Alcatraz 4, Best One Yet? General Discussion. Potential Spoilers

[Chaos he/him]

So, I just got Shattered Lens for Christmas, and I'm very impressed with it. I'm pretty sure it's the most funny of them, and it's definitely more tightly plotted than the slower Book 3.

Thoughts?

[luminos]

I'll have to reread the first two for comparison, but its looking like this could definitely be the best in the series.  It's hard to top a chapter of quotes from small villages.

[Earendil]

I actually didn't like it as much as the others--it felt like the whole book was setting up book 5, rather than telling a compelling story in its own right. This is especially annoying, given the likely difficulties that Brandon will have in getting book 5 published (sounds like Scholastic doesn't want it, but what publisher is going to want the last book in a series that someone else has the rights to?)

[sorkinfan]

I actually didn't like it as much as the others--it felt like the whole book was setting up book 5, rather than telling a compelling story in its own right. This is especially annoying, given the likely difficulties that Brandon will have in getting book 5 published (sounds like Scholastic doesn't want it, but what publisher is going to want the last book in a series that someone else has the rights to?)

He should pull a Doctorow and publish it on his website for free or we could pay, I wouldn't mind.

[HiccupGreyjoy]

I´ve finished it just now. It was once agin funny and actually well-paced, but I liked book 3 the best.

[happyman he/him]

For me, book 4 took things a little bit *too* far with the unreliable narrator stuff. It's one thing for him to be unhelpful and awkward. It's another to rewrite scenes in a way they definitely didn't happen, and where you don't even believe they could have happened that way. (I'm looking at you, quotation of Hamlet.) My suspension of disbelief was strained way past the breaking point at points, even though I know Alcatraz said he was going to do it.

That's my major complaint. It is also a very weak ending for the series as well, since it wasn't meant to be the end. But that's really only to be expected. I do think, though, that five is going to have to be good (and somewhat less silly) to really end the series well.

[Observer]

Alcatraz and co. stretched all reason, and just about every main character broke the fourth wall more than once. It was funny, amazingly so in fact, but it stretched the abovementioned suspension of belief to almost breaking point. I loved the book, but the fourth wall issues still exist.