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HomeShop at BookSurgeFictionScience FictionGeneralThe Friendly Ambassador: Walking with the Enemy |
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| Customer Reviews: | | Average Customer Review: ( 1 customer reviews )
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An excellent space opera. Apr 10, 2012
By Kodai Okuda
""Write me a creature that thinks as well as a man or better than a man, but not like a man.""
All reviews that I do are measured using John Woods Campbell's criteria for science fiction. This criteria combines elements of "hard SF" with "soft SF" and space opera.
The Friendly Ambassador series is NOT a hard SF story, I don't consider it military SF either, but it has all of the elements of a choice space opera.
THE GOOD: Strong character development. Believable interactions between characters, each is his/her own individual and I found no characters that can be called flat or "filler." Battles are well done and have purpose, no combat is done simply as paddding. Story is coherent, flows well, and leads to a conclusion that makes sense. The use of Greek names adds to the perfect feeling of space opera and lends itself to the atmosphere of reading a classic epic or legend. I enjoyed that touch very much.
THE BAD: The Romantic element is quite good, but there is too much of it for my tastes. The sexual liasons are far too numerous for me. While some may enjoy this very much, I do not. I like a bit of sex in my science fiction, but I dislike reading page after page about the feelings one character has for another. I realize this story is a space opera and that is supposed to be in a space opera story type, but it is still a turn off for me.
THE UGLY: The prologue. It needs to be redone. It is the only portion of the book in which there are changes in perspective from past to present tense without explanation or reason. I understand that this is a summary of the previous three books, but it does not flow anywhere near as well as the book itself does. I would suggest rewriting the prologue as a character telling what has happened in a journal or aloud speaking to someone else. Perhaps Tipi explaining it to his son or some such. Other than the prologue, I found no glaringly bad errors or mistakes within the novel itself.
CONCLUSION: A really fun space opera to read. It has everything you would expect from a Greek classic or Classical Romantic tale such as Le Morte d'Arthur. I recommend this series for anyone looking for a good space-romance.
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