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The Chronicles Of Riddick: Ghosts Of Furya (2014)

by S.M. Welles(Favorite Author)

3.71 of 5 Votes: 5

languge

English

genre

Science Fiction

publisher

Macala Publishing, LLC.

review 1: I first bought this book going 'Oh my God, it's a Riddick story. It'll be fun'.I never even knew anyone had licensed Riddick for follow on stories. Well, I started reading and then flipped back to the beginning to look at the copyright pages and figured out that this was fan fiction. Hey, I'm not knocking fan fiction here. I hope to have rabid fans writing in one of my universes some day.So armed with this knowledge I plowed ahead. This is an origin story of Riddick. He's found on Furya 15 years after the Necros destroy his people. However the planet is not utterly annihilated like so many others they've attacked which should be a great mystery - it isn't really explored but then again, we're focused on a teen Riddick who's totally feral but already smart and deadly from s... moreurviving the jungles of his homeworld since being a baby.The main character, Waters, is the commander of the squad that finds young Riddick. She's the most fleshed out of the secondary characters and at first I was thinking: 'clearly we will have a love interest' but she turns out to have more of a maternal urge for the young Furyan and wants to nurture and help him - bravo for not doing the obvious.Riddick is well written, I can see from this where he will grow into the onscreen badass we've come to love. There's definitely more character motivation provided beyond he's just a great killer. Ms Welles provides him with a lot of humanity.It's a basic fun action romp by someone who clearly loves the possibilities of the Riddick universe. If you take it as just that, you'll enjoy it. There's battle, sneaking around, betrayal, monsters - standard Riddick fare.That being said... Personally I hate to say anything that can be considered negative about another writer's work. I worry that some will think my criticism is either sour grapes or that I'm trying to turn readers against my supposed competition. Writers don't compete, there are more than enough words and readers for everyone. Honestly, I promote other writers whenever I can. I like to try to give constructive criticism when I review, so....Ms. Welles really needed a better editor/proofreader as there are copious glitches throughout the manuscript that, while not harming the story, do make you stop and go 'huh'. Minor things like that make some anal retentive readers run away and definitely keep the big publishing houses from taking you seriously. But that's a skill thing that can be easily learned or fixed by another set of eyes - hell, I typo like crazy and rely on machines and other people to help me fix things.The characters around Riddick are a bit shallow. Really seeming to exist only to move him from point A to B, I honestly didn't invest a lot of emotion in them in general. Some of the names made me laugh and cringe at the same time. Two members of the crew are Waters (Jade Waters no less) and Pond. The bad guy is named Fink. I personally found this too juvenile as a naming convention. I was always taught that unless you're writing for kids keep the names unique and not alliterative, thematic, or descriptive of the character. But that's just me.BTW, why would a culture several hundred years in our future still read Wolverine stories in comics, and have a figurine on a necklace? I mean it's possible but not probable. My only real worry about this book is if it is fan fiction did she get permission to use the character and the title 'Chronicles of Riddick' which are owned by other people who have huge legal teams and deep pockets. I hope she did get permission before charging money for the story. I'd hate to see her get lucky and have this take off just to get squashed by a company and author protecting their intellectual property against illegal use. I know I would get miffed if someone used one of my characters without my prior permission.Most fan fiction is free on various websites so the owners rarely care but once you begin to sell, you're getting into dangerous ground.I wish S.M. Welles the best in her endeavors of writing. Try this book if you want a straightforward action story read.
review 2: An interesting if quick read, this book is a prequel to the filmed Riddick stories, detailing his childhood and early manhood. It begins with his rescue on his home world of Furya, then goes on to detail his life on Earth as he trains to be a marine, before it all falls apart for him. Framed for rape and murder, he is rescued by the people who first brought him to Earth, only to lose the one thing that really matters to him. At the end, he decides to wander the universe and thus begin his legend.I enjoyed the story, even though I'm not sure if any of this is canon and just filling in the gaps of the known story. The characterisation was pretty good, though the plot was fairly predictable at times.3 1/2 stars less

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