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A review by highlanderajax
The Combat Codes by Alexander Darwin
2.0
Oof. Man, did I want to like this book. Man, did I not really. Almost DNF'd this. Pushed myself to read it.
This is always going to be a book that focuses on the fighting, and you don't need to be Tolkien to get the desired effect. Fine. However, something about the way this is written is...cold. It's blunt and prosaic, and not in a self-aware, straightforward Robert Parker sort of a way. It just feels unimaginative. The author wrote this book to have an excuse to write about people doing MMA, and while that's totally fine I feel like if you're going to write a book just because it's one you want to read, you need to be able to communicate clearly to others WHY you wanted to read it. This just doesn't. In Combat Codes, Darwin has told me in fairly workmanlike terms about an activity I already know well, and has put it in a frankly cliched sci-fi setting.
The problem is, fundamentally, Darwin is trying to mesh together two things that just do not fit - realistic fight scenes, and a book centred on fighting. You can take two main approaches. If you're going to write a book about fights with plot shoehorned in, the fights have to be inspiring, they have to be jaw-dropping. You need to have the fights be a spectacle in and of themselves. If you're going to have realistic fight scenes, they need to serve a purpose beyond the fight itself, because actual fighting is often incredibly boring, especially in text form.
In movie terms, you can have Kickboxer or any other classic kung fu movie, where people do backflips and jumping split spin kicks and focus their chi to deliver death blows, and everyone is there to watch JCVD spin kick a man's head off...or you can have Warrior, where people grapple and punch and grit things out, all in service of a bigger story about fathers and sons, economic hardship, pride and pain. Nobody wants to see Bruce Lee carefully jab someone in the face 200 times to a lopsided decision victory, and nobody needs to see Tom Hardy backflip flaming punch someone's heart out, because seeing him refuse to tap to his brother and finally forgive the years of emotional pain doesn't need the sugar on top.
Darwin wants to write the former. He wants to write a book about fighting, in a world with gladiatorial one-on-one fights, where fighting is a sport and war and a business and everything. Unfortunately, he is also a martial artist, and knows how fights actually work, and he wants to inject that knowledge into the world he's created. He does so; he describes the strikes and grapples as exactly what they are, and honestly he does that very well indeed. I understand exactly what's happening, and can map that all to experience. Unfortunately, strikes and grapples, without seeing them live in front of you, with the blood and sweat and energy...are very fucking boring things indeed. What he's therefore created, to me, is a world full of very boring, realistic violence, described in fairly dull, dry terms.
The academy/accumulation style story is one I like a lot, but Darwin's specific style just made it impossible for me to get through the book properly. The violence feels clean and neat, even when it's supposed to be brutal and horrifying. People get beaten to death and it feels like the narrative barely notices, there's that little impact on the reader.
Maybe part of it is because I am quite familiar with, and accustomed to, martial arts and fighting. I know how punches and kicks and chokes work, so I don't need them explained to me in the very pedestrian terms Darwin seems to prefer. Maybe this book sounds better if you don't have any fighting experience, I can't say.
What I can say is that I did not want to keep reading. I pushed myself to do so, and credit where it's due, the book finishes better than it starts. Unfortunately, the narrative never really rises far enough to overcome the core problems, and late-stage efforts to add some intrigue fail to land properly due to a deficit of emotional investment thanks to the weak start. Standard-issue first-book cliffhanger is fine, but it feels mild and amateurish, doesn't hook me properly.
NOTE: I read the two sequels, to make sure I wasn't being unfair in my review. I'm not. The same problems from this review plague the other novels separately AND the series as a whole.
TL;DR: Dry, technical descriptions of violence need a compelling world or interesting protagonist to avoid being boring, and Combat Codes has neither. A paint-by-numbers sci-fi story with too much of its identity wrapped up in accurate fight scenes fails to enthrall, horrify or particularly entertain. Would not recommend.
This is always going to be a book that focuses on the fighting, and you don't need to be Tolkien to get the desired effect. Fine. However, something about the way this is written is...cold. It's blunt and prosaic, and not in a self-aware, straightforward Robert Parker sort of a way. It just feels unimaginative. The author wrote this book to have an excuse to write about people doing MMA, and while that's totally fine I feel like if you're going to write a book just because it's one you want to read, you need to be able to communicate clearly to others WHY you wanted to read it. This just doesn't. In Combat Codes, Darwin has told me in fairly workmanlike terms about an activity I already know well, and has put it in a frankly cliched sci-fi setting.
The problem is, fundamentally, Darwin is trying to mesh together two things that just do not fit - realistic fight scenes, and a book centred on fighting. You can take two main approaches. If you're going to write a book about fights with plot shoehorned in, the fights have to be inspiring, they have to be jaw-dropping. You need to have the fights be a spectacle in and of themselves. If you're going to have realistic fight scenes, they need to serve a purpose beyond the fight itself, because actual fighting is often incredibly boring, especially in text form.
In movie terms, you can have Kickboxer or any other classic kung fu movie, where people do backflips and jumping split spin kicks and focus their chi to deliver death blows, and everyone is there to watch JCVD spin kick a man's head off...or you can have Warrior, where people grapple and punch and grit things out, all in service of a bigger story about fathers and sons, economic hardship, pride and pain. Nobody wants to see Bruce Lee carefully jab someone in the face 200 times to a lopsided decision victory, and nobody needs to see Tom Hardy backflip flaming punch someone's heart out, because seeing him refuse to tap to his brother and finally forgive the years of emotional pain doesn't need the sugar on top.
Darwin wants to write the former. He wants to write a book about fighting, in a world with gladiatorial one-on-one fights, where fighting is a sport and war and a business and everything. Unfortunately, he is also a martial artist, and knows how fights actually work, and he wants to inject that knowledge into the world he's created. He does so; he describes the strikes and grapples as exactly what they are, and honestly he does that very well indeed. I understand exactly what's happening, and can map that all to experience. Unfortunately, strikes and grapples, without seeing them live in front of you, with the blood and sweat and energy...are very fucking boring things indeed. What he's therefore created, to me, is a world full of very boring, realistic violence, described in fairly dull, dry terms.
The academy/accumulation style story is one I like a lot, but Darwin's specific style just made it impossible for me to get through the book properly. The violence feels clean and neat, even when it's supposed to be brutal and horrifying. People get beaten to death and it feels like the narrative barely notices, there's that little impact on the reader.
Maybe part of it is because I am quite familiar with, and accustomed to, martial arts and fighting. I know how punches and kicks and chokes work, so I don't need them explained to me in the very pedestrian terms Darwin seems to prefer. Maybe this book sounds better if you don't have any fighting experience, I can't say.
What I can say is that I did not want to keep reading. I pushed myself to do so, and credit where it's due, the book finishes better than it starts. Unfortunately, the narrative never really rises far enough to overcome the core problems, and late-stage efforts to add some intrigue fail to land properly due to a deficit of emotional investment thanks to the weak start. Standard-issue first-book cliffhanger is fine, but it feels mild and amateurish, doesn't hook me properly.
NOTE: I read the two sequels, to make sure I wasn't being unfair in my review. I'm not. The same problems from this review plague the other novels separately AND the series as a whole.
TL;DR: Dry, technical descriptions of violence need a compelling world or interesting protagonist to avoid being boring, and Combat Codes has neither. A paint-by-numbers sci-fi story with too much of its identity wrapped up in accurate fight scenes fails to enthrall, horrify or particularly entertain. Would not recommend.