Mike’s Reviews > Haze > Status Update

I'll be honest: I have no idea what Barnard was attempting to accomplish. The last quarter of the book is very different in tone from the first three quarters, meaning that the book really lacks cohesion. And I have no idea why we're seeing flashbacks, why this book is set in the future, or really why any decision was made. Barnard seems to have something to communicate, but I can't grasp at it.

I'll say this at least: I was not expecting the book to go in this direction. The novel still feels very shapeless and formless to me, and I'm still not entirely sure what Barnard was going for. But there are at least some good ideas here.

And now we're in a mental hospital. Great. Look, I don't want to be pessimistic, but mental hospitals are one of those things that authors get wrong nine out of ten times it's attempted. And to be honest, based on how this book has gone so far, I'm not given much reason to think it will be an exception.

Finally, after more than halfway through the story, we get what appears to be the inciting incident. This pacing is very slow, to the point where I'm honestly not sure what Barnard was going for. Also, it's just now occurring to me that Haze is a huge manic pixie dream girl.

This writing is so unedited. Oftentimes, Barnard writes a completely different word from what he meant - 'queue' in place of 'cue', 'feudal' in place of 'futile', 'Rowling' in place of 'rolling', ect. Also, I'm still not sure what the plot of this book is supposed to be - there's no underlying tension or goal that the characters have.

The worldbuilding is next to nonexistent so far. There's some subtle stuff, but for the most part, other than the existence of digital diving and the smog in the air, this world is almost identical to today's society. It feels like a big missed opportunity.

Also, there's not much of a plot so far. I'm not sure what the conflict is supposed to be, and I feel like I should know by now.

This prose is very, very bad. There are lots of odd word choices, sentences start and stop in weird places (lots of run-ons, lots of fragments), and most of the scenes flow very poorly. This is very obviously published independently, which is very unfortunate.

That said, I like Barnard's sense of humor, so it's possible that this isn't hopeless. If the story is good enough, I might not hate this novel.