SnakesCrap Novels! On A Plane (Bookblogging #21)

Because I read fast, I often burn through my reading material well before the end of a road trip. In these cases, I have to buy a cheap paperback at the airport and hope. Sometimes it works out, sometimes I end up with Killer Instict by Joseph Finder. This is a bad book which only wishes it could get optioned to become a bad movie.

First things first - the plot is ludicrous. Random down on his luck super-baddie insinuates his way into our hero's life and, and, and...James Spader! Somehow our hero transforms himself from complete wuss to corporate knife-fighter, yet is still too much of a doofus to see that JAMES SPADER is in fact, a Bad Influence.

Second, this is NOT a plot where starting at the end works well. Any suspense as to where we are headed is kinda ruined by putting the denoument in the prologue.

Third, TALKING KILLER FALLACY! This one just drives me nuts, even moreso in books than in movies. Just kill him and stop talking about it. Of course, that's a much shorter book with no happy ending, and we can't have THAT, now can we?

I guess the one positve is that there is an attempted assasination using Snakes...In A Bedroom? wATFO of that?

I'm skeptical of Amazon reviews, becuase I think there is a great deal of Astroturfing going on (and that's in cases where The General has not been at work.) That said, this one (amidst the sea of recycled tire products) tells it like it is:

What Mr. Finder does not know about the military could easily fill a book. Unfortunately, he chose to fill THIS book with a lot of made-up (at times laughable) cliches about what he thinks the military ought to be about -- and he is equally ignorant about how the corporate world really works. sometimes his dialogue and plot devices make one want to laugh out loud, though the author is dead serious and that is not the reaction he was seeking. The only thing that saves this book from zero stars is its rapid pace and serviceable prose. I will never buy any book written by him again.

Other than that, how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?

Pooh's View: Thank you, no.

Cross-Posted at Kakistocracy