Review of Jolly Roger

[Clauson Justin]

[Following is an official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Jolly Roger" by Thomas J. Leveque.]

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3 out of 5 stars

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Jolly Roger by Thomas J. Leveque is a thrilling book filled with adventures of treasure, treasure hunts, pirates, and maps. It is an intriguing book filled with suspense, crime, deaths, laughter, and love.

The book starts with the unexplainable death of Roger, which brings his estranged brothers to Louisiana for his funeral, hoping to return to their busy lives immediately after. However, events surrounding the death of Roger have other plans for them, which include investigations and clues that take them on adventurous trips that elongate their stay. This makes them create new bonds and renew old ones as they make new friends, and these friends turn into family. As the investigation goes on, they are left with meaningless clues and so many unanswered questions. Who killed Roger and why? Are they next? And will their investigations lure them to the killer, or will they lure the killer to them? Want to find out? Dive into the pages of this book.

I loved certain things about the book. First, I loved the author's humor. The characters of Diz, Daz, and Johnny were so hilarious; they made me have a good laugh. I also loved the bond amongst the party. With most of them just getting to know each other as a result of Roger’s death, they really stuck up for each other. Seeing this made me understand the meaning of true friendship and how you can bond with people over a short period of time. Another aspect of the book I loved so much were the flashbacks. I loved that the author was able to show us what happened in the past and how it led to the events of the present.

However, there were some parts of the book I did not really appreciate. One was the excessive use of ellipses, which made the book look tacky to an extent. Another was the error. The book had a lot of errors, and it was obvious that it was not well edited. Also, the author kept on changing the spellings of some of the characters' names; an example of this is Roger. He kept switching from Rodger to Roger, especially at the beginning of the book. I know that the name has different spellings, but he could have stuck to one, at least for the purpose of the book. Another example of this was Lafitte; he was also switching from Lafitte to Layefette. At a point, I thought they were different people; it was really confusing. Also, I thought that there was no need to start a new paragraph of a chapter with a character’s name if we were not getting their personal point of view but still that of the narrator explaining their lives.

Objectively, I would rate this book three out of five stars, mostly because I loved the adventure and humor displayed in the book and also because I believe it’s a great story, save for the poor editing and other issues I mentioned above. I would recommend this book to lovers of adventures that include treasure hunts. Readers who enjoy crime novels filled with suspense and intrigue would also love this.

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Jolly Roger
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[NetMassimo]

This seems like a novel with good potential in need of more editing to fix the problems you pointed out that can hinder the reader's enjoyment. Thank you for your honest review!

[Catherine Radford]

I wonder as I couldn’t see in your review, when is the book set? The mention of pirates makes me think a long time ago, however the other parts about them travelling in for the funeral sounds more modern.