guy - as well as providing that bad guy with a psychotic level of homicidal motivation.

By running his mouth, he essentially backed his opponent into a corner with info that was threatening to that guy’s survival. The bad guy then began killing lots and lots of people he otherwise wouldn’t have cared about.

This is a lesson, if not an irritation to me as a reader. It’s a common thing in these books. Chatting with the bad guy, instead of just maintaining an obsessive fixation on destroying him.

Which would have been very easy if he’d kept his mouth shut. He even revealed his compromise of the enemy coms - by talking on them to the bad guy!

Not a genius, this guy. Not a thinker. Therefore, not a killer. Killers want to win, not talk.

But that lesson aside, the book was still entertaining, so I still rate it high, since entertainment is the point.

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Great series, in spite of Stenwold

Revisado: 07-23-24

This is a pretty interesting series. Top notch. All around - story, narrators, characters, etc.

However, I absolutely despise the character Stenwold. This guy is the exact opposite of what a “spymaster” is. He thinks like a little girl. At best like a weak diplomat. I like all the bad characters far more than this character.

A weak, delusional good guy is a far greater liability than any evil character.

The story progresses in spite of this guy’s inexplicable naïveté and failure to grasp the obvious. This guy is literally the anti-“spymaster”. If this guy is your spymaster, you almost have a duty to betray him, or make him go away.

In a way though, that adds to the story. I really hope this guy doesn’t survive much longer.

Regardless, it’s a great series.

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The whining continues..

Revisado: 06-24-24

This book was entertaining. But still annoying. This series appears to be turning into a parody. I won’t give away stuff that happens, but a lot of it is a bit farcical.

The only character I really liked was The Wolf. Lame name, but the least whiny, angst ridden character. The book would have actually been perfect if she’d fully succeeded..

This book seemed particularly obsessed with bemoaning the inevitable horrors of old age. Apparently the author feels that old age is a death sentence.

That’s technically true, I suppose, but not in spirit. Unless you lack the spirit. The idea seems to be that old age makes you a loser eventually.

No. Old age will only expose the loser that you always were before, hidden behind the declining flower of youth. The same way that beautiful prostitutes tend to become very ugly old ladies.

But if you were a bad ass before, you will die a bad ass. Old age changes nothing. It only exposes what always existed.

Many people age quite gracefully. I’ve known many very old people who I admire because they’re so old, yet so still alive and energetic.

The protagonist is a control freak. Which is not the hallmark of grace and joy and longevity. Just cuz the guy’s an assassin doesn’t mean he can’t fully enjoy the work, and adapt as needed to his increasing age, like finely aging wine.

So all that whining about old age was quite annoying. Can we just stick to kickin ass and removing evil?

I would think that a competent assassin would be quite practiced in adaptation. To whatever. Including old age. Old age is just yet another variable to factor. If you’re not going to cry about the other stuff you’re forced to adapt to - why cry about old age?

So, sadly, the female assassin I found to be the most likable character. She just does her business, and moves right along.

As always, it seems in these books, the bad guys actually seem to have better mindsets than the good guys. They just direct those mindsets toward doing bad things.

But the mindset itself is neutral, and works equally well - if not far better, by virtue of righteousness - for the good guys.

“Good guy,” in these type of books, often seems to be equated with “Guilt ridden guy.”

Really?! On your worst day, Mr. Good Guy, you’re presumably not wantonly killing innocent people and plotting great evil. Guilt belongs to them - not to you. Literally.

A good guy is essentially a benevolent psychopath. Once you’ve decided on a course of action to deem to be good, then you will proceed on that course, and no guilt will be permitted.

Further, you will fully enjoy that course of action, because anything good must also be fully enjoyable. If it’s not good then don’t do it. But don’t do it, and then whine about it later.

It’s your desire which makes you good or bad - not the execution. Things can always go wrong. This only bothers control freaks. Whose guilt is essentially a lament that they failed to be God.

But good doesn’t meaning being God. Good means desiring to do good. Nothing more. It is enough.

Guilt is reserved for the bad guy. Enjoyment is reserved for the good guy. So let’s see a bit more relish in the good guys. A little more joy in their craft.

The pursuit of excellence is enjoyment. Not the pursuit of moral perfection - the pursuit of excellence in the work, for its own sake. The pursuit of excellence automatically makes you highly adaptable, and least whiny.

Like an artist. The great artist always wants to do better art. There’s no guilt involved in the art - merely the pursuit of greater excellence.

So the good guy - already having resolved to do good - is not trying to be God, but merely enjoying the excellence of his work.

Anything good is worth enjoying. Not whining about.

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Not great

Revisado: 05-27-24

At this point in the series I think it’s most likely this series was ghost written by a woman.

The main character is extremely annoying, as before, but in the last two books I felt the story and other characters made up for this.

But the story and plot in this book was nonsensical. I won’t elaborate as that would spoil it, but basically it’s like a whiny girl blaming everything on God.

I also find the fake “profanity” extremely annoying. Another hallmark of Sanderson’s books - or whoever really writes many of them.

