Senate Proof - Logan Snyder

**DISCLAIMER** I received this book from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review. So that's what I'll aim to do.

I had a lot of issues with the book, some of which I think could have been cleaned up with a bit more editing. First, all the major plot points are there. The book follows a set of characters. At the center of the action is the McAllister Distillery, an illegal bootlegging distillery in suburban Virginia. John McAllister, the reigning patriarch of the illegal empire and family has unwittingly allowed the operation to run away from him as other players in the operation attempt to wrest control of the operation, and its wealth away from him.

Enter Caroline, a beautiful girl out to investigate her father's murder 20 years prior in the town. Enter Jackson, a handsome young law student out to get a summer job in town, who's interviewer is inconveniently murdered the night before the interview. Other involved people, Ron McAllister, John's erstwhile son who after 20 years of exile is trying to get back to the head of the organization, Senator Windgate who is planning his retirement from the Senate (and the distillery), and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court Michael Abramson.

Sounds good right? Yeah, it should be. But it's not. So here are some of the problems.

While the characters should be interesting they aren't. Their motivations are always too convenient and too two-dimensional. At the end of the book, I'm not even sure I could tell you what purpose Jackson even served. He's a cute law student. He hits on Caroline. After she's "discovered" by McAllister, she agrees to go away for the weekend with Jackson. So after her dog has been shot and her apartment ransacked, she's what... looking forward to a weekend of boozing and horse track betting? After she's revealed at the end of the book as a federal agent, this makes even less sense.

She gets kidnapped in Louisville by some unnamed member of the distillery group and is then inexplicably passed from place to place as the plot tries to make you fear her ultimate demise. Jackson, pledging to rescue her, also goes to an old law firm, then someone's home, and then finally back to the distillery to try to rescue her. All the while he has no plan and no actual skills to do this. In the end, he's saved by the Chief Justice and Caroline. What?

Amidst all this nonsensical plodding along of the plot, the writing gives out inexplicable levels of detail. Here's an example: (after being held captive in a dark room, the light switch is turned on and)

"She barely made out the outline of a large cabinet against the wall just a few feet away. Blindly, she felt her way to it and wedged herself tightly against the side. Luckily, a blue tarp was next to her and she eased her way under it without making much noise."

The captor then believes she has somehow escaped and sounds the alarm. I really didn't know what to make out of this whole scene.

Here's another one: (our heroine Caroline has been beaten)

"Because of the darkness, Caroline hadn't notice that she was blind in her right eye. It was swollen shut. She reached up to touch it, but winced in pain as she grazed the wound. That explained the blood on her mouth. It must have been running down her face for quite some time."

So hopefully you get the point that a lot of the narration was just oversharing the details. Even the character development was painfully spelled out for the reader. I believe that if the author has to tell me that the character has grown as a person and therefore that's why he's now taking action, that really is a red flag that perhaps the author didn't do a good enough job showing me the character and letting me conclude on their own that he has now grown as a person.

Overall, I thought the writing should have been tighter. For example, when we are first introduced to Jackson, we see him drive to Notre Dame, get dumped for another guy by his girlfriend Samantha, get beat up by said guy, and return to Virginia in disgrace. A more effective introduction would have been to meet Jackson, at his home in Virginia, nursing his wounds. The entire part of the trip to see her was completely overkill. Although he does call Samantha later in the novel, this plot point never develops into anything. I wasn't even sure if I was supposed to care about or remember her at all.

The story and the writing show promise, so I don't want to seem completely down on it. It reminded me a bit of Steve Berry's earlier work that started out a bit sloppy and again too convenient until he got a feel for his style and character. I wouldn't completely say no to reading another Logan Snyder book again, but it won't be something that makes its way to the top of my to-read pile.

1 .5/5 Stars.

A Crown For Cold Silver - Alex Marshall

**DISCLAIMER** I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. 

My opinions on the book changed several times over the course of reading it but in the end it earns a four star rating and a hearty recommendation to fantasy readers. 

Where to begin? Well probably the beginning. At first, I was put off by the book dropping me into its fantasy world with little explanation or detail. I spent the first 20% barely hanging on to the facts of what I did or didn't know. But after that initial discomfort, the story really hit its stride. 

I've read that Alex Marshall is a pseudonym for a well established writer and I think that's obvious from the style of the prose, if not from the initial shell shock of the surroundings.

The book has so many things going for it, but instead of following the usual fantasy tropes, this book really turns things on its head. The characters are all over the ace sexually. There are no graphic scenes in that regard but the freeness and openness exhibited by the characters towards the subject don't follow the usual limited rule game of nobility. The story also doesn't take place in an otherworldly Europe. It's kind of like if A Song of Ice and Fire happened all across the sea rather than in the seven kingdoms. The locales are varied and non traditional. 

The story essentially begins when a regiment of the Crown visits a mountain village and slaughters a town - except for the one person they were really sent there to kill. The person they were supposed to kill? Her name is Zosia and twenty years prior to her village being massacred, she and her five lieutenants (the Five Villains) brought war down on the Crown as they sought to usher in a more egalitarian rule. 

The massacre brings Zosia out for revenge and we get to meet her five former villains along the way. Chevalaresse Singh, a cavalry captain with an impressive mustache (a woman), Bang-Ho, husband to a King, Hoartrap the Touch, a sorcerer, Fennec, a sneaky bastard; and lastly, my total favorite, Moroto, a former junkie with a chip on his shoulder. 

The villains all find out their old Cobalt Company has been reformed without them and is taking on the Crown yet again. There are so many minor players and ulterior motives. The big payoff doesn't appear in this first book so I have to expect to read it later. 

By the end I bought into the story big time. I'm excited to read the next installment because as you can expect like every good fantasy novel, there is going to be a sequel. 

4/5 Stars.