Flesh and Silver

I got this book from the Chaplain's tent while I was deployed, and read it cover to cover as fast as I could. I immediately found his other book, Call From A Distant Shore, and read it just as hungrily. These books speak to the heart of heroism, the willingness to stand up after life knocks you down, and face the worst odds you can imagine, not for personal gain, because it's the right thing to do. These are both very satisfying reads, with intriguing characters and interesting worlds. I can't wait to read more from this author.

A sci-fi book with good character development and enough mystery to prevent you from putting the book down. The intense character development and backflashses slowed the book down, but it's a quick and easy read. Good, strong ending, if a bit predictable.

Where can I start in describing this book?Good characters? Check.Good concept? Check.Good ending? Check.The author resists the impulse to make the story too heavy-handed, and the characters are idealists that don't always suceed just because the plot demands that the good guys win. Although the good guys win, and man and woman are together, and the plot of the bad guys is foiled.But along the way, we see that the characters are fallable. Not in that annoying anti-hero sort of way - that manages to triumph against all odds. In the way that you and I are fallable. In a way that sometimes, we overcome our failures and rise above them.To look at the review, it would seem to be another story about another set of people that has a happy ending. While this is certainly true, I find that I lack the words to explain why I read this story as quickly as I could. Perhaps because it is balanced. Trying to put it into words makes the story seem weaker than it is.Perhaps it is the simplicity that is appealing. A simple story about a man that overcomes his weakness. A man that crawls out of a bottle and makes something of his life. Perhaps not too plausible, perhaps a bit to neat and happy an ending, but certainly one that I read toward, and enjoyed.And that's all one really needs to say about a book.Buy it!

This book contains the two major elements that make a story memorable: a good, original plot line and characters that you actually care about. The book starts with an interesting premise and pulls you in very quickly. The plot becomes more convoluted as the story progresses and is nicely revealed/resolved by the story's end.The characters are original,believable, and come to life vividly with Burns' writing. This was a page-turner that pulled me in enough to really care how the characters fared and how the story ended.This is a great first novel, well worth the read, and I look forward to his next effort.