Rameau Friday: An Officer's Duty - Jean Johnson

I’m rounding up the rating because while it wasn’t as good as the first in the series I really enjoyed reading the book.

As Ia advances through the ranks of the Terran Space Force she continues to walk that very thin line between lie and deceit in the best interest of all humanity. It takes her to the Navy Academy and pilot school… and I lost count on how many things I’m misrepresenting in my review. Military isn’t my forte.

The world of future is still there, only expanded and further explored. The ever changing character gallery introduces new faces and names all the time while rotating a couple of familiar names to focus for a while. There were some I’d missed but didn’t see, and there were some I hadn’t missed but glad to see all the same. 

What’s different to the first book is the shifting focus onto Ia’s character growth. Johnson doesn’t switch genres in the middle of a series but she does spend some time on illuminating through the interactions with her family who Ia was before she became hell bent on saving the galaxy, and who she could be if she wasn’t so stubborn to not allow anything for herself. 

And that’s where this book’s greatest weakness lies. 

Ia does find her Achille’s heel, which was something I’d been waiting to see from the very start. Just as Johnson, Ia doesn’t quite know what to do with it, but she tries. And it would have worked—adequately—hadn’t that revelation discussion been botched. In my opinion Johnson fails to hit that precious balance between avoiding repetition and doing justice to the character—Ia’s blind spot in this case. What I read was rushed and unsatisfactory instead of a poignant scene between two people facing and accepting a personal tragedy. I am glad, though, that the heel wasn’t completely forgotten and I’m hoping that as the series progresses the character gets a chance to pervade Ia’s life just as Bennie has. 

I like Bennie and hope to see much of her in the future. August can’t come soon enough.

4 stars
Series: Theirs Not to Reason Why #2
Pages: 439 (paperback)
Publisher: Ace
ISBN: 9781937997690
Published: July 31th 2012
Source: Bought

Review: A soldier's duty - Jean Johnson

Ia is a precog, tormented by visions of the future where her home galaxy has been devastated. To prevent this vision from coming true, Ia enlists in the Terran United Planets military with a plan to become a soldier who will inspire generations for the next three hundred years-a soldier history will call Bloody Mary.

My thoughts:

I always have a hard time remembering what people are named in books. Of course I keep track of who is who, even if there are lots of characters. But as soon as the book ends names slip my mind. Well not this time, Ia is an easy name to remember ;) That and the fact she was totally kick-ass.

Anyway, I did not end up liking the book as much as I wanted to. As always do not get me wrong. That does not mean the book is bad. No, it was well-written, thrilling and interesting. Will she save the universe? (even if I mostly want to travel forward in time to see if it all works out). 

The negative thing is that it was very very heavy on the tech and military jargon. Not something I find particularly interesting to read about. Also this one character was so hard to understand. 

Just like I tend to skip sex scenes in other books (none here though, nothing of that sort at all, no romance no sex), when it came to be too much military stuff I skimmed. It's not that it was heavy, just boring for me.

But I do wonder what happens next. It's quite the undertaking to write about someone trying to save the universe hundreds of years before things go bad. And I do wonder what will go wrong?

conclusion:

If you like sci-fi then yes give it a go, or if you like military books, action, suspense.

Cover
Kick-ass

Series: Theirs not to reason why #1
Genre: Sci.-fi
Pages: 432
Published: 2011 by Ace
Source: Own

Tomorrow there will be a review of book 2 and Rameau is taking care of that.