These Mean Streets, Darkly (Liquid Cool, #0.5) by Austin Dragon

These Mean Streets, Darkly (Liquid Cool, #0.5) Reviews

• 
  Montzalee Wittmann

  These Mean Streets, Darkly (Cyberpunk Short Story): A Liquid Cool Prequel by Austin Dragon is a very interesting prequel that left me wanting to know more and so I had to buy the first book. The dark but interesting city with the many shades of strange, and the odd characters, and the missing girl that is the focus. The whole feel is odd but made me what to know more so I picked up the book to see. I normally just read freebies unless it is something I just have to have but this was less than a buck so, I am going to check it out. I like checking out new authors, new to me anyway. It's called Liquid Cool.
• 
  Meenaz Lodhi

  Liquid Cool unleashed! A Metropolis, a terrifying near future, a kidnap turns out it’s a major sinister plot... the life described in this Megacity is very realistic, to the point of horrifying, to think our next generations may have to live this year uncertain, sad and horripilant existence, is scary, present facts tend to corroborate. This prequel is an introduction of the style and ways of the “gray people”, masses, the police force, shady business and large corporations. An intrepid and unique beginning!
• 
  Caleb M.

  This book is good. Not great, but good. A short story to try and get you sucked in to buying the full length novel Liquid Cool .
  
  This is a crime story set in a dark atmospheric "omnicity". Neon lights everywhere. Rain all day all night (Like my home town). Imagine the worst city iddled with crime, and this city, Metropolis, is worse. By a lot.
  
  Thats the setting and I dig it. I can imagine it perfectly, and its a place I could see a good novel taking place. But this was the teaser trailer to the movie. Something to get you excited for " the big event". And it just wasn't enough to make me want the full book.
  
  I may come back to it someday, but today is not that day.
• 
  Austin Dragon

  It's only a short but does an excellent job introducing the world to us, making us care about the victim, and building the anticipation for our detective hero.
• 
  Luna

  EDIT: I lazily went over my younger self's rant about this book and corrected a few awkward sentences, confusing sections and non-inclusive language. I also removed some of the vomit-inducing arbitrary pettiness. The brat... 🙄 ...lucky for them, I can't punch through time.
  
  === T H E B A D ===
  
  § HELL LOTTA EXPOSITION: The author included entire paragraphs of explanations without letting our understanding of the world flow naturally. He tells instead of showing, which artificially enlarges the book. It also helps to drag the pace, making it slower than it should be.
  
  § OFFICERS & FEMALE OFFICERS: There's a weird use of the word "female," to an extent that it gets uncomfortable to read. No man is ever referred to as 'male' in this book, thus giving the use of 'female' a heavy derogatory tone by establishing 'male' as the default and 'female' as a variation of it.
  

  He calls the policemen "officers," but the policewoman he calls "female officer," which becomes even worst in a scene in which the only officer is a woman, and her gender is mentioned again and again, and again—for no good reason. The thing is: you won't call a woman a policeMEN, because she is not a man, you'll call her a policeWOMAN, but the word "officer" has no gender attached to it, thus making the use of "female officer" slightly sexist—which can be unintentional but is still there.

  
  
  § BY THE WORD: The word count seems to be increased by the usage of more words for the sake of using more words. Despite it being a short piece, it has a lot of filler words. Phrases are longer than they should, making the pace even slower.
  
  § THE NARRATOR: The narrator isn't a character, yet, they act like one. It looks like they were supposed to be but ended up not being, which is slightly mind-boggling. There are some more colloquial mannerisms that contribute to making phrases longer by giving them a more complex structure and filling them with adjectives and speech marks — further damaging the pace.
  

  Long descriptions should create suspense, they should be a build-up for a twist or just a way to trigger your brain to play scenarios, imagining probable outcomes that may be very far from the actual conclusion of the scene, but still instigate you to engage with the story. This book just shows some detailed suspenseless—chill even—scenes for no good reason. It felt to me like there was only build up but no payoff.

  
  
  § INCONSISTENCY: There's a moment in which the city is described as ten times bigger than Seattle, and there are people who apparently know the story of each street—not only do they know the streets, but they're also so very familiar with their own unique stories. Cars fly, the place is huge—these mean streets seem hard to remember. Characters also have a very hard time reacting accordingly to situations. One moment you are the sassiest hostage, the other you are crying after you've been saved.
  
  § THE AUTHOR DOESN'T SEPARATE SCENES: Austin arbitrarily divides his book. A chapter might be a scene or multiple scenes, which is fine... as long as you know the scene has changed. Whilst reading I felt like I suddenly was teleported somewhere else every once in a while. I thought the scene was still the same and it was a completely different one already.
  You don't really need to be super fancy — with three asterisks (***) you can divide your scenes and avoid the reader having to pull up a magnifying glass to find clues, re-read a section just to situate themself.
  
