Like the other two novels in this series, this was a real page-turner for me. I couldn’t wait to find out if the writing could get any worse than it already was. Almost everything about this book was bad, from the characters’ uni-dimensional stiff-upper-lip traditionalism to their stilted Ayn-Randian soapbox dialogue. These novels should be required curriculum for aspiring authors as an example of (1) how to write a novel that’s entirely not important, moving or enjoyable to read, and (2) how to pander to an annoying cohort to sell scads of books.
First off, what’s with the author’s commafied name? Is it a way for a traditionalist conservative to combine two surnames without using the (presumably) liberal device of hyphenation?
The author seems to be itching to let you know that he is a smart guy. Foreign language references and obscure facts pepper the text (but often in relation to useless minutiae about the bible and interpretations thereof). He comes across as a learned person, and probably impresses the hell out of your average tea bagger, but he lacks the world-is-grey open-mindedness that I find is the necessary product of really thinking things through. He seems like a dilettante, a painfully self-conscious high-schooler who desperately wants you to notice how sophisticated he (thinks he) is.
Militarism. Ugh. It is my understanding that the author is a retired soldier/spook of some kind. Most of the protagonists in the book are either current, past or retired employees of the armed forces or government, relatives of same, or armed forces camp followers. Everyone seems to have that maddening authoritarian closed-mindedness that either comes with that territory, or are birds-of-a-feather which that territory tends to attract. That particular chicken-egg question is interesting, but the bottom line is that the book makes it feel like we are surrounded by people who think like this, they are comfortable making the rest of us pay for their fantasy world, and the world is poorer for it (in all senses of the word).
Page 71-72. Young soldier Joshua gets married and moves in with his new wife Kelly and Mr. Monroe, his new father-in-law. “Let me lay down some Monroe Doctrine for you,” Mr. Monroe says. “If you are going to live in my house, then I expect you to attend home church meetings with us. [For you, dear reader, I have removed here Mr. Monroe’s stilted and unrealistic obsessive-compulsive exposition about church meeting locations and timing, and the interface of the same with guard duty schedules.] I consider attendance mandatory. Do I make myself clear?”
What kind of man considers this an appropriate way to think about relations with other people, or (god forbid) talks to them this way? This is not one of the book’s caricatures of a bad guy, or even a complex- or anti-hero-protagonist (there are none in the book). This is what the author considers a good guy.
You’d think Joshua would pack his bags post-haste, right? Or in the rough-and-tumble, post-apocalyptic times in which the novel is set, maybe stage (or at least plan, with gritted teeth, bitten tongue and bided time) a palace coup? Not quite. He says, without irony and with actual assent, “I wouldn’t have it any other way, sir.” If this kind of thing gets your goat, don’t read this book, unless, that is, you’re prepared to spend (waste?) several hours with your goat well-gotten.
I don’t know who is worse, the upstream authoritarian, Mr. Monroe, who wants to treat people like this, or the downstream authoritarian, Joshua, who accepts such treatment. Here we have the yin and yang of authoritarianism, both sides of which are black.
And note what a clever guy the author is by having the father-in-law’s last name be Monroe. Monroe Doctrine. Get it? Given the author’s ham-handedness, I wouldn’t have been surprised if there had been a character named Mr. Flank whose modus operandi was – wait for the reveal – to surprise enemies from the side. Or for the bad-guy enemy soldiers to have spoken with German accents. Oh wait. The book did have bad-guy enemy soldiers who spoke with German accents.
Page 92. In a flashback scene, we join Kelly and Joshua on a date – er, make that a rendezvous. “As well-educated Christians, they both disliked the word ‘dating,’ since both properly saw their meetings as courting for marriage.” Because, you know, there is only one appropriate way for young people who find each other attractive to relate to one another. The steak house was casual, so both “dressed up only to the extent of wearing freshly laundered jeans and nicer shirts.” It’s like Rawles read the Jacqueline Kim email as a model for how to describe a date. Kelly flirts: “Someday, let’s do a Bible study. We’ll take a concordance…After that, I’m confident that you’ll come around to my way of thinking.” Joshua flirts back: “I want to make it clear that I am courting you for marriage.” I blush – with embarrassment both for the author and for readers who think this garbage is in any way acceptable writing.
Page 201. Something good: A reference to Max Manus. Google him. Watch the movie.
Page 229. “The [bad-guy U.N.] brigade had…a polyglot of troops.: roughly one third American, one third German, and an odd mix of Dutch, Belgians, Lithuanians, Estonians, Bulgarians, and Britons. A few of them wore beards.” [emphasis added, author’s snide prejudice not]
There are times when I wonder if Mr. Rawles is a genius. Maybe he’s just affecting the ways of a hide-bound militaristic genre author. Maybe it’s all just smartly calculated and finely calibrated to get a (good) rise out of his God-fearing militaristic target audience and a (bad) rise out of liberal heathens like me, with any kind of rise being suitable for creating publicity and advancing sales. Rises for one and all, joy. Based on that take, he’s brilliantly successful. Maybe Rawles is a master social satirist who is laughing all the way to the bank, financially and artistically.
When I’m feeling less generous (as I much more commonly do), something tells me Rawles (Wesley, Rawles?) spends less time laughing all the way to the anything, and more time with a stern, matter-of-fact scowl on his face to accompany his government pension check.
It is my understanding that this book is the third installment of a trilogy. Thank God. That means it’s over.
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