A review by jessartisan
Dead to Me by Anton Strout
2.0
Having read quite a few very good urban fantasy novels, I have to say this book was a mess in comparison. I think the basic premise was good, but the execution was sloppy.
Repeating that a group is evil doesn't *establish* that it is. By the time we're actually shown how evil the group is (which seemed pretty mild on the evil spectrum), we've already been through chapter after chapter of "they're bad, I swear. Trust me." The characters were unrealistic and the dialog was terrible - it's what snark looks like when stupid people do it. The main character was almost constantly behaviorally inappropriate, for no good reason - like a really bad, dumb actor over-reacting to everything while trying to be clever.
Problems aside, it wasn't so bad that I gave up on it. There is promise there.
Repeating that a group is evil doesn't *establish* that it is. By the time we're actually shown how evil the group is (which seemed pretty mild on the evil spectrum), we've already been through chapter after chapter of "they're bad, I swear. Trust me." The characters were unrealistic and the dialog was terrible - it's what snark looks like when stupid people do it. The main character was almost constantly behaviorally inappropriate, for no good reason - like a really bad, dumb actor over-reacting to everything while trying to be clever.
Problems aside, it wasn't so bad that I gave up on it. There is promise there.