Review of The Gender Divide

Michael · Posted: Fri May 15, 2009 8:01 pm Post subject: Review of The Gender Divide

Changing the World Again:
A Review of The Gender Divide by David Boultbee

The Gender Divide, September 2007, David Boultbee
Shadowmere Publishing
ISBN 978-1-890785-12-3
Reviewer: Michael Southard

The Gender Divide is a thoughtful science-fiction story set in a future world where women live three or four times longer than men and are the dominant force in society. Although plot progression is slow, the characters are well done and the science relating to nanite augmentation is well-detailed and deeply interesting. In fact, alongside the political turmoil reaching its burtsing point, Boultbee's descriptions of nanite augmentation was part of what kept me reading the story.

Ryan Peters is one of a very few men who live as long as women, the result of a secret experiment by a man determined to change the world. That man had prepared for the dangerous consequences his work would inevitably provoke and safely hid his formula before his mysterious death. Now Ryan, as one of the subjects of the experiment, is the only one who can find the formula, and his secret "handlers" hired him to do that and helped him to acquire forty years of training in the military to achieve that goal.

I did not enjoy The Gender Divide as much as I would have liked, but overall it's a fairly good book. The overuse of adverbs slows the pace a bit, I think, and therefore it probably should have been edited better, but doesn't reallty spoil the experience. If not for this and the slow progression, I might haved like it a lot more. I give The Gender Divide 3.5 stars.

(Starting with this review, I will be using a rating system from now on. The ratings will be defined in this manner: 1 star=terrible, 2=fair, 3=good, 4=very good, and 5=excellent).

Review Copyright © by Michael Southard. All rights reserved.

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