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thecaptainsquarters 's review for:
The Silver Bullets of Annie Oakley
by Mercedes Lackey
Ahoy there me mateys! This be the 16th book in the Elemental Masters series which retells fairy tales in an alternate magical universe. I have only read one other book out of the series but from what I understand they can be read as standalones. I loved Lackey's work as a child and I love the Annie Oakley "myth" so I was excited to read this.
This ended up being okay. Lackey often seems to write in a way where ye are not sure of the intended audience. In this book Annie is a married woman who felt as though she was a young child at times in the tone of her thoughts and in the writing style itself. I expected the character of Annie to be more headstrong, fierce, and independent. She felt too much like a frail woman who was dependent on her husband. She also spent a lot of time focused on clothes and comfort. This just wasn't tied to the version I had of Annie Oakley growing up. Other readers may have more success with the character than I did.
I also thought the plot was kinda boring overall. So much of this novel was talking about the magic and not really using much. And what was explained of how the magic worked didn't seem very clear or detailed. I wouldn't usually expect a lot of explanation in a later book of a series except that Annie was learning about magic for the first time. Her training seemed nonsensical and haphazard. Not a lot seemed to happen while waiting for the final showdown that is blatantly going to happen. Even the circus portion of this book had no real descriptions except for how they loaded trains and the tours given of the encampment.
And the final showdown was lame. I mean seriously bad. I did think I was going to abandon this book around the midway point. Nostalgia for the author and Annie Oakley made me finish. I can't say that I would recommend this book to anyone but I am now more curious about other retellings in this series. I will have to track some down to satiate me curiosity given how much I remember enjoying the other book of this series that I read. Arrr!
Thank ye kindly DAW for the eArc!
This ended up being okay. Lackey often seems to write in a way where ye are not sure of the intended audience. In this book Annie is a married woman who felt as though she was a young child at times in the tone of her thoughts and in the writing style itself. I expected the character of Annie to be more headstrong, fierce, and independent. She felt too much like a frail woman who was dependent on her husband. She also spent a lot of time focused on clothes and comfort. This just wasn't tied to the version I had of Annie Oakley growing up. Other readers may have more success with the character than I did.
I also thought the plot was kinda boring overall. So much of this novel was talking about the magic and not really using much. And what was explained of how the magic worked didn't seem very clear or detailed. I wouldn't usually expect a lot of explanation in a later book of a series except that Annie was learning about magic for the first time. Her training seemed nonsensical and haphazard. Not a lot seemed to happen while waiting for the final showdown that is blatantly going to happen. Even the circus portion of this book had no real descriptions except for how they loaded trains and the tours given of the encampment.
And the final showdown was lame. I mean seriously bad. I did think I was going to abandon this book around the midway point. Nostalgia for the author and Annie Oakley made me finish. I can't say that I would recommend this book to anyone but I am now more curious about other retellings in this series. I will have to track some down to satiate me curiosity given how much I remember enjoying the other book of this series that I read. Arrr!
Thank ye kindly DAW for the eArc!