BookWyrm

ospalh reviewed Blessing of Salmakis by Fern V. Bedek

Fern V. Bedek: Blessing of Salmakis (EBook)

Romeo Valenti is a super star and embraces it. Perhaps a little too much for …

Very much what you expect

5 stars

Surprisingly, the transformation of the protagonist is pretty much the original aftermath of Ovid’s Salmacis story from Metamorphoses.

The rest of the book is just standard Bedek: a non-cis person, this time being genderfluid, getting a supernatural transformation and coming to terms with their hitherto ignored aspect of their personality. Oh, and »harem«/polyamory plot elements. Also, they are rich, which always helps

The story isn’t all that gripping, the editing could be better, but, meh, good enough.

Surprisingly, the transformation of the protagonist is pretty much the original aftermath of Ovid’s Salmacis story from Metamorphoses.

The rest of the book is just standard Bedek: a non-cis person, this time being genderfluid, getting a supernatural transformation and coming to terms with their hitherto ignored aspect of their personality. Oh, and »harem«/polyamory plot elements. Also, they are rich, which always helps

The story isn’t all that gripping, the editing could be better, but, meh, good enough.

ospalh commented on The Papal Decree by Luis Miguel Rocha (Vatican, #3)

Luis Miguel Rocha: The Papal Decree (Paperback, 2011, Michael Joseph)

Oh, look. We do get an age for »little Ben«: 27. The rest of the book he is written about like he was 13 or something.

ospalh reviewed The Papal Decree by Luis Miguel Rocha (Vatican, #3)

Kill, kill, kill, kill!

2 stars

Content warning some plot points

»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.

ospalh commented on The Papal Decree by Luis Miguel Rocha (Vatican, #3)

Amazing action scenes this got! Here is one were two guys ... checks notes walk from one hotel room to another.

Oh, dear.

Amazing action scenes this got! Here is one were two guys ... checks notes walk from one hotel room to another.

Oh, dear.

ospalh commented on The Papal Decree by Luis Miguel Rocha (Vatican, #3)

More general again: Almost every chapter is chronologically written as the middle, the beginning, the middle the end. Maybe that is seen as a brilliant literary technique in Portugal, but for a thriller, read in English, it is annoying.

ospalh commented on The Papal Decree by Luis Miguel Rocha (Vatican, #3)

Content warning premise of the book, revisited

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.

ospalh commented on The Papal Decree by Luis Miguel Rocha (Vatican, #3)

Content warning premise of the book

»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.

ospalh commented on The Papal Decree by Luis Miguel Rocha (Vatican, #3)

Content warning nitpicking: cruises

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.

ospalh commented on The Papal Decree by Luis Miguel Rocha (Vatican, #3)

The English titles of this series (trilogy) is a mess. 1. O Último Papa → The Last Pope. Fine so far 2. Bala Santa → The Holy Bullet. Fine, too. But there are other editions, like Penguin, were this is The Holy Assassin. Um. OK. I guess the bullets are fired by an assasin. 3. A Mentira Sagrada should be The Sacred Lie. But it is not. Some editions are called The Pope’s Assassin. Quite confusing, when you have The Holy Assassin. Penguin didn’t use that. That would have been too much. But the didn’t use The Sacred Lie either, but The Papal Decree, because why not.

ospalh commented on The Papal Decree by Luis Miguel Rocha (Vatican, #3)

Content warning Early plot device

»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!

ospalh commented on The Papal Decree by Luis Miguel Rocha (Vatican, #3)

Oh, dear. So far the writing, or the editing, isn’t very good. Lots of stuff is just repeated. The translation must have changed the units of measurement to American. I don’t believe that a Portuguese author would write about stuff being x feet deep. Most annoying are temperatures. »fifty-fife degrees«. Yeah, that has to be 55 °F. 286 K makes more sense in context than 328 K.

ospalh reviewed Can I Crossdress My Way Out Of This Arranged Marriage? by Fern V. Bedek

Fern V. Bedek: Can I Crossdress My Way Out Of This Arranged Marriage? (EBook)

Our poor Half Elven protagonist had an arranged marriage sprung on him out of the …

Fun read, exactly what you expect

5 stars

Content warning The »reveal«, minor details

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.

ospalh reviewed Magica Riot by Kara Buchanan (Maidensong Magica, #1)

Kara Buchanan: Magica Riot (EBook, Storm Maiden)

Out of the closet and into the fire!

The last night of Claire Ryland's …

A ton of fun. Exactly what was promised.

5 stars

So, yeah. In a way i’m getting to old for magical girl stuff. The fight scenes were well done but, meh, not really for me.

ospalh commented on Magica Riot by Kara Buchanan (Maidensong Magica, #1)

Out of the closet and into the fire!

The last night of Claire Ryland's …

Content warning Nitpicking: aviation

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!

ospalh commented on Magica Riot by Kara Buchanan (Maidensong Magica, #1)

Out of the closet and into the fire!

The last night of Claire Ryland's …

Content warning Minor plot points

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.)