  § THE DIALOGUE IS CONFUSING: The author names the characters a lot, which I found a little clunky, and I couldn't really tell who was talking when he didn't. The voices were very similar in my mind.
  
  § LACK OF CHARACTER MOTIF: The reason why things happen is completely overlooked. No character has any reason to do anything, yet, they do.
  A story is made of actions (with reasons and consequences) and obstacles. This story felt like an endless string of actions. Something happens and something happens and so on, so forth most of the time. The mother (I forgot her name [Catherine? {I just said they got named a bunch... ;-; —
  it's Carol; I checked —}]) is the only one with reasons to me. She lost her daughter to (in her own words) a "freakazoid", so I can understand her reasons. The other characters didn't telegraph their reasons so clearly and there are 5 POVs (if I remember correctly), meaning she didn't get enough time to get me invested.
  
  § LACK OF A STORY: Set up, build up, pay off — these are the building blocks of a story. This prequel to 'Liquid Cool' feels more like the set up for 'Liquid Cool'. There are many characters, plotlines, and concepts introduced but the story never continues.
  My hunch is that this short story is just the introduction to Book #1. I have been putting off reading Liquid Cool, so I don't really know that.
  
  § THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A SYNONYM: The characters are referred to by their title and name all the time. I found it a bit annoying. This is very petty of me.
  
  === T H E G O O D ===
  
  § SILLY NAMES: I originally had some unexplainable strong feeling about the naming convention, but I don't really know why. In retrospect, not even questioning the names people have in the far future seems more natural than if it were explained.
  The bigger the city, the fewer people actually bat an eye on those things. There are people who actually choose to have specific nouns as their name and, to be honest, most names, if you look at their history, are just compliments and specific nouns that might or might not have had their etymology lost in time.
  Like Luna; which means moon in Italian and Spanish.
  
  § THE PREMISE IS COOL: I read the blurb and it really got me psyched. The aesthetic and the challenge of solving crime in such a massive and difficult world made me want to read it. The prequel disappointed me a tad, but maybe the actual Book 1# delivers more.
• 
  Allyn Nichols

  A great intro to the Liquid Cool universe.
  
  High tech noir at it's finest! A must read for anyone who loves cyberpunk, blade runner and black and white movies about bummed out detectives that smoke too much in the rain. Great work.
• 
  Teawench

  more of a teaser type thing than a prequel. a lot of characters to keep track of. a lot of repetition in descriptions. I don't feel a need to read any more of the series.
• 
  Aurora Dimitre

  -I received this book from the author for review-
  
  I tried to keep a few things in mind while rating this book - this is a prequel and I haven't read any other part of this series, this is a short work of fiction and therefore characters won't have as much time to be fleshed out, and things such as that. And keeping those things in mind, this was a perfectly adequate, interesting book.
  
  This book takes place in a futuristic city - a city that is probably my favorite part of the book. The atmosphere in this book is done absolutely phenomenally. The way the mood of the situation is portrayed, the language that the author uses - it works so well for the story. Atmosphere and setting and how it's all tied together is something that I never remember I love until I end up reading something that does it well, and then I'm completely blown away.
  
  The writing was something sort of average - the style fit the story, and it didn't distract from what was going on, but it didn't wow me when it came to sentence structure or anything like that.
  
  As well as that, characters - like I said up there, I tried to keep a few things in mind when rating, and those things are mostly in the realm of characters. Because I am a character person, shorter works where you don't get as much insight into characters don't always work for me, especially when there are as many characters as this book has, being a prequel and setting things up for the first book in a series. But , I did find the villain intriguing. And while I didn't really care much about the victim - sure, it is sad, but it takes more than that for me to care - the fact that the villain was so interesting really pushed it through for me. I did want to know what he'd do next.
  
  And the dialogue was cool - with a lot of books, I've noticed that all of the characters sound the same while speaking. That's not so with this book, and I always appreciate it when an author makes an effort to make their characters not sound the same.
  
  Overall, this is an interesting science fiction/steampunk novel with a crime-filled, intriguing world that I think anyone could fall in love with. It's got a fast-paced plot that, I presume, gets you ready for the rest of the books in the series, and pulls out a villain that I'm certainly interested in.
• 
  Matt Knepper

  First, I have to say that I wouldn't consider this a prequel. It's really not a story all on its own. It's the very brief beginning of a much larger story to come. There was no resolution. It just left me hanging. I wanted more - much more - but I suppose that was the intent.
  
  This story is really just setting the scene for the upcoming Liquid Cool series. We get a vivid description of the city in which we'll meet our hero and villain, although we might have trouble telling which one is which. The world created in this story is bleak and despondent, and I loved it. Not a terrible place, but by no means a good one either.
  
