Customer Reviews

The Musketeer's Apprentice

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

 

 

I'm steadily making my way through this series, and am now on book four. These books are a frustrating mixture of interesting character development and some fun ideas, with just a ridiculous level of sloppiness -- sloppy editing, an apparent complete lack of proof-reading, and most frustrating of all for me, an almost total lack of historical research. I get the feeling that if Ms. D'Almeida had simply bothered to read a few Wikipedia articles while writing these books, she could have saved herself from myriad errors! She also seems to have a bizarre lack of knowledge of French names (some of the minor characters have truly weird names that seem to be out of some middle school kid's fan fiction), and of how the names and titles of nobility actually work. In the previous book, one of the things that made me say "argh" was that Cardinal Richelieu's name is given as Armand de Richelieu, rather than Armand Jean du Plessis, Duc de Richelieu. Ok, so it seems like a small error, but it's one of the many points where I was taken out of the narrative by saying to myself "the character who says that would never make that mistake!" And now here in "The Musketeer's Apprentice," a crucial plot element hinges on the point that the Duke of Buckingham and Constance Bonacieux allegedly have the same initials, CB, so his handkerchief could be mistaken for hers. Only, they don't at all! Supposedly the CB stands for "Charles Buckingham," but a) Buckingham wasn't his last name, it was his title, and b) his name wasn't Charles! The guy's name was George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham! It's this kind of seemingly minor thing that adds up to be really infuriating. A little research, or the services of a decent proof-reader/editor, would have gone a long, long way toward making these books be what they should have been.

Some other reviewers were bothered by historical inaccuracies and sloppy proofreading in this paperback novel. Well, I don't like either of those flaws, but I know so little about the world of the Musketeers that I wouldn't recognize an historical inaccuracy anyway. (Try me on books about Jesse James, Billy the Kid, the American Revolution, or Abe Lincoln and I'll get quite nit-picky myself.) However, I am almost 66 years old, and my knowledge of the Musketeers comes from the old comic-book "Classics Illustrated" version of Dumas' novel, and several movie treatments. On that level, this story was just fine. I found my copy in a "dollar store" for just over a buck, and while I agree it was a slow start, the last two-thirds got better and better. This is not enduring literature, but rather a good way to be lost in another world for several hours. I used the book for "emergency reading" because my job entails sometimes getting to people's homes for paperwork appointments too early, or having them ask me to delay at the last minute, or finishing too quickly to drive straight to my next appointment. So I took about three months to get to page 100, then one month to do the next 100, and finally, I got really hooked on the tale and did the last one-third in a week. Thanks, Sarah. Your novel had humor, action, sex, intrigue, and a surprisingly large amount of family conflict and sad emotion. It was obvious that by my not being familiar with the other series entries, I was missing a lot, so I will look for this book's mates and grab another volume if I get the opportunity.

I've now read all three of the Musketeers mysteries, and Musketeer's Apprentice is another piece that's great fun. Ms D'Almeida does an excellent job of recreating the style of Dumas' originals without becoming too modern. An excellent and intriguing mystery is combined with adventure, high politics, and family tensions.

I personally didn't have any issues with the copyediting glitches - while "peaked" instead of "piqued" is a glaring error, I have seen much, much worse and in any book it's almost guaranteed that something will slip through. It didn't spoil my enjoyment of the book in any way.

I hope there'll be more of these, and I'm eagerly looking forward to the next Musketeers mystery.

Wow!

What more is there to say? Once again, Sarah D'Almeida transports her readers to the Paris of Dumas. Richly crafted characters, a plot that twists and turns and keeps you guessing until the very end, fight scenes that would make Jackie Chan green with envy all fill this novel.

More important than all that -- in my opinion -- is the way Ms. D'Almeida makes the Musketeers her own without betraying Dumas in the process. Unlike so many novels based on characters as well-known as the Musketeers, Ms. D'Almeida stays true to the original. Another strength is the way she interweaves historical events with her plotline, giving it a feel of realism.

If you want a book that will keep you entertained and does not bend, much less break, your boundaries of disbelief, "The Musketeer's Apprentice" is a must-buy.

To be honest, I haven't finished this book yet, but early on, I'm already having issues with it. First of all, in the beginning when the author is introducing the main characters (the musketeers), it gets difficult to understand to whom she is referring. I find the introductions rather long and somewhat confusing. Also, the editing has so far left something to be desired, with awkwardly-constructed sentences and incorrect punctuation--capped off in an instance in which the author says a character's attention was "peaked." (sigh) Sloppy, sloppy, sloppy. One would think Berkley's publishing house would do better work.

I hope the tone and quality of this book improves....