John L. French

Usually, books in the "Systema Paradoxa" series focus on a specific fearsome critter. Not so "Cessie at Bay", which offers two for the price of one: the eponymous"Chessie", the "Nessie" of Cesapeake Bay, plus a family of snallygasters. The story is even in part told from their pov. They are depicted as not only intelligent and telepathic but also making moral decisions, trying to get along with their human neigbours.

Add to that a plot involving spies and submarines on the eve of WW II, a show more plot that unfolds concisely and without ado, well-written by an author who can do his stuff and has clearly done his research (except in one instance, mentioning "Saknussemm and Lindenbrock" (sic) as if they were real people), and what you get is a quick, fun read. show less

If you like your historical police procedurals gritty, gruesome, but realistic, this book is right up your alley.
PLOT: The year is 1888 and Red Jack (Jack the Ripper) is terrorizing White Chapel. Detective Adrian Hope, of Scotland Yard’s Hound Squad, is on the job, but he is working on other cases. His faithful sidekick is Grace “Gracie” O’Malley, an Irish wolfhound. In this short book, the pair investigate three interlocking cases: the murder of young boys, a murder of a police show more decoy, and a murderous social club.
POSITIVE: I love that this book was written by a retired crime scene supervisor. The man knows his stuff. His writing is gritty and graphic. (You have been forewarned!)
For the animal lovers in the crowd, there is no animal violence and yes, Gracie survives.
The characters are well written. Be prepared for the pop ins of some famous personages. (To say who would spoil the surprise.) In this regard, be prepared for a few less than realistic factors. Just go with it.
NEGATIVE: While I believe the scenes are well drawn and realistic, the author should do a little historic research. Yes, Scotland Yard did use dogs in 1888. They were brough into work on the Jack the Ripper case. However, two-way mirrors didn’t exist in 1888 and weren’t invented until 1903 and were not in use in police stations until much later in the 20th century. I did not check out electric cars or other conveyances.
I wish the book was longer. Each of these short stories could easily been stretched into a full book and those books into a series. Adrian and Gracie make a cute team. I hope the author writes more about them.
CONCLUSION: I am already looking for the earlier books by this author. I recommend it. show less

[Disclaimer: I got this book via LibraryThing's Early Reviewer program]
True, it's a science fiction novel. But actually this book is a hardboiled crime story, which is not strange at all since French has been a crime scene supervisor. From that point of view the book is a guarantee: the reader knows exactly how the story will evolve, and so she may taste better the detail. Indeed it is a pleasure to read the book, especially when the Truth-Finder (the Earth detective) and his reptilian show more assistant interact. It is not a Pulitzer-winning book, but it deserves to be read. show less

Death on Omega Station by John L. French is basically a classic detective story injected into an alien-built space station setting in the not too distant future. It's well written, the plot is excellent (pure detective story stuff), and it's hard to put down. Being only 112 pages in length, this novel can easily be read in a single sitting (which this reviewer did).

As for the Science Fiction aspect of this novel, there isn't much originality on the technical/scientific side, but the way all show more of the components used in this novel are coherently woven together is sufficiently reasonable to hold one's attention. While the range of alien physiology is also somewhat conventional, the individual characterizations and the cultural description of each alien race are colorful, interesting (at times intriguingly so), and require only a modicum of suspension of disbelief. The reader can get sucked into this alien setting easily enough, because it captures the imagination. In addition, since the main protagonist is human, this story is very relatable.

But there are some obvious flaws in Frech's future science. Possibly the most objectionable is the injection into this futuristic narrative some technologies and challenges that are much in vogue today, such as apps, cloud storage, the current limitations of AI, etc., which will, undoubtedly, be completely outdated and forgotten in any future era that's sufficiently advanced to have developed faster than light space travel. In fact, the book's inclusion of today's scientific and engineering achievements in such a futuristic setting is likely to make this novel feel rather dated in ten or twenty years, if not sooner.

Placing today's soon-to-be-obsolete state-of-the-art engineering and science in a far off SciFi setting is not much more credible than writing about people using typewriters and sliderules on starships. Robots, on the other hand, and digital data manipulation are tangible constructs in use today that will undoubtedly be around in one form or another deep into the future, albeit in vastly more sophisticated forms, packages, and usages than they are today.

It's the job of a Science Fiction writer to imagine what the future form of these things -and entirely new creations - will be and place vivid images of those future things in their reader's mind for them to be amazed or wonder at, or be horrified by, or ponder over, or dream about; not to lazily insert today's tech and science unmodified into a future setting. The latter is boring, or comical at best. Most likely people on starships won't use cellphones (nor will people 100 years from now).

Another extremely noticeable fault is the use of today's confused gender pronouns for asexual or nueter species like the Dagon. Using plural pronouns to reference a single individual may be politically correct and in fashion today, but it is unforgivably awkward and confusing to read when referring to an alien. To think people in the distant future would continue to be unable to create singular gender neutral and asexual pronouns is laughable. Since they don't exist today, French should either invent them (this is Science Fiction, after all) or skillfully finesse the text so that such pronouns aren't needed. To call a single alien "them" or "they" is really bad form, perplexing, and will make this novel dated very quickly.

This novel also needs some close proofreading. For example, the ommission of the word "be" in the following sentence on page 105: 'There would tension in the air and suspenseful music playing in the background." And again, on the same page, in the next line the second instance of the word "I" is missing: "Foolishly, I wished had on boots with spurs and a six-shooter on my hip." This is shody workmanship.

It makes one wonder, "Are there no good proofreaders anymore?" Such sloppiness is unacceptable in a published work. A cursory review of this text in a spell checker would not only eliminate misspelled words (there are several in this book), but also many of the grammer mistakes, like those mentioned above. Just bring it up in Microsoft Word, or any good text editor, and look for the red and blue underlines. Simple as cake...so why didn't the author take time do this simple, very necessary task?

Overall, however, the level of imagination, logical consitancy, and writing skill displayed in this book is pretty high. Like all great detective stories, Death on Omega Station has all the plot twists, dead ends that proove useful later, tantalizingly subtle clues, a dynamic climax, and a satisfying denouement; it's inherently interesting as Science Fiction and it reads well. What more could one ask (other than correcting the faults mentioned above)? show less