Book #30 of 2014: Mutegi's Sweet One
Jul. 21st, 2014 08:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thistlechaserMutegi's Sweet One by Charlie Richards
Rating: 1/hated (1-5/hated-loved)
He became rock hard after just that brief kiss, and his warthog really wanted to claim the man.
I didn't expect this book to be good, but even I couldn't guess just how awful this thing was.
Quoting lines:
Ben's back and ass with his own shuddered, twice more, pleasure Ben stepped back and his brow creased.
Ben noted the other Slipping from the followed.
"But you're not," different," He glanced Ben denied.
There are some things you just have to accept, gaining his thoughts. He about.
There are more than twenty "sentences" like that. In a 72 page book that the author charges $5 for. Forget about a beta reader or a friend looking it over, I don't believe the author herself reread this damned thing before putting it up for sale.
But let's back up a step, to the plot. The author has written thirty or so "books", half of them about these shifters. One of the biggest thing that annoys me about this book is that the idea had potential, but I'd be surprised if Charlie Richards could write a check, let alone write a coherent story, so that potential is lost.
The book is set in our world, other than that there are a very few "shifters" (were-animals). The series focuses on a motorcycle gang made up of gay shifters -- they don't have a pack of their own in their species, so they came together to form this mixed-species biker gang/pack. And they're all gay. All of them being gay is a stretch, but that idea as a whole in the right hands could have work.
Charlie Richards's hands are not the right hands.
Many bigots thought it was impossible for shifters to be gay, but everyone in the gang was gay, all thirteen of them.
Why? What does the kind of sex you enjoy have anything to do with someone being a were-animal? Not to mention, no one knows shifters exist other than them and their human mates, so who are these bigots?
So the gang is riding down the road and encounter a broken down truck. Because they're kindhearted gay biker shifters, they stop to help. Would you believe that the guy in the truck is the mate of one of them?! What are the chances!!
Every shifter has a mate out there in the world somewhere, like a soulmate.
Blah blah, the two have sex because of course the human (Ben) has the hots for the warthog shifter (Mutegi) at first sight.
There's a seriously stupid subplot about a group of human bigots who want to take Ben's sister's baby away because Ben is gay. These bigots have broken the law multiple times and are trying to beat/kill them, but the law doesn't care. Because Ben is gay.
The shifter gang and the gang of bigots get into a fight. Explain this to me:
A tusk went through the man's heart and gave him a quick death.
How can a warthog (one shaped like a real warthog, not running around on two legs like a werewolf might) possibly get its tusk through a man's chest and into his heart? Wouldn't the dome of his head get in the way?
The dialogue was stupid and unrealistic. Most characters were just stereotypes. The sex was barely okay. The only thing I liked in the whole book was Mutegi's nickname for Ben (Sweet One), until we got to things like this:
He noted the three scoops of sugar Ben put in [his coffee]. Well, that explains why he tastes so sweet!
Um. I don't think that's all it takes to change the flavor of... everything ...about a man...
The writer was so bad that the only description we had of Mutegi (the main character!) for the first 95% of the book was that he was big and African. Big in all ways. It wasn't until the 96% point that we found out anything else - that he had dreads. The next page the story ended.
To sum it up, this book is everything that's wrong with the self-publishing industry. Crap quality (sorry for insulting you, crap), a $5 price tag!, and writing worse than most any fanfic. This person wrote dozens of books; apparently they're selling because she keeps writing more. You can get these same tropes and much better sex/writing from hundreds of different fanfics or original stories around on the net for free.
Rating: 1/hated (1-5/hated-loved)
He became rock hard after just that brief kiss, and his warthog really wanted to claim the man.
I didn't expect this book to be good, but even I couldn't guess just how awful this thing was.
Quoting lines:
Ben's back and ass with his own shuddered, twice more, pleasure Ben stepped back and his brow creased.
Ben noted the other Slipping from the followed.
"But you're not," different," He glanced Ben denied.
There are some things you just have to accept, gaining his thoughts. He about.
There are more than twenty "sentences" like that. In a 72 page book that the author charges $5 for. Forget about a beta reader or a friend looking it over, I don't believe the author herself reread this damned thing before putting it up for sale.
But let's back up a step, to the plot. The author has written thirty or so "books", half of them about these shifters. One of the biggest thing that annoys me about this book is that the idea had potential, but I'd be surprised if Charlie Richards could write a check, let alone write a coherent story, so that potential is lost.
