{"id":17882,"date":"2023-02-21T18:47:06","date_gmt":"2023-02-21T23:47:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=17882"},"modified":"2023-02-21T18:47:06","modified_gmt":"2023-02-21T23:47:06","slug":"semi-review-true-conviction-by-james-p-sumner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=17882","title":{"rendered":"Semi-review: ‘True Conviction,’ by James P. Sumner"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I\u2019ve got translation work today<\/strong> (loud cheers from the gallery!), so I\u2019m going to just drop this semi-review of True Conviction<\/a><\/em>, a book I didn\u2019t complete. I quit reading before the end because it annoyed me in a number of ways, and I figure I ought to warn you against it. But I won\u2019t post the cover because I don\u2019t want to rub it in. The thing is, trashing a book I didn\u2019t like can be an exercise in self-righteousness (even when the author\u2019s way more successful than I am).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here’s the setup \u2013 Adrian Hell (that\u2019s his name) is a professional hit man and (we are told) a legend in the field. He is (he claims) an ethical assassin. He\u2019ll only kill bad guys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And yet, the first job he takes at the beginning of True Conviction<\/em> is to kill a businessman who backed out on a land deal with a Nevada mob boss \u2013 the guy may be corrupt, but does that deserve death? Then Adrian gets in a fight with his employer and ends up on the run, and he meets an attractive female assassin, and\u2026 I lost interest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First of all, I didn\u2019t believe the Adrian Hell character. He\u2019s always talking about how tough he is. That\u2019s a sure sign \u2013 in literature, anyway \u2013 that he\u2019s not as tough as he wants you to think. (In real life, I suspect it may be quite common for really tough guys to be loudmouths, but in literature we\u2019ve learned that it\u2019s cool reserve that earns the reader\u2019s respect.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Secondly, the book was overwritten. The author doesn\u2019t trust the reader to figure out what he\u2019s saying, so he explains EVERYTHING. Including his little jokes \u2013 which might work as little jokes if he didn\u2019t inflate them to the bursting point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maybe you\u2019d like True Conviction<\/em> better than I did. Apparently they sell a lot of copies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve got translation work today (loud cheers from the gallery!), so I\u2019m going to just drop this semi-review of True Conviction, a book I didn\u2019t complete. I quit reading before the end because it annoyed me in a number of ways, and I figure I ought to warn you against it. But I won\u2019t post … Continue reading Semi-review: ‘True Conviction,’ by James P. Sumner<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[7,15],"tags":[4567,4566,4568],"class_list":["post-17882","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction","category-reviews","tag-adrian-hell","tag-james-p-sumner","tag-true-conviction"],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17882"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17882\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17883,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17882\/revisions\/17883"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}