My Favorite Books

The Walking Drum
Ender's Game
Dune
Jhereg
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
The Curse of Chalion
The Name of the Wind
Chronicles of the Black Company
The Faded Sun Trilogy
The Tar-Aiym Krang

Tuesday, December 26, 2023

Review: Darkside

Darkside Darkside by Michael Mammay
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The fourth book in the Planetside Series
Previous Review of Colonyside

And I have read them all. Just in case you have lost the thread here, there is a convenient review right up from that will bring you up to speed. So Col Butler is back and he is as entertaining as ever with his trusty sidekick Sgt Murphy … as in the best laid plans and all that. Of course, now he is retired with a collection of misfits that would make the A team jealous. In this story, a young girl sweet talks him into investigating the disappearance of her father on a mining moon run by two former, corporate adversaries … and of course, something just doesn’t add up. 

So what we get he is a little mashup between military SciFi and a detective thriller/mystery … and I have to admit my nostalgia for the military contributes a lot to why I really liked this story. For the most part, Carl is simply shaking trees to see what pops out and everybody has something to hide. As with the previous installments, the pacing is solid and quickly pulls you through the slightly over-the-top story to a satisfying conclusion.

I was given this free advance reader copy (ARC) ebook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

#Darkside #Planetside #NetGalley

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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.