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MY ⭐️ RATING: 4.5/5
Format: Kindle Whispersync
BOOK DESCRIPTION
Britannians on the March
With the Carthaginians pushed inside the walls of Londinium, the Britannians can finally stop reacting and take the fight to them. Hoping to retake the British Isles and even add new allies to the Alliance, legions are dispatched to Ériu, the emerald isle, to push back Carthaginian expansion there.
Ky, a test pilot from the future and now Consul for the Britannic Empire, knows that Carthaginian retaliation is coming and prepares an explosive new surprise for the invaders.
MY REVIEW
With how I felt about The Trumpets of Mars, I was fully expecting to bring on the same criticism of shying away from actual combat during these battles, but I was somewhat wrong. While Starnes did a lot more than he’s done previously, which made me happy because there were some good scenes, but I still feel like there just wasn’t enough done. For a book that has several battles in it, there’s a lot that could’ve been expanded upon, but instead was just glazed over. With The Sand of Saturn only being 384 pages which is 300 pages shorter than book 1, The Sword of Jupiter, it just wasn’t enough and left me wishing there was more to it than there was.
With there being multiple locations, Starnes takes on multiple POV’s adding in Llessar, Velius, as well as Lucilla. Llesar, Velius and Ky are all dealing with battles at different areas and sometimes the change of locations was used as a cut scene in a way, to keep from talking about travel, which is ok with me, or going into more depth about the battles that I’ve stated above, and when we come back, the battle is coming to an end or has ended. Again, just wish there was a lot more to these battles rather than them ending or being interrupted by changing location and POV.
“Looking beyond the front rank, he saw the Consul, holding two of the longer Carthaginian blades, covered in blood, looking like a demon sent from the depths of the underworld.”
I will say this, my rating was going to be lower until I got to the last 30-40 minutes of this book, because it was phenomenal! This was a battle that I didn’t mind the lack of depth of combat because they took to the seas, and had one of the coolest scenes where I can honestly say that it is my favorite part of this entire series so far. I was anticipating to see what would happen next on each page, I was completely locked in on that. But of course the coolest thing is seeing Rome progress with things Ky continues to introduce to them, especially knowing it’s something that shouldn’t be known for a very long time and to see how they interact with it. That is what really makes me enjoy this, aside from the phenomenal narration by Kevin Kemp.
It seems like a lot of criticism but it’s really just the depth of action, because I really do enjoy the story and where Starnes is taking it. He’s done a great job of building up the characters and introducing new ones that are just as interesting as the ones we already know. I’m very excited to see what happens next, though I know I may still have that same criticism throughout this series. One other thing I really liked and will come in handy as I wait for the audio for books 4 & 5 is that he basically uses chapter 1 as kind of a story so far to help catch the reader back up.
Wolfmantula.com 