Reader’s Diary

P. T. Deutermann

This is a very good naval tale about three friends’ experiences in WW II in the Pacific.  The surface combat sequences are particularly good.

Taylor Anderson

Happily, Anderson recovers from the stumble of the last one and this excellent lost in time/alternate Earth series once more hits its stride.

William C. Hammond

“For Love of Country” is a very worthy successor to “A Matter of Honor“.  It continues the story of the seafaring Cutler family and is set in the corsair-infested Mediterranean, the Barbery Coast, and revolutionary Paris.  Unlike the first book in the series, this one doesn’t cram too much plot into too small a book.  I’m looking forward to many more in the series;  number three is due in October, 2011.

Les Johnson and Travis S. Taylor

In this novel, American’s returning to the Moon discover a stranded Chinese crew.   The American astronauts, with the help of a commercial space tourism company rescue the Chinese.  The authors wrote this as an argument for resuming. manned missions to the Moon.  Ironically, all the mishaps that the fictional astronauts experience undermine the authors’ case for manned space flight: the flights accomplish nothing.   There are some interesting scenes in the book,  but it’s all pretty predictable – it’s no “Apollo 13“.

J. D. Davies

The fact that there’s a large degree of similarity in “fighting sail” novels doesn’t keep me from reading every on I can get my hands on.  Still, it’s nice to see an author come up with a new plot device.  J.D. Davies’ trick is to set the action to the Restoration era and enlist his characters in the navy of Charles II.

The main character is Matthew Quinton, son of a loyalist family, trusted by the king, but with virtually no knowledge of seamanship, despite the fact that he’s a ship’s captain.  This wasn’t unusual at that time, but Quinton’s lack of knowledge is why he losses his ship in the first chapter.  He soon gets another one – loyal gentlemen apparently being in short supply – and the story proceeds.

The book doesn’t live up to the promise of its novel original setting.  It’s two thirds over by the time things really get going and the pieces don’t all mesh smoothly.  However, it is Davies’ first novel, so I’ll read more if the series continues in hopes that his storytelling improves.

Julian Stockwin

I love the Kydd series, but this one focuses too much on the setpiece Battle of Trafalger scenes and too little on Kydd and his friend Renzi.  Stockwin spent half  of this book not on his main characters but with a midshipman aboard Nelson’s “Victory”: I enjoyed the other half.  Still, given the excellence of its predecessors I  eagerly await the next Kydd book.