John Hattaway

So, a little over a month ago I walked into Borders and purchased a copy of John Zakour’s The Flaxen Femme Fatale. Unfortunately, my priority at the time was to finishing up coursework at school and as a result it got set aside with the highest post-college-course-work reading priority of all the books I have to read. As a result, when I was done with college and had my family moved all the way across the country, I was able to pick up the book and start reading it. For those that don’t know, or haven’t been introduced to my opinion of this series of books, I really enjoy them. They are, effectively, cotton candy in the reading category (for me) and as a result, I have a tendency to run out and purchase Zakour’s books when they are released. One of the reasons for this is because I know that many publishing companies base future books off of initial and early sales and as a result, in order to keep my favorite authors publishing what I like to read I have to buy their books. This is also the reason I purchased many of the other books on my To Be Read list and why they are on a shelf to be read. In short, I like what I like and want it to continue and in some cases change and improve.

With all of that out of the way, I decided that Zakour’s The Flaxen Femme Fatale would be my first post college read. I was excited for the book. I am excited for the next book and if you are interested in some of Zakour’s thoughts on the process, you can go over to his website and read about it.

However, I would like to state that there were inherent problems with the book. Not in the story telling, but more in the proofing of the book. In many cases, much of the syntactical structure of the story was reversed or completely left out. I read slowly because I enjoy the taste of the words on my brain and in my mind and as a result I notice when adjectives and adverbs and connectors are reversed or out of order. The reason this is important is that the book, in theory, should’ve been proofed by several different people and as a result I think the publishing errors were egregious enough to have been caught and corrected before publication. Because Robert Jordan was one of the first authors I really tried to follow online (though the current Wheel of Time communities were never of much interest to me as I don’t care for the discussion among fans in relation to where they want the story to lead), I found myself interested in his comments about finding mistakes and having them fixed and what printings have what fixed. With all of that said, I think that later runs of the book (most likely combined with another of Zakour’s books) will have most of the problems fixed. Even with that said, it was a distraction for me.

Other than publishing mistakes, I enjoyed the story though I don’t necessarily feel that it rose to the level of writing that Zakour had with his writing partner Lawrence Ganem. Even with that said, I also think that Zakour has taken his protagonist, Zachary Nixon Johnson, in a direction that increases the depth of the storytelling while keeping the nature of the series of books light and easy to read. In this installment, as the story opens, Zach Johnson is visited (in his dreams) by a flaxen haired woman (Natasha) who tells him not to get involved in finding her. From that point throughout the book, Zach is left chasing her from one tourist trap to another starting in Las Vegas and ending in space. The outcome is… well, pure Zakour. It is a kind of mix between optimistic idealism and plainly unrealistic. I am not sure which one, but it felt good.

Feeling good is one of the elements of these books that I really like. In this book, Zach discovers more of the truth behind HARV, his cybernetic assistant as well as the role he plays in the safety of the world. Why this is important is because it marks a distinctive shift in the focus and direction of the books, on top of which Zakour appears to be taking the character and storylines in a new direction. More specifically, he has built a sub-plot of conspiracy and governmental control as a means of advancing his story and as the principle reason his characters are doing what they are doing. I bring this up not to share what you can expect with the story, but more to illustrate that Zakour as sole writer wrote a book that is a sudden and (impossibly) subtle shift away from where it has been going. The basic plot of most of the books has Zach Johnson being approached by someone to help them (often a hot woman) save the world from some other (often hot woman) person who is bent on taking over the world or destroying it. To help him, other than HARV, he has Randy, HARV’s creator, his assistant (and one of the most powerful psi’s on the planet) Carol, his fiance Electra, and GUS (his gun). In most books, Zakour has a cast of supporting characters (often hot women) who step in to help out in their odd and disturbed ways because, as hot women they are also very powerful. In most cases, this book is no different from his other books in that the world is being saved from a hot powerful woman who was cloned from (though slightly altered) Carol as the most powerful psi in creation. Because she is so powerful, no one can do anything to stop her. This does not stop other characters from other books from trying to step in and assist in this and as a result of that assistance several familiar people end up dying.

What’s more, Electra’s mother, a politician, is interested in gaining more power. A General Wall (female, powerful, not necessarily attractive though also not unattractive) has enlisted Zach’s help and does a lot more to advance not only the agenda of her employers (e.g. the World Council), but also her own agenda. We are led to believe that she is a mastermind, though admittedly, I am not certain Zakour effectively introduces the idea of genius into this work to allow the reader to sufficiently follow the logical progression of Zach behing hired to Zach taking down the bad guy. On top of which, there are a sufficient number of red herrings to distract the reader from the principle plot line (e.g. Zach is public enemy number one, Zach goes to Comic-Con, to Zach spends time with his fiance). Eventually, Zach realizes everything he’s not supposed to realize, helps the victim, and then returns home to end yet another adventure

What I think, other than a course change, weighed this story down were a couple of things: first, this was the second book Zakour has done about psi’s and their power. Granted The Blue Haired Bombshell was more overtly about psi’s and the psi ability (and the moon); but this one was designed to set up conflict (me thinks) in the future where the changes that are forced upon the psi’s of Earth and the Moon will play out. More, it seems that almost every villain babe and villain hero have psi power and this book is no different. More, Carol is set up to be very powerful and I think that Zakour is planning something there with her, especially since she’s been growing in importance with every story. Second, Zakour constantly referred to the basic premise of the book, Zach saves the world, and continually points out that the UNIVERSE, about once a year and at about the same time, steps in and places the world back in peril and make it up to Zach to save everything. As a result, this self-recognition of the basic premise of the series felt completely wasted on the audience and drags the basic story down as the audience, in general, doesn’t need to know this information. If a new reader is picking up the book, then the tongue in cheek action will illustrate what is happening and references to other cases as a result of other characters showing up is sufficient to illustrate that Zach has been in this position a few times before; and for established readers (I would like to think I am one of those), there is no reason to re-establish the basic premise since the established reader has been reading for quite a while.

I think the story was well written and since I know that Zakour outlines the entire book before he writes the first page, and since I know that his first chapters are meant to establish a well written book, my only conclusion to the entirety of the story and the way it felt to read was that Zakour was a bit rushed in the writing process. The structure of a really good story exists, but I think that even with the standard elements his execution felt a bit lacking. It feels rushed. I am not sure what Zakour’s process in this book was or what kind of a time frame he had in writing it, but the outcome didn’t feel like past books and even though he has written another good addition to the Zach Johnson universe, the outcome is that I didn’t enjoy the book as much as I have in the past. Truth told, I am now waiting for his next book, Sapphire Sirens, to come out to see what he is doing.

Two things happened in recent months, though. First, my father-in-law told me he really enjoyed The Plutonium Blonde (first book) and borrowed The Doomsday Brunette to read because he liked that kind of book, which, in turn, helps me understand what he likes for when I suggest things to read. Second, Erin picked up The Flaxen Femme Fatale and started reading it. She enjoys the chapter length and (against odds) has been enjoying the book. She might even pick up and read some of the earlier books. As a result, I feel confident in suggeting these books as fun and light reading.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Clockwork Princess | Cassandra West

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This entry was posted by smokingpen on Friday, January 2nd, 2009 at 9:26 pm and is filed under John Zakour, book reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.