A 'Did Not Finish'... 'Death Trek' -Jeffrey N. Wallmann


I used to be a lot more patient with books back in the day. If I picked one up then I'd do my best to finish it, even if it was awful. What heady, carefree days they were... Did I really have nothing better to do with my time than not enjoy what I was reading? Apparently so.

These days though... Life is really too short to spend on a book that I'm not enjoying, so I don't :o) I mean, why would you? And it's not like there aren't plenty of other books, in my flat, that I could be reading instead. So yep, today is a 'Did Not Finish' post. Step forward, Jeffrey N. Wallmann's 'Death Trek'.

I found my copy of 'Death Trek' almost exactly a year ago in Deptford Market. I was in the mood for something a little 'old school' and it doesn't get much more 'old school' than that cover, does it? It took me a while to get round to it (I wasn't in the mood for 'old school' for very long and then I had to wait for it to come round again) but the other day, it seemed like the right time to give 'Death Trek' a go. Lets just say that I put it down quicker than it took me to pick it up...

On an alien world ruled by magic and illogic, the warrior Vantro was called upon to do battle with the invading Fanes, a galactic religious order with vast magical powers. Casting his lot with a banished humanoid princess and her huge scaly servant, Vantro's mission was to vanquish the invaders, who had joined forces with treacherous planetary nobles, or lose the latest of his myriad lives!

Bloody hell...Despite the fact that I have a job, I will still buy anything if it's only 50p, especially if it's a book with a muscular, sword waving man on the front cover. Will I ever learn? Unlikely, but lets talk about why I didn't get any further than a few pages in. I know, you really should give a book more of a chance than that, shouldn't you? Well yes but only if you think that the book deserves a chance...

'Death Trek' didn't start off well, for me, thanks to the very clunky opening sequence where our hero Vantro is possibly... teleporting? I don't know, he's definitely floating but I couldn't tell you why and that felt kind of important to know. I've had a look online and this is the only 'Vantro' book that I could find so to start out by having him go all floaty (and for no apparent reason) just seemed a little odd. But anyway, it was early days so I thought I'd read a bit more.

Describing Vantro's people (the Shoi) as 'agile swingers' was unfortunate but I tried to give the book the benefit of the doubt and keep going, the fact that none of it was particularly interesting though, to me, was looking like more of a showstopper as the pages went by. Not for long though, I had to bow out at the mention of 'war Libits' (and the people riding them were 'Libiteers', for fucks sake...) though, that and a very tedious sounding battle that I didn't have the will to finish. I have a pet hate for ridiculous sounding, made up names in Fantasy and if I didn't care about whether Vantro beat the Libiteers or not (I still haven't read this bit and I don't care either way) then the book just wasn't for me. So down it went.

Maybe I should have given 'Death Trek' more time but those first few pages are vital in a book this size (a hundred and seventy two pages). If you haven't caught my interest in the first few pages then I'm going to stop and read something that will catch my eye instead, which is just what I did.

I'm willing to have my mind changed though if anyone has read 'Death Trek' and thinks that I should persevere. Any takers...? Didn't think so... ;o)


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