Tired- A Review Shop [CLOSED FOR CATCH-UP]

Leeward

empiresofwater

Hi, great to see you! Not sure what my review shop can offer you, since your writing is a whole other level already, but anyways, I feel like I should tell you that this might be a lackluster review because I'm writing this late at night to fend off the anxiety of essay deadlines. 

1. What I got from the title, cover and blurb:

I like the title. It's short, simple, and cool. I searched it up, and it means 'the direction downward from the point of reference', implying a voyage that is going to go very, very wrong. 

The image on the cover works, a ship in the middle of some kind of storm. The subtitle gives me a sense of foreboding, really chilling vibes. 

From the blurb, I get that a mutiny has occurred, and a Captain is assigned to hunt it down with a crew full of sick people and a first lieutenant who wants his job but didn't get it. I'm curious about what happened to the ship, and I'm not sure why but I'm kind of wondering if the mutineers are human? Overall I'm getting sea monster/undiscovered sea creature vibes and I'm not sure if it's accurate, so I don't know where to put my expectations. Also, I'm excited by the MxM cz a lot of swashbuckler stories I've heard about feature straight couples and the prospective romantic tension between two rivals on a ship sounds awesome. 

2. What I understood from the story so far:

The review covers until Chapter 5, and I probably read through the rest while waiting for my friend to get back to me on her essay. 

The story starts with an explosive beginning in the middle of what I assume is an epic naval battle featuring Captain Hiram Nightingale. Fast forward two years later, Captain Hiram is on another ship, headed somewhere else to be the captain of the Scylla, and has a conversation with a little kid named Robert. Captain Hiram receives his mission to track down the Ulysses and meets his crew and ship. He deals with one of the crew who was arrested and interviews the survivors of the mutiny on the Ulysses. 

3. What I thought of the characters:

There's not much to say on this front, to be frank. I was like 'wow, Captain Hiram survived all that bombing and shooting in the battle' and that's pretty much it. I was more invested in the plot than anything else, so I really don't have anything to say at this point. 

4. Nitpicks and personal opinions (this will include spelling and grammar):

I think I should preface this by saying that I'm sleepy, salty about life and currently having a terrible time trying to understand things. You know, when one lacks sleep, everything starts looking and sounding weird? Yeah, that's happening to me right now and might affect the quality of my nitpicks. 

The last sentence of the blurb reads as jarring and cut-off and it made me go 'huh?' at the end. I can't put my finger on it, but it seems rushed and doesn't really work as a hook for me. 

I think a lot of the comments have already pointed it out, but I'd like to add it here too: the last sentence of the battle in 1 also made me think that they fought till dawn. 

I like 2. I liked it very much. I could picture the setting, enjoyed the conversation between Captain Hiram and Robert, but in all honesty I don't understand a thing about what's going on. I'm guessing Captain Hiram got demoted, or he's suffering from PTSD from that epically scary battle, and currently he's on another ship heading somewhere. 

3 was where things started making sense for me. I like (yes I'm using a lot of I like because I don't have a vocabulary anymore) that it grounds things in the time period, like the original captain of the Scylla dying of yellow fever and the HMS Hermione mutiny thing. The kid in me who loved Greek myths was very excited when the myth of Ulysses and the whirlpool and the monster was brought up. 

5 was the highlight of the read for me. I was super intrigued by Fairfax's story exposing the horrors of an actual mutiny at sea. 

I love the descriptions of the crew, though I can't remember much of it at the moment. 

The part where Captain Hiram lays eyes on Lieutenant Courtney made me go 'woop!' cz it reminded me of a bl meet-cute I watched before. 

I didn't spot any spelling and grammar mistakes, though I would suggest copy-pasting an emdash or using two endashes when you're actually using an emdash in the sentence. 

To be honest, I was kind of dreading doing this review because a) I'm more of a binge-reader but your stories are addicting, like it's hard to pull away once I've started and b) I really didn't think I'd be able to provide much critique which probably resulted in this very, very shallow review. Congrats on all your awards though, can't wait for Atalanus to finish by the way!