B.V. Larson - star force?
- Thread starter sozme
- Start date
biodroid
A.D.D.
I tend to avoid self published authors on Amazon. I got burned by Hugh Howey and Anthony Ryan.
I've been reading his Battle Cruiser (Lost Colonies #1) and it's been reasonably interesting. However, I can't shake the feeling that the novel is underdeveloped, especially in terms of the characters, plot, and worldbuilding. The prose isn't sloppy - I just can't shake the feeling that its missing something.
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Has anyone else read any BV Larson? Over the past 5 years he's become something of a tour-de-force on Amazon, so I presume we must have some of his readers here?
Guilty as charged. I've read some of BV Larson's stuff. He has a vast library of which I've read some. I would call him above average in Military SF, at least those things that I've read. I think I've read (and that statement might give you more insight than the rest of what I have to say) all his Lost Colonies series. He's heavy on heroes being the key to any victory. I would say that from a critic's point of view the heroes might be a bit one dimensional and the story's a little on the predictable side. Over all I will likely read more and wouldn't tell someone that they should give him a pass
sozme
Well-Known Member
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- Feb 24, 2013
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Welcome to every one of his books (that I've ever read). All of the stories in the main Star Force line are exactly like that.
tinkerdan
∞<Q-Satis
Honestly I hadn't really heard of him until I stumbled across this thread.
I checked the Star Force first novel and was impressed with it as a first novel--though there were quite a number of elements that threw me a bit and I'm not sure from some descriptions that the author has improved much.
I liked the way it began. There was a bit of grittiness about the way people were dying at the beginning and this all tied nicely with the mysteries involving the ships and aliens that were abducting people. Even though the reader doesn't get the whole--true picture of what's going on; there's enough conjecture to build the framework of supposition that is almost enough to help push the reader forward.
However I think that the gritty deaths at the beginning are almost canceled by a miraculous resurrection and the tempered a bit by the failed resurrection of the more important characters. Almost a balance but his female character starts out strong and then just sort of flattens out and doesn't get utilized well at all and if I'm reading things correctly in the reviews this holds true throughout the series and it greatly annoyed me.
The main character becomes almost synonymous to Deus ex Machina so there are a lot of fantastic battles that stretch the suspension of disbelief to a breaking point and the main character seems to bask in the limelight even though there is potential for others to far exceed what he's accomplished.
The middle of the novel sort of stalls out into battle and battle strategy and the strange thing is that the main character who isn't really a strategist seems to overshadow all the characters while he muddles around making mistake after mistake and never being seriously dressed down. (It's hard to take the other characters seriously.)
The last part of the novel has the same flavor as the first with more mystery and obviously there is a revelation that not everything the main character has assumed about the aliens is quite true and they really do think quite differently from flesh and blood humans.
I enjoyed that the aliens were difficult to figure out and understand; while at the same time it was annoying how the main character kept stumbling across ways to discover more about them while trying to deal with their technology that was hopelessly single minded about it's objectives.
I'm not sure that I could endure much more, however it was heavy on the ground pounding battle end and I'm not a great fan of those stories.
It's easy to get hooked into the story so I have to give the author a lot for that; however there is this vast void throughout that even though the main character physically changes a lot he never changes his inner character and the remainder of the cast are just thrown in so there can be a larger body count while he just barely survives(often his own mistakes).
I checked the Star Force first novel and was impressed with it as a first novel--though there were quite a number of elements that threw me a bit and I'm not sure from some descriptions that the author has improved much.
I liked the way it began. There was a bit of grittiness about the way people were dying at the beginning and this all tied nicely with the mysteries involving the ships and aliens that were abducting people. Even though the reader doesn't get the whole--true picture of what's going on; there's enough conjecture to build the framework of supposition that is almost enough to help push the reader forward.
However I think that the gritty deaths at the beginning are almost canceled by a miraculous resurrection and the tempered a bit by the failed resurrection of the more important characters. Almost a balance but his female character starts out strong and then just sort of flattens out and doesn't get utilized well at all and if I'm reading things correctly in the reviews this holds true throughout the series and it greatly annoyed me.
The main character becomes almost synonymous to Deus ex Machina so there are a lot of fantastic battles that stretch the suspension of disbelief to a breaking point and the main character seems to bask in the limelight even though there is potential for others to far exceed what he's accomplished.
The middle of the novel sort of stalls out into battle and battle strategy and the strange thing is that the main character who isn't really a strategist seems to overshadow all the characters while he muddles around making mistake after mistake and never being seriously dressed down. (It's hard to take the other characters seriously.)
The last part of the novel has the same flavor as the first with more mystery and obviously there is a revelation that not everything the main character has assumed about the aliens is quite true and they really do think quite differently from flesh and blood humans.
I enjoyed that the aliens were difficult to figure out and understand; while at the same time it was annoying how the main character kept stumbling across ways to discover more about them while trying to deal with their technology that was hopelessly single minded about it's objectives.
I'm not sure that I could endure much more, however it was heavy on the ground pounding battle end and I'm not a great fan of those stories.
It's easy to get hooked into the story so I have to give the author a lot for that; however there is this vast void throughout that even though the main character physically changes a lot he never changes his inner character and the remainder of the cast are just thrown in so there can be a larger body count while he just barely survives(often his own mistakes).
