Mike’s Reviews > Bring It (Sabel Security #2) > Status Update

This is not a great climax. To frame Pia as the protagonist (as much as any character can be a protagonist in a book that cares this little about character growth) and then have a climax where she finishes her side quest and lies in a hospital while the other characters take out the real bad guys... it's just not good writing.

On the whole, this wasn't for me, and it's hard to ignore the mild racism, but it was well-structured and well-written, so there's only so much anger I can generate at it.

I suppose this is roughly the book equivalent of a well-made but not particularly interesting action movie. There's not even an attempt at any sort of character arc, even though the characters are well-developed enough that James could've written one if he wanted to. It's just a tight, well-written story, nothing more.

To James' credit, this book is really well-written, and mostly well-structured so far. It has its flaws, but it accomplishes what it sets out to do effectively.

I feel like this book is kind of operating on rule of cool. Like, it's strange to me how emotionally cold the characters are, but I kind of don't care, because that's clearly not the point. This is mildly racist and misogynistic, though, and I have a bit more trouble looking past that.

Pia's portrayal is kind of toeing the line between reasonably powerful and fetishistic. I probably wouldn't notice it as a problem, if not for how frequently we see her from the eyes of others, and how rare we get her own perspective. It sort of draws attention to her physical beauty, her money, and her dominance over others, without the reader fully sympathizing with her (at least so far).

I think I was kind of worried about this being bad, but if nothing else, this is really well-written. I'm enjoying it so far.