Mississippi Jack

Well, this book was completely pointless, which is a shame, because I was hoping for so much more. When I set out to read the Bloody Jack series, I was excited because it seemed like we had the fun, exciting female lead YA has been struggling to make popular today. She was vivid in her characterization, the acting for the audiobook is some of the best i've seen, and it was a pirate book to boot. How many pirate books have you seen in YA fiction? Yet, now, 5 books in, I can say that Meyer cannot sustain this story over the course of a 12 book series. Jackie is becoming a Mary Sue in the worst ways. She is never challenged by the plot and is always in the right. This book is also filled with so many plot conveniences that I wonder if it is worth it continuing with this series.

The plot of the novel goes as follows. It continues right where we left off with Jackie and company fresh off their ordeal aboard a slave ship when Jackie is captured for piracy. She is taken on a ship that will bring her back to England, when she is rescued by her acting troupe and lead ashore into America. She and her servant Higgins decide to go to New Orleans, to see what they can do about the situation. So they begin in Boston and make their way there using the Mississippi river, on a river boat that have captured, meeting many new people along the way. Interspersed with these are accounts of Jamie Fletcher, who is desperately trying to catch Jackie, so that he and she can be together.

This was not at all the plot I had hoped for. What I wanted after the events of the 4th book was more of a plot that put Jackie out of her element. For example, a trial novel, where she tries to maintain her innocence, and works to clear her name would have been a nice change of pace to all of the swashbuckling that we have gotten in this series so far. Yet, here we have more of the same as before, with Jackie making her way down the Mississippi river, and singing at taverns to earn her keep. Eventually she begins an acting troupe, and they put of plays, with, of course, Jackie being the star of the show. This means that it is just plain boring for half the book. Early on, we do meet Mike Fink, a characterture of the typical loud boisterous American River boat captain that one sees. He makes for an interesting, if somewhat annoying person for Jackie to interact with, but then this is ruined when he is written out of the plot, and we are left with the rest of the boring side characters. They are dull, with the reader not learning much about them other than what they can do to serve the plot. With this book being almost 100 pages longer than the last one, it drags considerably, leaving me wondering when things are going to pick up speed, but they often do not.

There are other ‘Jackie-ism' that show themselves in this book too. For example, Jackie manages to escape every encounter she is in with barely a scratch, and, worse, never seems to be affected by them. Everyone seems to like her instantly, except for the bad guys, who don't like her because, well, their bad. They are the slavers, ungentlemanly British soldiers, and the like who you're not supposed to admire anyway. The antagonists, if you can call them that, have no dimension to them, which makes their dispatch all the less satisfying. Jackie also meets many different people along her journey, who, of course, all like her almost instantly. They never do not get along with her, or offer any real challenge to her. This makes their interactions seem too perfect, and unbelievable.

All of these things combine to form a book that is action packed, but ultimately unexciting. I never felt any tension for Jackie, nor for any person who was trying to free her, because I knew they were going to be alright in the end. With the exception of a few characters, they all make it in the end, with few casualties that mattered little to me, because I had not gotten to know them very well. The only good thing about this book is the small historical tidbits that one finds, such as how the Louisiana Territory changed hands often before going to the US, and how British soldiers were trying to convince certain Native American nations to fight against one another. This occurred before the War of 1812, and these were nice little touches that I appreciated. As for me, these positives are far outweighed by the negatives. I may read the next book, but it is going to be some time before I do. I give it a two out of five.

I love Jackie Faber... but I just couldn't get into this one. I loved the first few chapters it was high adventure with Jackie! But then...there was too much singing and it felt like it just kept dragging on and on.