Reviews and Comments

»Titus Andronicus: all cast members line up onstage, and at a signal, begin hacking at each other with swords, blood bladders spraying high-pressure Max Factor Red #2.« That is the abridged version of the Shakespeare play, according to John Varley.

This book is very much like that, but with guns, and the people shooting at each other are priests.

Half way in i just gave up trying to keep up with who is who, who is still alive, and who is on which side. Doesn’t really matter.

I wrote some comments on the »Gospel of Jesus« and the bones of Jesus. Turns out, they are even more fake than i thought. As such, they are a useless MacGuffin. Which leaves the whole carnage pointless.

There are also nasty people that we were supposed to admire, i think. For example the French police man, who not only smokes indoors. There is a surprising amount of sexism, every man thinks the one woman in the main plots needs to be »protected«, or »has« to grab her hair for no reason. Ableism, too.

OK, the bits from page 142 would be a problem. But only if the Church itself would substantiate the claim. And skeptics still wouldn’t believe it.

»The Gospel of Jesus«, Yeshua ben Joseph being alive in 44 CE. Those are the two bits of writing that this book is about. The basic idea seems to be that those bits of information would shake the Roman Catholic Church. That i don’t believe. First nobody would care. Then there would be years and years of discussion on the dating. Then the Gospel of Jesus would be declared pseudepigraphic. The note of some Yeshua could just as well be about some other guy. Neither Yeshua nor Yosef were really rare names.

Also, there already is the Pistis Sophia, were the resurrected Jesus was hanging around some 11 years. That hasn’t brought down the Roman Catholic Church.

Oh, well. That’s what fiction is. But still, the author gives unnecessary many details, and they are just off. The book is set at a very specific time, November 2010. And one guy is on a cruise in the Mediterranean. Just calling the ship he was on the ship would have been fine. But no, the author had to stick in there that the guy is on the Mariner of the Seas. And, while mostly cruising the Caribbean, that ship did go to the Mediterranean. But in 2011, not 2010. In 2010 it was off the west coast of North America.

»The elderly archeologist« … is literally unbelievable stupid. We have a first century text we need translated, and it is urgent. Why would that be urgent? Why would he have to immediately go and fly to who knows where? Why in the middle of the night? You have an ancient text to translate? Great. We have a basement full of them. It is urgent, you say? Why? The text has waited for centuries, it can wait a few days more. Oh, and send me a scan now, a photo if you have to!

OK, so, on surprises this is low. Another one of the »everybody knew the protagonist was trans, except for the protagonist« story. But that is what we are here for.

The world building was fun. I liked the wedding ceremony at the end.

If you want to put an antenna mast on the skyscraper that has a helipad on top in this world, that is fine. But please, not both! Landing on a helipad, where you don’t have a proper view of the ground all around is hard enough. Going in through a maze of antenna masts? No. No, no, no no! Much too dangerous!

Ok, two things. They don’t seem to do proper debriefings after the encounters. There Claire could have mentioned the ceiling she hit, what is later called the wall (the Wall?).

Also, Nova has now thrown her cymbals twice. I don’t think she mentioned the second time to the armorer. This sounds like a dramatic complication in the next fight, were they probably will shatter.

But that is what the armorer is for. Long-term durability isn’t really a thing with modern weaponry. If you can win a fight in a way that weakens your weapon you do it. But then you mention it in the debriefing, so that something can be done about it.

(I just recently heard about US Navy pilots more or less deliberately ruining the engines on their planes: by saving fuel they put a lot of wear on the engines. But the choice was saving the pilot and the airframe, or losing it – together with the pilot and a pristine engine.)