Rod Raglin
This blog will touch on the experiences I have as a writer (not to be mistaken for my experience as a writer, i.e. how many books I've written, etc); the pleasure and the pain, the joy and the grief, the satisfaction and the frustration, the magic and the reality - have I left anything out, oh yeah, the rejection, rejection and more rejection, the humiliation and the embarrassment, the jealousy and the resentment - that pretty much covers it, except for why I do it which perhaps I'll realize along the way. Are you totally confused? Good, let's begin.
Didactic, clichéd, chauvinistic and likely predictable, but I quit before the end
The Cause depicts a future America where the gap between rich and poor has become a chasm, and the government uses brute force and disinformation to maintain a semblance of order.
This is hardly original, so it’s not surprising the hero, Isse Corvus, is an ex-military, ex MMA fighter, and is now being trained in black ops by a secret unit of the CIA.
This seems to be the standard resume of characters in this type of novel, as well as being muscle-bound receptacles of testosterone, with cynical, chauvinistic attitudes, and an IQ verging on genius. A philosopher-warrior which, when you think about it, is an oxymoron.
When author, Roderick Vincent, tries to instill depth in the character of Corvus it’s with very, very broad and unbelievable strokes and comes in the form of great chunks of info dump.
Much of the philosophical ramblings smack of author intrusion and more than often don’t advance the plot nor develop character.
The characters are clichéd and the narrative, when not didactic, reads like a violent video game. I never did find out what the “the cause” was. At about a third of the way through I couldn’t find “cause” to continue.
I received this book free from Story Cartel in return for an honest review.
