STUART WOODS’ “SEVERE CLEAR”: SEVERELY DISAPPOINTING

RATING GUIDE:

 

5 – A keeper!   

4 – Very good

3 –  Passable

2 –  I’d rather read a telephone book

1 – An absolute bomb.  Read at your own risk!

Females enjoy the occasional testosterone-driven movie (especially when the hero is played by someone like Daniel Craig), but what about the testosterone-driven book? 

Stuart Woods’ “Severe Clear” is one such book.  In fact, it’s but one of Stuart Woods’ many testosterone-driven books featuring his version of The Guy’s Guy, Stone Barrington.

Stone Barrington is the hero and the subject of a series of novels by Woods.  A former detective who’s now a rich lawyer in New York City, Stone handles ultra-sensitive cases for a living and mingles with his cop friends, as well as his friends in high places (like the FBI).  Occasionally, he sleeps with them.

In this book, Stone has to stop a group of terrorists from avenging Bin Laden’s death by blasting this hotel called The Arrington (which also happens to be co-owned by Stone), hundreds of celebrities, the President of the United States and Mexico AND, oh, a few million people here and there.  Will Stone save the day?  Like James Bond and every other hero with a series of his own, of course, he does!  The question is, is the journey towards the traditional happy ending any fun for the reader?

I really admire and respect authors for the kind of work they do.  Writing is definitely hard work.  It’s a lonely, difficult job.  Imagine spending one’s hours in front of a computer, writing something that usually involves ripping your heart open and/or wracking your brain for thoughts and ideas and THEN offering them to people for them to judge.  As one who loves reading books (and blogging about it), I think it is but fair and respectful to the author to be objective and list down the strengths and weaknesses of his creation.

I hate to say this, but here goes.

If you’re a true-blue fan of Stuart Woods’ Stone Barrington series and are willing to read and appreciate ANYTHING as long as it’s a Stuart Woods/Stone Barrington book, then you’ll probably love this book.  However, if you are a book reader who doesn’t really care whether the author is a New York Times bestselling author and isn’t really a Stuart Woods/Stone Barrington fan, then reading this book will be AGONY. 

In terms of format, this is the first time I have ever come across a book that hardly contains any prose/visual description.  Apart from giving us the names of the characters, Woods doesn’t even give his readers an idea as to what his characters look like, sound like, act like.  In fact, this book gives me the impression that Woods planned on writing a screenplay but only decided to turn it into an actual book at the last moment. 

In terms of plot, it is action-packed and commercially appealing enough.  It’s very easy to see this novel turned into a big-budget Hollywood movie.  However, the plot is very predictable.  Hero tries to foil terrorists’ attempts of harming capitalist America. 

Stone, as well as  his associates and love interests, are flat and uni-dimensional.  There’s a total absence of character development here.  In fact, it’s the bad guys who have more “character” for it is these people that Woods assigns a back story to. 

Americans or those who live in First World nations might like or relate to this book more, since Woods’ story plays on the fears of another big terrorist attack following 9/11 and the death of Bin Laden.  However, as a reader from the Third World, I find Woods’ story quite racist.

In Woods’ book, the story begins with agents worrying about picking up a conversation between “someone” in Afghanistan and “someone” in Yemen that includes use of the words “the Arrington”.  Although Woods’ character didn’t really take the “threat” seriously based on that conversation, I just couldn’t help but wonder.  Do American agents automatically tap into conversations of people from Afghanistan and Yemen simply because these people come from these two countries?  And are American agents so paranoid as to assume something will go wrong, simply because they heard foreigners talk about an American hotel? They didn’t even understand what the conversation was about?  Woods’ agents not only seem paranoid, but also racist and frankly, quite stupid.

Woods also writes, “A Filipino waiter came with menus, and they ordered.”  Okay.  I just have to ask this.  How did Stone’s characters reach that conclusion?  Did they ask the waiter what country he came from?  Did the waiter tell them he was Filipino?  I’d hate to think that Americans would assume EVERY waiter who is brown-skinned has to be Filipino. 

It is admirable that Woods’ female characters are strong (ball-busters, actually) and hold important positions in male-dominated groups such as law enforcement.  But Woods apparently can’t help but succumb to the desires of his Caveman fans, because he lets Stone sleep with not just one BUT TWO of these ball-busting females, apparently without any of them knowing (what, aren’t they smart enough?).  So, they’re smart and accomplished, but ultimately, they’re just booty call?  Quite insulting.

I also expected the chapters would end with a bang, so you’d be encouraged to read further.  So, can you imagine reading further if your character does something as “exciting” as watch an old movie?  (That actually happens in Chapter 16)

 

The only thing that kept me from falling asleep while reading this book was my urge to throw this book against the wall.

Come to think of it, this isn’t even a book, but a screenplay masquerading as a book. 

I understand that every author has his or her high and low points.  However, this is not the kind of book that I expected from someone who has made it to the New York Times’ Bestsellers list.  It’s the kind of book that makes me wonder, did Woods just write this to fulfill a contractual obligation or make money?  Was he going through anything difficult in his personal life while writing this?  Because this definitely isn’t the kind of book you would expect from a highly-popular author who has written many books and has lots of fans.

This book just gives me the impression that Woods is either just tired of his character(s), or writing in general.  In any case, he needs to recharge if he desires to keep his fan base and develop new ones.  The quality of this book is just very disappointing. 

RATING:  1