In all my years, I don’t think I’ve ever read a book that unintentionally mimicked a newspaper or magazine article. I’ve read, and enjoyed (and not enjoyed) fiction books that were intended to be like a non-fictional account, such as Zombie War by Nicholas Ryan (his 3 other zombie books are damned good, too). However, The Gray Ship was just strange, and read the way the first few paragraphs of so many news stories read. You know, where they bring in the human interest? Things like “The captain is seated at the far end of the table. Ashley Patterson runs a tight meeting. She asks questions, listens to the answers, and will not tolerate political sideswiping.” It just seems stiff, rather than flowing, and I kept expecting the meat of the investigative journalism story to show up.
Perhaps you would need to read it yourself to understand. Me, I gave up at 5%, which is a shame, because the premise, namely that a modern day U.S. warship is transported to the 1861, right before the battle of Ft. Sumter, is something that I really love. A good time travel story with history. Oh, well.
Interestingly, this is the third straight book I’ve abandoned. The previous two were at around 50% and 40%, because they just kept plodding on without really going anywhere. Viva la Kindle Unlimited!
