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Title: Not as exciting as its predecessors.
Review: As a true O'Brian fan who devoured the first 18 books in this series, I can tell you #19 was a disappointment. I was bored most of the time and couldn't get involved in the story at all. O'Brian's writing seemed perfunctory at best, and the cavalier way in which he did away with both Diana Villiers and Barrett Bonden shocked me. I'm not giving away any major plot twists here, because there weren't any -- they just died. I'm disappointed in Mr. O'Brian but will read #20, hoping he will return to true form. If not, maybe he should quit while he's still sort of ahead, so those of us who love the series will reread it fondly and treasure it forever without it being tarnished.
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