Customer Reviews

Sky Raider (Deathlands)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The book was excellent shape. it took three weeks to get it and like I said the book is in good shape for the price. I onlt give two stars because it took so long to get it.

This new entry in the long-lived Deathlands series is penned by Nick Polatta.

And like Nick's last couple of novels, Sky Raider came off as a mediocre stroyline in the overall Deathlands saga. Nick always writes and creates a hardcore post-holocaust scenario, and has seemingly decided to go to lengths into showing readers more of an inside look of the lives of side characters in the form of the family of the Dethland's barons. As well as their security men - or sec men - as well as the people of the baron's ville. This works on some level, but mostly does not further the plot or go deep enough to engage the reader.

For instance, in this particular volume, the baron Tregart's daughter, Sandra, has somehow learned how to fly in the form of the resurrected technology of flight, something that has been lost after the megacull of skydark. Now, this has a great idea, and has been done by the past main writer, Laurence James, many years ago. So, even though Nick Polatta has come up with a solid idea of having a group of post-holocaust survivors having found some old-fashioned planes, enabling them to have the upper hand in firepower superiority and taking advantage of it, the writer never fully explains just HOW this woman learns the lost art of 'piloting'. (Really needed this.)

With her restored biplane, Lady Tregart not only bombs her nearby enemies into submission, but also has her own dark plans to thwart her own father baron out of his kingly position. Another good story plot, but it just comes off as underdeveloped. For some reason Nick Polatta's novels have lost their panache that he showed in past Deathlands novels such as Devil Riders and Bloodfire.

Don't get us wrong, Polatta still manages to give readers a fun and exciting action/adventure romp through the hellish lands of post-holocaust America, but just doesn't come off as polished as his past novels, nor the last novel Cannibal Moon. Strangely enough though, where we felt that Alan Philipson failed to show the strong feelings of J. B. towards his woman, Mildred Wyeth's capture by cannies in last issue titled Cannibal Moon, Polatta does here in the same scenario. And although that is the right approach, it feels like it has already been done. Should have used anything else but cannies. (Or perhaps it felt too soon to do this, since this just happened in the last novel.)

With such a large number of books in the series now, the storylines need newer and fresher material to knock it out of the ballpark. This novel has some touches of that, but it just takes too long for Ryan Cawdor and company to not only get out of the redoubt, but they never really get to meet up with the Tregart family. There is also too many pages spent with side characters that do little with the overall novel, but should be spent further developing the main characters.

And the mutants! There are a new group here called Howlers. But they don't howl! And long-time readers never heard of them before. So why did the writer treat them as if we the reader should know what they look like? Zero description. They are not explained like they used to be in past novels. Yet another reason for this 3-star review.

With such breakthrough Deathlands novels such as the last Cannibal Moon, and Vengeance Trail, the six novels inbetween become a mixed bag of mediocre to terribly bad. For fans who don't want to see continued growth in their main characters, and are happy with just a plain old-fashioned stripped-down post-holocaust action/adventure, and not something totally fresh and new, then Sky Raider should quench your thirst for plain bloodletting.

But after reading this series for 21-years, we expect something more and fulfilling. It's the difference between a decent meal and a great meal.

I bought this for my husband. He has read it already and loved it, as usual. I have bought him all of the deathlands series. Of course I had to buy a lot of them used but he didn't care. He says that they are the best books (along with the Outlanders series) that he has ever read. He has read a lot in his day too.