Eclipse Hunter (Novel)

The starting premise is good, and the first few chapters are fairly well done, but the characters soon become so cartoonish that it is difficult to continue reading.

It is also hard to keep laughing at the 'innocent killer' meme, hard to accept the supposed friendships between the semi-normal 'adults'/teenagers and the main character who is like a 4 year old in a state of arrested development. It is also hard to accept the lack of emotional/social development by this man-child: rather than see him seriously progress and develop into a teenager/adult, the author tries to keep the 'humor' going by playing on the incongruity.

The constant laughing about abusive relationships is also disturbing (eg: people being forced at gun-point to be 'friends'). Because the story is meant to be lighthearted, the characters do not seem to really mind this behavior, but it is wrong and furthermore, it is highly unlikely that people wouldn't quickly begin to chafe under such constraints.

Worst of all are the obvious parallels with MK-ULTRA: abused to the point of suffering from Dissociative Identity Disorder (AKA multiple personality disorder), a victim breaks down into several personae, some of which are often very childish, while other ones are near-robotic... I don't think that books that try to make this palatable are a good thing.

... Last updated 13 years ago

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Nice, but not realistic

by kamerdiner
14 years ago

Rating: N/A

Maybe i should not wait for realism in novel, but when characters act like spoiled brats of anime-like, i just don't get it. Novel's plot is nice at the beginning, but very strong character from the start don't impact me much also. Nice for breakfast reading though.

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Hilarious

by Fathom
14 years ago

Rating: 8.0 / 10.0

At first I thought this would be a heavier type of drama, but by chapter 3 it started going more like a typical comedic shounen.

The story is about 2 brothers. The oldest brother lived spoiled and in privilege, while the younger brother grew up a portion of his life in a dark attic w/ barely any human contact. Through a crurel twist in fate, the brothers get separated. And when they are able to meet up again, the little brother has changed in more ways than one. Now that the younger brother has returned, Daren, will spare no expense to try to give his younger brother the life he should have; including forcing his younger brother to go to school to learn about teenage life. So the main story appears to be a 15 year old boy that’s a super killing machine trying to pretend to be human amidst his fellow students.

Overall, I quite enjoyed the story. I’m glad it’s not about characters fighting for justice or saving the world. In fact, both brothers have no moral problems in killing people. The dialogue is actually pretty hilarious, and I can’t wait to read the rest of it.

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