Nick Of Time: A Genre Blender Featuring Time Traveling Pirates

Nick of Time by Ted Bell

This is another bargain bin item. I get most of these books for a dollar or two a piece and because there’s so many I often skim them before buying them. I have make sure I’m not buying a boring romance or mediocre mystery. But this one was called “In The Nick Of Time by Ted Bell.” And I when I skimmed it, I found it was about Time Travel, and like the typical sci-fi nerd I am I go “sweet!” I love Time Travel. So it was quickly tossed into the “To buy” pile.

The book Nick of Time, starts out with the even of a twelve year boy named Nick sailing the ship, “The stormy Pretral” through a series of rocks and reefs in a area called “the Seven Devils” And it immediately it the first twelve pages you get thins Treasure Island feel, which is awesome way to start out a book by the way. After that Nick arrives home late, so his mother gives him no dinner. He lives on Greybeard Island in 1939, just before World War II. He lives with his mother, father and sister. His father is a spy for possible Nazi airplanes and subs to report any activity to Churchill. But one day his father receives a letter saying that the king wants him to stop spying and in order to do some he will remove his family from their home. His father and mother leave to speak with the king about it, telling Nick to take care his little sister while they’re gone. Meanwhile on the island, Kate and Nick discover a chest that is antique yet looks brand new. The two children hide it, but soon find that there are pirates on the island looking for it and they hold Nick’s dog for ransomed. For help, Nick and Kate joins with a friend Gunner Hawke and go to Hawke castle in order to get help. (With the chest) Lord Hawke reveals there is a time machine inside the chest with a letter saying his great grandfather needs help back in 1805.

So overall, the character of Nick is a huge throwback to Jim Hawkens in Treasure Island. Yet set right before WW II with a long lost time machine created by Da Vinci that the pirates are after, is the complex yet very original plot for the book. It’s giving pirate novels a sci-fi twist. And the only way to describe it is this about the closest thing I’ve seen to the Disney movie Treasure Planet, where they attempted to do the same thing.

So now that I’m done explaining, what is good and what is bad?

The good is it’s a blend of piracy, time travel and then some WWII espionage. It is a genre blender and genre blenders are just so fun. So even if you don’t like one of those elements there still maybe something you enjoy. The book has a complex and elaborate narrative in which it’s unpredictable. And I will say here, because it’s unpredictable, it does have an element of suspense. It is a little draggy when explaining the time machine but it picks up with a good pacing and you’re never bored.

The bad? Well I have to say detail. When they travel back to 1805, there is lack of detail. There’s even a lack of detail in 1939. I don’t live in these times, so unless I’m a history wiz, I really don’t know what difference is between the two time eras here. There should have been astonishment of how things are different or a bit about Nick adjusting to 1805. Also Kate is captured on a U ship with Hawke’s assistant Hobbes and honestly I know very little about U-boats, so really wished they put background info there too. But I thought maybe it was because it’s aimed at kids, but then there’s a seen where a boy had his arm blown off. Well certainly if they’re going to throw gore in for the older reader they should give us more detail, for people who don’t know the terms of the older days. There were illustrations in the book of different events and characters and sadly helped me understand more of the environment more than the author did. That and there are plot holes. Such as Nick goes to Lord Hawke knowing anyone who enters his castle is to be shot dead. He goes on a whim that he might help having no idea of who he is at all. That just doesn’t seem realistic to me. And then one last thing. The book is called “Nick of Time”. Cute for the title. But as the book goes on, the author uses that as pun way too much. There’s too many scenes where Nick arrives to save some one and they go, “You just arrived in the nick of time.” Once I forgive. Twice is pushing it. Three no way. But they do it four times. It just makes the reader roll their eyes when they see it.

So overall, it actually is a creative e story and a great genre blender. If you like pirates and time travel read it. If you’re like me, like you enjoyed Disney’s Treasure Planet, this will be amazing. But its barely anything beyond that even though. It does not delve into any real details or drama that is happening. It’s just fun with a lot of action, and is worth looking into for that alone..

3 1/4 smoothies out of four

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Those Who Seek Forgiveness: A Reminder To All Of Us Of How Much We Miss Anita

Those Who Seek Forgiveness by Laurell K. Hamilton

Okay, this is another smoothie review based in an individual short story. Why not a whole book? Well tell me how to review a collection of short stores with it having a meaning behind it, and I’ll start. Every story in my opinion whether it’s a novel, novella should be seen as it’s own piece of work and should be treated as such. This one comes from Laurell K. Hamilton short story collection called, Strange Candy. And this one is called, “Those Who Seek Forgiveness.”

“Those Who Seek Forgiveness,” is the official first written piece involving Anita Blake. And if you know anything about Laurell K. Hamilton, you will surely know about the great Anita: Blake Vampire Hunter series that she created and sadly destroyed with the later books. This takes place before Guilty Pleasures (which is the first official Anita book) and long before Jean Claude and Richard came along. This was when Vampires were still illegal. The events focus on a job of raising a dead husband for a woman, who wants him to forgive her. She says he died of a heart attack and she wanted to say she is sorry to him because she had affair and wasn’t faithful. Oh and by the way, Anita is a Necromancer.

But if you have read Laurell K. Hamilton, you clearly know things are never what they seem. And I won’t say more about the story because it is an awfully short story. It plays as an introduction as the character and world more than any else, but I better get on with the review.

The good? Its the old Anita Blake. It is the woman that all the fans fell in love with at the beginning of the series. It’s not the sex addict Anita appears to be in the latest books. Its the Anita we love. And also without Jean Clause and Richard, it was less complicated. It was simple, sweet and just made me realize how much I miss Anita.

The bad? Not much to say other than it is really short. The story is officially fifteen pages long. And I did want more. But guess beggars can’t be choosers.

So overall, it was short and simple. Maybe too short. But compared to Laurell’s other works lately, I will accept fifteen pages of fun over five hundred pages of erotica. Because let’s face it people. Laurel K. Hamilton is so much more talented than that. Guilty pleasures and sex scenes can only go so far until you say, “That’s Enough! I want the old Anita Back!” And here we get our wish, even if it is so short.

Overall Rating: Reminds Me of How Badly I Miss Anita

3 smoothies out of four

P.S. check out book and ebook website at http://www.freewebs.com/lelue/