Sam Johnson
8/11/12
Tour of Utah Stage 6
I recently read the book Stage Six: The King of the Empire by the author Tour of Utah. The book had many redeeming qualities, but there was so much suffering in the story I ultimately have to give this book a bad review. The plot revolved around a race that had been in progress for a long time. Stage Six is of course the sequel to the previous book in the series Stage Five: Queen Stage. The plot is very simple: the big race is almost finished, and most of the racers are very tired, but there is one more big test they must pass before they can go home. There is a magical yellow shirt that is passed back and forth between the best racers. Most of the racers are simply trying to finish, while a few of them are still battling for the overall victory (and the magic yellow shirt). The characters in the book are mostly bicycle racers. At first I liked the author's descriptions, but then things got very repetitive: all day long the racers spend their time wallowing in extreme pain along the slopes of some gigantic mountain. This happens over and over and over again. The author tries to make each new mountain seem different or exciting in some way, but in the end, it all seems the same: suffering in the mountains. This brings me to possibly my favorite part of the book: the setting. The beautiful mountains of Utah provide a beautiful backdrop for the racing action, and the author does a wonderful job of bringing those beautiful mountains to life. The beautiful mountains even take on a vengeful quality, trying to punish the racers for some cosmic crime they committed in their past lives. Overall Stage Six: The King of the Empire is an interesting book, but I cannot recommend it.
Oh yeah, and here's a laser cat dance party:
Oh yeah, and here's a laser cat dance party:
1 comment:
You have reminded me that lord of the rings was a lot of walking - and that cyclists are hamsters running on a wheel.
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