  There were a couple of characters I found fascinating, but most of them seemed extraneous. There were far too many characters for the length of the story. I expect all of them are crucial to the future storyline, but for now I was introduced to too many of them too quickly. I did, however, like the manner in which they were introduced. This was a writing style that really fits my tastes, but it might not for others. I think it blends well with the atmosphere the author creates. It comes across almost noirish.
  
  It's a short story that doesn't go very far, but my interest has been piqued. I wasn't blown away, but it served its purpose. I am definitely excited for the first book in the series to come out.
• 
  Attila

  If this should have teased me to read the whole book, than it failed miserably... Scenes thrown after another without any coherecy or any indication of the change, support cast without names, terrible dialogues, every cyberpunk cliche you can think of...
• 
  Rosemary

  These Mean Streets Darkly - a review by Rosemary Kenny
  
  The novella starts with a long and detailed description of Metropolis an 'uber-city', where hover cars roam the skies freely and everything in the
  city centre is fresh and luxurious - a total contrast the the 'mean streets' described by the title of this 'film-noir' homage by the talented Austin Dragon.
  
  Hoodlum Easy Chair Charlie arranges a 'hit' through intermediary the Thin Man, giving him a photo of the proposed victim and the payment for a rush job.
  In turn, hit-man Red Rabbit spirits young Lotty away from her mother Carol, when the pair take a shortcut through Alien Alley on the way to Lotty's school.
  
  Which officers are sent to investigate Lotty's disappearance? What clues can Carol give them? What police asset is called in to help?
  How many others are already on the Missing Persons list at the police HQ?
  Who is Mr Ergo and whom does he hire to help find Lotty? What deal does this person strike with Red Rabbit? How much are they asking?
  Does the deal go through? Who is Flash and why is he sympathetic to Carol and Lotty's plight? What does his boss Run-Time suggest she do?
  
  As the pace quickens and the plot thickens the fascinating characters engage the reader on many levels and the multi-layered interactions between
  them hint at the drama and intrigue to follow, all of which make a great introduction to the Liquid Cool Detective Agency and its Agent Cruz.
  Get your thrills here - I guarantee you won't regret it!
  
• 
  Brit (Circus_of_Damed)

  The concept of this book is intresting and gives me Blade Runner vibes. That said this novella was not the best introduction. I picked this up when I relized you were supose to start with the novella, and I know understand why. The novella is not a complete story it the start and it finished in the first full length novel of the series. This is not a style of publishing I enjoy. Each installment should be a complete story in plot with character interactions and relationship branching across the series. Second is the jumps in location and characters we are fallowing with no indication it jumps. Plus the names of most of the characters are not what we traditionally consider names which can make fallowing these jumps even more complicated. As a whole this book doesn't give the best first impression of the series but is nessesary reading and the start of the series.
• 
  Mark Zodda

  Doesn't set the environment for this cyberpunk world as well as Liquid Cool did. Limited additions to the backstory. Some of the introductions to characters and events seem to set up future stories because it sure didn't clear any part of the Liquid Cool story for me, and if anything, made it murkier. Read after Liquid Cool and not before.
• 
  Nathaniel

  This was intriguing. Am I going to read the novels in this series? Maybe...I mean, I really enjoyed the world. The characters were cool, the mystery is intriguing, the atmosphere is dark and creepy. I also really like the covers for the novels. Maybe I'll pick up the first one to see how I like it. I would love to find a new amazing sci-fi series.
• 
  Graham Carter

  The beginning really reminds me of the British 2000AD comic main strip- Judge Dreed, a futuristic city that overpopulated by people of all walks of life living as best they can A perfect crime to involve the reader in- a child abduction and what an introduction to the villain. it makes me want to learn more about him! Highly recommend giving this novella a read!
• 
  DJ

  It is interesting. As the first time I have ever read anything by Austin Dragon; his style, his characters, his world; demanded that you pay attention. At times; I found it slightly convoluted and had to circle back myself and reread sections to be certain I did understand where I was heading!
  I look forward to reading the series —-
• 
  Martin Pingree

  Although this short read is a little out there, I found it quite interesting. A new and different take on the future of our civilization. A young girl is kidnapped and as always the police are involved. This is a prequel to a new series that sounds like fun.
• 
  Justin Sylvia

  
  I wasn’t sure what to think of Liquid Cool or even it’s lead up, These Mean Streets. However, I think it’s safe to say that I am intrigued & will be reading book 1: Liquid Cool, sooner rather then later, that’s for sure.
• 
  Steve

  This is a prequel to the Liquid Cool series.
  I can't really say it is a great story but it is good enough for me to be more interested in this world the author has built. I already have the first of the series set in my TBR pile for future reading.