The Digital Renaissance: Review: MARSHAL OLIVER BLACKSTONE: Oliver's Gold

Thursday, December 26, 2024

Review: MARSHAL OLIVER BLACKSTONE: Oliver's Gold

MARSHAL OLIVER BLACKSTONE: Oliver's Gold by Riano D. McFarland
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book: **
Performance: ****

The story itself was pretty much as expected for the genre; strong, mysterious and rugged man facing some threat that prevents him from winning his love interest … in this case, it is the marshal’s reputation and all of the young guns trying to win a name by taking him out … and a young lady who doesn’t quite fit into the Boston High Society her daddy’s wealth brings. Over all … it is a fell good tale that follows a well worn and very predictable path. The characters are all too good to be true, but are fun none-the-less (especially Oliver). Here there are two basic plots … how Oliver can become wealthy enough to “deserve” his lady love (which doesn’t hit home for me at all) and how to keep the danger from his violent past from breaking in on his new life of retirement.

So the first half of the story is focused on trying to keep his history as a western marshal a secret (which is a bit of a stretch … with a bit of a genie out of the bottle problem that never really gets solved). The second half of the story is Oliver chasing his gold to solve the wealth problem. The story moves quickly here and there is enough hand waving to prevent any buildup before we get to the anticipated climax. All of that considered, the narration was quite good and makes this a fun distraction worth the effort.

I was given this free advance review/listener copy (ARC) audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

#OliversGold #MarshalOliverBlackstone #FreeAudiobkFacebkGrp #KindleUnlimited

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My Ratings Explained ...

[ ***** ] Amazing Read - Perfect story, exciting, engrossing, well developed complex characters, solid plot with few to no holes, descriptive environments and place settings, great mystery elements, realistic dialogue, believable reactions and behaviors; a favorite that I can re-read many times.
[ **** ] Great Read - Highly entertaining and enjoyable, exciting storyline, well developed characters and settings, a few discrepancies but nothing that can’t be overlooked. Some aspect of the story was new/refreshing to me and/or intriguing. Recommended for everyone.
[ *** ] Good Read - Solid story with a 'good' ending, or has some other redeeming feature. Limited character development and/or over reliance on tropes. Noticeable discrepancies in world building and/or dialog/behavior that were distracting. I connected enough with the characters/world to read the entire series. Most of the books I read for fun are here. Recommended for fans of the genre.
[ ** ] Okay Read - Suitable for a brief, afternoon escape … flat or shallow characters with little to no development. Over the top character dialog and/or behavior. Poor world building with significant issues and/or mistakes indicating poor research. Excessive use of trivial detail, info dumps and/or pontification. Any issues with the story/characters are offset by some other aspect that I enjoyed. Not very memorable. May only appeal to a niche group of readers. Recommended for some (YMMV).
[ * ] Bad Read - Awkward and/or confusing writing style. Poor world building and/or unbelievable (or unlikeable) characters. Victimization, gaslighting, blatant abuse, unnecessary violence, child endangerment, or any other highly objectionable behaviors by Main characters. I didn't connect with the story at all; significant aspects of this story irritated me enough that I struggled to finished it. Series was abandoned. Not recommended.