Reviewer Namta Gupta:
Namta is a senior journalist based in New Delhi, India and has been
covering news in all its form for past 5 years. An MA in English and
Human Rights she is an avid reader and loves every piece of fiction
and non-fiction that she can lay her hands on.
Author: Mike Hartner
ISBN: 978-1-927867-31-0
Publisher: Eternity4Popsickle
Follow Here To Purchase I, James (The Eternity Series) (Volume 2)
Author: Mike Hartner
ISBN: 978-1-927867-31-0
Publisher: Eternity4Popsickle
This book is second in the “Eternity Series” of which the first one was I, Walter.
I had reviewed the first book and had then said that “this book would certainly be a big budget Hollywood movie, one day, if any producer has an imagination as rife as the writer of this book."
So how does the second book go from there? Frankly, it is a little disappointing to note that this book seems like an unfinished product and needs serious editing.
In Chapter 17, for example, an entire paragraph has been repeated and there are other mistakes as well that break the flow of the writing.
For any writer, I understand, these points will be heartbreaking to hear, but when a writer has shown good potential in the first work, then it is equally disheartening for a critic to find these mistakes that mar an otherwise good narrative.
Every professional writer needs to invest in a good editor and getting an honest feedback is essential or else the entire exercise and the hard work could be rendered futile.
Another issue with the book is that its characters do not seem to have layers to their roles; even the narrative is linear and sometimes borders on being tepid.
The silence, the fights, the romance and all other elements of the book seem a little dull; this certainly was not the case with the first book.
The good point is that the writer has done good work around the issue of slavery and has handled deftly.
On slavery, the writer has done full justice to the narrative and has shown the glimpses of the same writing style which were the hallmark of the first book.
Perhaps mentioning the first book again and again would be surprising and also annoying for some readers, but anyone who has read the first book will face the same predicament; in that book the writer has raised the issue of child soldiers and the horror that they faced in the battlefields. The beauty of the words that flowed, in describing the scenes, could melt anyone.
In short, we can say that the second book needs more tweaking as most mistakes are not due to any lapses in the storyline but more due to lack of proper editing.
If this can be addressed quickly then this can turn out to be a good series overall.