Derek Lawrie
As usual from Harris it's an enjoyable thriller, the last quarter dropped a little into a Hollywood cliche, but it was never going to be perfect (ie he's never been better than Fatherland and Enigma, so more WWII please!)
Very clever stuff based around the fact that the red shirted crew member always died on Star Trek away missions. No need to be a Trekkie/Trekker (my splitting of the term might give something away there) either, it's light comedy and some existential musings. It's not perfect, but you get the impression that Scalzi knows that and is happy with it.
Pretty good, bit of a slow burner (no pun intended) as it doesn't appear to be going anywhere and it isn't as big a plot as you would normally expect for Reacher, especially after the serial killer story in The Visitor.
Not disappointed though, yet to find one of the series that genuinely let me down.
Written in the same style as Conan Doyles originals and eminently enjoyable, not sure how they could wangle any more novels out of it though?
I like the tv show but this is better, its a plot they used on the show but with a different killer and different reasons. The show does get quite a lot things right, with some minor name changes and they didn't lop off Peter Wellers leg in order to play Lucian (he is still spot on though). Quite looking forward to reading the rest of these.
Loved it as expected, took an age to get through, also as expected and what an ending! You can't do that! Although to be fair he has been getting rid of characters at a good rate.
I would liked to have seen more of Bran, especially once they got to where they were going. Some Rickon would have been good, and a bit more Arya at the end there, she's got to come back to Westeros surely?
Loved it, my only grievance is that when one character appears in the novel they as good as have a huge neon sign above their head screaming guilty. Still doesn't detract from the story, and always makes me feel a little special at the end when I see that I was right. It was probably written for idiots like me to feel that way.
Contains spoilers
Very mild spoilers in here, not really directly mentioning any of the plot, but if you don't want to know anything you probably shouldn't be reading personal reviews like this.
Like many others I had been greatly looking forward to this after 'I Am Pilgrim', and the first half to two-thirds is pretty good, not up to the previous novels standard but still good, then it, well, it takes an unexpected turn into basically a different genre for 60-100 pages and then sort of returns to what it started out as.
It didn't deter me, but it was certainly jarring and the story at that point is rife with trite cliches as well (maybe it always was and I just didn't notice till that point), and I forged on and finished it, but what I did finish wasn't the book I started.
Really odd it's almost Hayes got about two-thirds through, and something happened (COVID at a reasonable guess, not that it has has anything to do with the plot, but it does get mentioned), it's like he just couldn't decide what to do with it so made a radical sidestep. I suppose if you look at two of the more famous screenplays he was responsible for you get an inkling of where things could go from the standard spy far I thought I was getting.