Chuckles Mini Reviews CatchUp

I review everything I read, on my blog and on Goodreads. Most reviews are of a decent length but sometimes you don't have much to say about the book because of its length or you DNFed it or various other reasons. In cases like that it makes sense to write a few mini reviews in one post and clear them out your way! Time to catch up with a few books read between April and August!

1) Alan Watkins-A Conservative Coup
Those who follow my blog know that I enjoy my politics so I thought this one would be great, charting the events that led to the downfall of Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister and the tense leadership contest that followed. Sadly this book was not what I expected. I understand that there needs to be background but in this case we got way to much of it. We know the Tories are in-fighting over Europe but we didn't need the entire history of the European Union and ERM, a lot of which was very technical and dull. I get that we needed a background to the Poll Tax and other reasons that she fell out with key ministers over and some of it was interesting, but there seemed to be too much padding rather than just the information we needed. 

I did like finding out the ministers on both sides who stood against the Poll Tax though, including Leon Brittan, Nigel Lawson, George Young, Ted Heath, Jack Straw and Tim Yeo. I just felt there was no tension to the whole downfall and contest, and the author bugged me by jumping about the timeframe which was confusion so the whole thing lacked cohesion. It was much more interesting to read about in Ken Clark's memoirs.  
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8123404-a-conservative-coup 
Read April 2018.
2 stars. 

2) Brian McClellan-Forsworn (Powder Mage #0.1) 
Erika ja Leora is a powder mage in northern Kez, a place where that particular sorcery is punishable by death. She is only protected by her family name and her position as heir to a duchy. When she decides to help a young commoner—a powder mage marked for death, fugitive from the law—she puts her life and family reputation at risk and sets off to deliver her new ward to the safety of Adro while playing cat and mouse with the king’s own mage hunters and their captain, Duke Nikslaus. Occurs 35 years before the events in Promise of Blood.

I decided to try a couple of short stories from the world to see what I thought before tackling the full novel and I enjoyed this. The blurb describes the plot so no need to repeat it. I liked Erika, having to hide her gift and her reasons for helping Norrine escape death for being the same but without the protection of a powerful family. I loved Santiole, the mistress-at-arms responsible for training Erika. I loved the idea of what a powder mage was, able to control powder ie gunpowder with magic. There was a lot of action for a short story-the events in the woods, the search for Norrine and the dangerous journey to Adro where they will be safe. I liked the way the story was told and it has intrigued me to read more about this world, maybe even the novels themselves!
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20614529-forsworn 
Read June 2018.
3.5 stars 

3) John D Randall-The Yellowstone Conundrum
The blurb is so long that I'll give it a miss but there is a link if you want to see it. Basically, the Yellowstone Caldera has erupted, an earthquake under Puget Sound triggers a tsunami onto Seattle, dams fail and the power grid goes down. This is exactly the kind of apocalypse drama that I love to read. I can't get enough of them! I was looking forward to reading it until I saw some online reviews of it and I then approached it warily. And I did not like it one bit.

The writing style and the way he uses language is just weird. ie 'Still by the end of February there should have been more promise, if not the future, then at least for today.' Huh? This came right after we are told that the MC doesn't actually know if it is February or December as he can't tell the difference. I'm not sure what planet the MC lives on but I can tell the difference! We then switch to his personal POV then a page later we go back to talking about him. It's followed by a random rant about doctors and pharmaceutical companies. There seems to be random inane character thoughts put in the middle of info dumps about boats, building descriptions and scientific details that make my head throb. It all combines to disrupt any chance of the story flowing, there is no cohesion to what we are being told, with random subject changes going on constantly. There was no tension to the events due to this weird writing style that seemed to have no purpose. The spelling and lack of editing was really poor as well. And just before I DNFed it, here is the 'climax' to the sex scene! 

'Jimmy James hit the runaway just as her plane landed and the pair started to glide down the runway to the exit ramp.' WTF?????????
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18137265-the-yellowstone-conundrum
Read August 2018.
DNF 1 star.