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Taken: An Alex Verus Novel by Benedict Jacka (view source)
Revision as of 12:36, 5 September 2012
, 12:36, 5 September 2012no edit summary
Benedict Jacka, the guy who started writing the first Alex Verus book at the age of 19 in a school exercise book in his school library is back with the third. He's obviously matured over the years as it's what people tend to do, but so has his writing, demonstrated by the fact that ''Taken'' is by far the best of his offerings to date. The most notable difference being that Benedict has emerged from the shadow of author and major influence [[:Category:Jim Butcher|Jim Butcher]] to find his own style.
Book two, [[Cursed: An Alex Verus Novel by Benedict Jacka|Cursed]] was definitely better than Alex Verus's debut, [[Fated : An Alex Verus Novel by Benedict Jacka|Fated]] but he still came across as a British [[Turn Coat (Dresden Files) by Jim Butcher|Harry Dresden]]. However, now we see Alex as a compelling character in his own right. He maintains his pronounced sense of humour, but the quip quotient has been reduced, making him seem less self-conscious. Also he still gets in to scrapes which is great as Benedict has a talent for writing action sequences (as seen in the exciting climaxes of both the previous books). However now the cinema-graphic quality action scenes are liberally scattered throughout the story. If you need an example of that, then the Jaguar/M4 motorway/re-animated life forms scene is a master class in combining humour with excitement without losing pace.
Not everything's changed though, some factors remain reassuringly constant. Arachne is back in business, Luna continues to carry a curse that will kill a tactile person as soon as look at them and poor Sonder continues to hope that one day he'll be used to his full potential. More dangerously, Alex continues to work with those of a darker motivation. Sometimes it pays off and sometimes it doesn't but the books are written in such a way that we can't predict the danger or which of the potential baddies will be his malevolent nemesis this time around.