CO'Neil

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CO'Neil

CO'Neil’s book reviews

Uncle Bernac
3
The empire in question being Napoleon's. Brigadier [in this story, still Lieutenant] Gerard has a supporting role in this adventure story.

Three and a half stars.
07/06/2012
The Firm of Girdlestone
4
Essentially a Dickens novel. Long, full of many dilatory passages that don't really move the plot forward, an orphan, evil guardian, thwarted suitor, sweet innocent heiress, etc.

Goes to show how Dickens actually was good at what he did.
07/02/2012
The Green Flag
4
Historical action/adventure short stories. Kind of lightweight writing for magazine publication, I guess.

Nowhere near as penetrating or gripping as the Holmes stories, so goes to show why they were the wildly popular ones instead.

Above average, nonetheless.
06/26/2012
The Grain Ship
5
Very entertaining collection of nautical horror and adventure stories.
06/05/2012
London River
3
Generally, a collection of vignettes having to do with shipping on the Thames in the very last days of sail and early days of steam.

The author was evidently very highly regarded as a prose stylist, but to this reader it's like eating rocks.

Maybe a professor of English literature could better explicate why Tomlinson's oeuvre should be appreciated.
05/19/2012
The Yellow Claw
2
If the first three Fu Manchu novels qualify for a rating of 1, this book is a 2. It's at least twice as readable, but the bar is not set very high.

All along, it seems we will be enjoying a comparatively conventional detective adventure story, but then it ends with a staggering non-conclusion.

Oh, Rohmer.
03/11/2012
Toast
4
A bit of a period piece -- somewhat dated, in other words, which is only to be expected. I especially liked the updated (to the 1980s) continuation of the theme from At the Mountains of Madness, where Lovecraft's Antarctic explorers returned with Elder technologies to weaponize in western warfare.
11/20/2011
The Bright Face of Danger
4
A young man who has been educated at home, more bookish than swordsman, sets off on a journey which will provide him some adventure as a change of pace. Open as he is to whatever circumstance presents, be it a duel, rescue of a fair lady, escape from imprisonment in a sinister chateau, he's kept well occupied.

I like this guy's writing.
09/24/2011
An Enemy to the King
4
Plenty of action, adventure and swordplay in 1600s France.

A little too heavy on the romance, introspection and second-guessing for my taste, but well worth reading overall.
09/13/2011
author2
Tom Turner - Cults, Money and Murder
FEATURED AUTHOR - A native New Englander, Tom Turner dropped out of college and ran a Vermont bar. Limping back a few years later to get his sheepskin, he went on to become an advertising copywriter, first in Boston, then New York. After 10 years of post-Mad Men life, he made both a career and geography change and ended up in Palm Beach, renovating houses and collecting raw materials for his novels. He now lives on Skidaway Island, outside of Savannah, where he’s writing books about passion and murder among his… Read more