I didn’t realize this was fiction for teenagers, so that’s my fault. Although I wish that fact was more prominently displayed.

However, when I was a teenager, I didn’t read “teenage” fiction - whatever the hell that’s supposed to be. It seems demeaning to teenagers to write down to them, and not just write for adults, which is what teenagers actually are.

I suspect a woman may be writing all of the teenage books under Sanderson’s name. But it’s a teenager really too stupid to enjoy his regular books?

I find that annoying because having enjoyed many of his ostensibly regular books, I didn’t realize that others were for little girls, essentially. Which is what teenage fiction amounts to - it’s very effeminate.

The main character, unless I forgot an exception, always got beat up - badly - by smaller girls. Literally the entire series. That’s an odd thing to consistently write.

So the ghost writer is a bitter woman as well. The main character never really acts like a real man. But if you imagine him as a teenage girl, everything he does makes perfect sense.

A bad ass killer of superhuman’s would not act as this “guy” does. The writer, while portraying him as the hero of the series, can’t keep herself from constantly emasculating him as a male figure. Even constantly belittling his kissing, of all things, which is odd. And bad kissing doesn’t exist simultaneously with genuine passion. Which the main character is supposed to be overcome with.

So the bitter female writer has never experienced actual passion. So stop whining in book form then, and reevaluate your relationship selections.

I’m still annoyed that a thing called teenage fiction even exists. If you’re a teenager, just read regular adult fiction, for Christ’s sake. Are you only partially literate or something?

You’re already adults. Act like it. You’re smarter than condescending literary categories that reduce you to an emotional little girl.

You can be that if you indulge that. And then end up as a bitter, middle aged woman writing this stuff.

Or you can be a bad ass actual adult.

This book was definitely a fall off. The other two at least held my interest with the stories and ideas. While ignoring my deepening irritation with the main character.

This story and the ideas involved just became more and more nonsensical, ending with me completely annoyed.

I also think writers should never write from their opposite gender. I have no idea what it’s like to be a woman, being a male, nor will I ever pretend to. Why would I?

But, as a man, male characters who don’t really think or act like men kind of stand out. The writer has never met or been an actual man. Not a real one. Granted, they’re fading fast from the world…

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Story great, main character annoying

Revisado: 05-26-24

The story was entertaining and interesting.

However, the main character is extremely annoying. I could barely tolerate him, but thankfully the story was good enough to offset this.

In this story, I don’t recall the main character making a single intelligent decision the entire book. And the entire time he’s running his mouth with the most consistently corny jokes perhaps ever recorded in literature. He also gets beat up and out wrestled by a young girl. Pretty standard for him.

Taking him seriously as a killer ain’t happening. But the rest of the story and the characters offset this clown.

The narrator’s voice didn’t help, because I found the narrator’s voice as annoying as the character whose point of view he was narrating the story from. They combined to create an incredibly irritating clown of a protagonist.

It’s possible this book is for “young adults” and I missed that classification. But young adults aren’t as lame as the main character.

Although I generally enjoy Sanderson’s books, because they have intriguing worlds, ideas, and stories, I also tend to find the main character of each book barely tolerable, and extremely annoying.

There’s also this delusional running theme through his books of converting evil beings to good ones. To make this idea more tangible, imagine talking a pedophile out of his love for small children. Same thing.

Which creates another common irritation in literature which is essentially sympathy for the devil. Creating weak protagonists who hesitate and second guess at the worst possible times.

Indeed, in this book the main character is, by his teenage girl mentality, single handedly responsible for enabling petty much every bad turn of plot that occurs. He’s that weak, stupid, and useless. While constantly running off at the mouth with lame jokes.


He actually attempts to abduct a superhuman character by.. punching the guy in the stomach.

How the author even thought of that is beyond me. The main character then brags later that he is a “gunman” and has no need for hand to hand skills. A “gunman,” by the way, who can’t hit the sky with a handgun, but only uses rifles. So naturally, he figured that he’d solely rely on hand to hand skills to kidnap a superhuman being. From an ambush, no less, where he has all the options and surprise on his side. Naturally, his ambush fails, he’s about to die - because the “gunman” sucks at weapon retention - but he gets saved by a girl with a rifle. Then later on he gets beat up by a girl he puts a knife to. WTF is going on with this guy?

That’s the kind of stuff that I could barely make it through.

For the record, if you lack “hand to hand skills” while attempting to sucker punch someone - superhuman or not - maybe just play it safe and use a hammer. Although, admittedly, the main character still would’ve hit himself in the balls or something..


Chatting with the devil instead of killing the devil the split second after meeting him - yet another common annoyance of literature found herein.

Despite all this crap, I found the book entertaining in spite of the main character. The ideas are interesting, and the story is interesting. Both of which I focus on more than characters anyway, which helps me ignore the main character’s existence.

As far as the story goes, the main character is actually irrelevant. He’s an idiot. But the story is such that it’s going to unfold a certain way regardless of the idiot narrating it. Which itself is perhaps an interesting idea as well. Since we’re all idiots..

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