Reviews for The Stainless Steel Rat Sings the Blues (Stainless Steel Rat Series #8)

The average rating for The Stainless Steel Rat Sings the Blues (Stainless Steel Rat Series #8) based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-09-25 00:00:00 Van Car So ends the Stainless Steel Rat prequel trilogy (yes, Jim DiGriz had a prequel trilogy long before Star Wars did)... and this third chapter wasn't quite up to the standard of the first two, in my humble opinion. Why? Well, it's like this: in this volume, Slippery Jim comes up with the slightly dubious idea of forming a musical group as a cover to infiltrate a prison plant (yes, it makes as much sense in the book as it does in this sentence) and, while the rest of the book is mostly fine, the scenes about the band are painful to read, particularly if you've ever been in one (or, as in my case, several). I'm not sure how much stock I put in the old adage 'write what you know', as it would prevent a number of my favourite genres from even existing if taken literally, but I'm going to say that in the case of music, you should definitely avoid writing about it if you have no experience of it because, without fail, non-musicians writing about what it's like to be a musician always ends up being completely laughable... and not in a good way. Anyway, other than that, the book is fine; more of the usual Stainless antics. Now, on to the next/first book in the series...

Review # 2 was written on 2019-12-06 00:00:00 Lisa Merrifield I'm glad that it has been a while since I last read a Stainless Steel Rat book. They are best consumed with considerable space between them, otherwise the sameness of the adventures and the humour becomes a drag. But there are a few treats in store in each book. In this one, Slippery Jim must visit a prison planet to find a stolen archeological artifact, undercover as part of a band. Their first encounter with unwashed nomads sends up organized religion. Next, they encounter a society where men and women live separately, a comic rewrite of Sheri Tepper's The Gate to Women's Country. Most of the men don't even know that women exist, giving Harrison the chance to thumb his nose at the whole Iron John: A Book About Men concept and the men's movement. These are short and that's a good thing. Especially as I have two more of them on the horizon for 2020! Book number 341 in my Science Fiction and Fantasy Reading Project.