The book is set in our world, other than that there are a very few "shifters" (were-animals). The series focuses on a motorcycle gang made up of gay shifters -- they don't have a pack of their own in their species, so they came together to form this mixed-species biker gang/pack. And they're all gay. All of them being gay is a stretch, but that idea as a whole in the right hands could have work.
Charlie Richards's hands are not the right hands.
Many bigots thought it was impossible for shifters to be gay, but everyone in the gang was gay, all thirteen of them.
Why? What does the kind of sex you enjoy have anything to do with someone being a were-animal? Not to mention, no one knows shifters exist other than them and their human mates, so who are these bigots?
So the gang is riding down the road and encounter a broken down truck. Because they're kindhearted gay biker shifters, they stop to help. Would you believe that the guy in the truck is the mate of one of them?! What are the chances!!
Every shifter has a mate out there in the world somewhere, like a soulmate.
Blah blah, the two have sex because of course the human (Ben) has the hots for the warthog shifter (Mutegi) at first sight.
There's a seriously stupid subplot about a group of human bigots who want to take Ben's sister's baby away because Ben is gay. These bigots have broken the law multiple times and are trying to beat/kill them, but the law doesn't care. Because Ben is gay.
The shifter gang and the gang of bigots get into a fight. Explain this to me:
A tusk went through the man's heart and gave him a quick death.
How can a warthog (one shaped like a real warthog, not running around on two legs like a werewolf might) possibly get its tusk through a man's chest and into his heart? Wouldn't the dome of his head get in the way?
The dialogue was stupid and unrealistic. Most characters were just stereotypes. The sex was barely okay. The only thing I liked in the whole book was Mutegi's nickname for Ben (Sweet One), until we got to things like this:
He noted the three scoops of sugar Ben put in [his coffee]. Well, that explains why he tastes so sweet!
Um. I don't think that's all it takes to change the flavor of... everything ...about a man...
The writer was so bad that the only description we had of Mutegi (the main character!) for the first 95% of the book was that he was big and African. Big in all ways. It wasn't until the 96% point that we found out anything else - that he had dreads. The next page the story ended.
To sum it up, this book is everything that's wrong with the self-publishing industry. Crap quality (sorry for insulting you, crap), a $5 price tag!, and writing worse than most any fanfic. This person wrote dozens of books; apparently they're selling because she keeps writing more. You can get these same tropes and much better sex/writing from hundreds of different fanfics or original stories around on the net for free.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 03:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 03:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 04:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 04:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 05:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 02:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 02:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 02:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 03:36 pm (UTC)"When he was a young warthog / When I was a young wartHOOOOOOG!"
Anyway. Just my usual minor quibble:
m. I don't think that's all it takes to change the flavor of... everything ...about a man...
Actually...it might. I know that the food a man eats can change the flavor of...that...pretty easily.
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 04:38 pm (UTC)Seriously, out of the whole entire book, I'm fixed on the coffee-drinking habits of bikers...
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 03:49 pm (UTC)SPOILERS!!!!
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 04:38 pm (UTC):D
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 06:33 pm (UTC)The visual aids are genius.
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 06:37 pm (UTC)I would Your book. happily.
Glad you enjoyed them! :D
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 06:43 pm (UTC)I would Your book. happily.
Funny you should say that. Because I've been planning to ask you if you'd like to beta/review it before publishing :-)
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 06:51 pm (UTC)Can you get it to me in epub or mobi format? I do all my reading on my Kindle. If it's pdf, it depends on how it looks once I upload it -- sometimes those end up in an unreadable state.
Because I'm reading on a Kindle, I can't edit it to the point I would at work. It'd be basic typos/grammar issues I notice, general logic stuff, unclear stuff, etc.
If it's ready now, it'll be a little bit of a wait before I can. I just started one book, and a publisher is supposed to be getting me another this week, so that one will be next. After that I'm open though! :)
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 06:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 07:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 07:11 pm (UTC)As I said, if that's not where your tastes lie, that's not a problem. It's going to be a collection of more or less stand-alone stories in any case, where each character gets their own episode, so you can read the gen or M/M ones if you like.
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 07:16 pm (UTC)If you do want me to read the gen or M/M ones, I'd be happy to!
no subject
Date: 2014-07-22 07:22 pm (UTC)Poor warthog author :-P
no subject
Date: 2014-07-24 01:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-07-24 01:46 am (UTC)