Genre: Adventure
Description:
An American
hedge fund analyst is sent to appraise an African mine that is controlled by a
brutal warlord. When the financier is kidnapped by child soldiers and dragged
into their bloody rebellion, he becomes entangled in their struggle and must
choose between claiming the immense wealth he worked so hard for, or throwing
it away and risking his life for a slim chance to save theirs.
Author:
Michael G. Keller is a filmmaker. Toy
Soldiers is his first novel. For more about Keller, visit his website.
Appraisal:
Toy Soldiers is a
compelling read in the way a B movie might entice a viewer to keep watching to
determine if it is campy or simply bad and having determined it is bad to
wonder if it can possibly get worse. On the last point, this story does not
disappoint.
The premise of Keller’s story is that greed of global corporations is
the cause of the Democratic Republic of Congo’s humanitarian crisis,
specifically the demand for coltan, a metallic ore used in electronic equipment.
That would be fair as far as it goes, though it ignores refugees from the
Rwandan genocide and other tribal wars that have affected stability in DRC for
decades and predate demand for coltan. Further, ending all consumption of
conflict minerals would not starve tribal warlords of funds. They can and do
turn to agricultural products, extortion and other means.
If Toy Soldiers is intended
to portray the scope of the DRC conflict, it misinforms. If it is intended to
show the human cost through the eyes of its victims, it fails. None of the
characters are credible as their actions and emotions are rendered as
caricatures by Keller’s puerile writing style.
“He pummeled the mercenary with his pistol, looking him right in the
eye as he battered his face into mush.”
“The absent-eyed mercenary spotted Sebu and gasped. Sebu shot his face
off.”
“The mercenaries torched huts and dragged young girls, kicking and
screaming, into the jungle to satisfy their beastly urges.”
“The children looked up in horror, at the colossus looming over them
like a nightmare. He blotted out the sun. They tried to dodge around him, but
he swatted them both to the dirt with the back of his ogreish hand.”
The following sentence describes food of boys trying to survive in the
jungle and exemplifies the writer’s lackadaisical regard for accuracy.
“Cassava root was pure starch and empty calories, with virtually no
nutritional content.”
Starch itself is a nutrient, providing calories needed to avoid
starvation. According to “nutritiondata”web site, cassava contains:
vitamins--A,C,E K, thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, B6, folate, B12, pantothenic acid,
choline, and betanine, along with minerals--calcium, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium,
sodium, zinc, copper, manganese, and selenium.
Inept handling of a humanitarian crisis aside, the novel is an affront
to English literacy.
Diction errors
“Their vacuous stomachs
screamed and pleaded for more,” Unless Keller actually wants to say the
stomachs were devoid of intellectual value, I assume he means “empty.”
“Moses’ men leapt up on the truck bed and plucked the new recruits
down onto the dirt.” One plucks up, not down. Confused with plunked?
In a limousine, “The general sat unnervingly close by Kaufman’s side,
with menacing bodyguards lurking across from them.” Lurk means to wait in
hiding as though to ambush, difficult to do in the back of a limo.
Metaphorical sins:
“The setting sun splattered across the sky like a fried egg”
“Exhaustion finally hit him like an avalanche.”
“Perforated like Swiss cheese,
the man’s blood spattered all over him.” (How does one perforate blood?)
Embarrassing alliterations
“Lantern light lapped against
his eye sockets, only making him look angrier.”
“The birds took flight, frantically flapping…”
“…they ceaselessly swallowed
shots” and also “ranted at a rickety podium…”
After a gun battle, “The children…giggled with glee as they sprinted
away, through the twists and turns of the wilderness…”
Say what?
“He wasn’t near death – he had somehow passed it, shuffling onward
like a headless chicken.”
“The currency trader pried his stunned eyes up from his screen to
force a truckling smile.”
“We
haven’t found him yet, sir,” the soldier truckled.
“He had felt flurries of air
from several of the rounds whizzing by his head.” Snow flurries, leaves flurry;
shock waves made by bullets do not flurry.
“…reached for his AK, but a grizzled foot pinned it to the earth.”
Foot covered in gray hair, an old Sasquatch?
“Sebu’s eyes
were glassy and delirious with fever.” Delirious eyes?
Clichés ad nauseum:
“The orphans jumped out of their skin.”
“Bang –a rifle
accidentally discharged and scared the boys out of their skins.”
“Excuse me,” he called down in a meek voice. Even that made the
trekkers leap out of their skin…”
“You’re alive!” Lumumba
exclaimed, literally jumping for joy.
“There was no corner of the market free of monkey business – nothing
new under the sun.”
Pretensions
“The markets were so fraught
with sound and fury, but ultimately signified nothing…“
It may be unkind to suppose the writer is trying to imply wisdom
through cynicism (and plagiarism). Markets determine how much I pay for a
gallon of gasoline or a pound of bacon. To me that’s not nothing.
“The upswings were a drunken orgy of celebration, while the drops were
punctuated with melodrama and teeth gnashing.”
Why? Surely traders in a hedge fund would hold both long and
short
positions.
“The corporate animal fed on cash and it grew fatter so it could
swallow more
and more; and it even excreted a little sewage, so people would
buzz around like flies, clamoring to do its bidding for a few stray droppings.”
No further comment but an apology for the many risible bits of
egregious writing that I have left out.
In an afterward, Keller wrote, “Eagle-eyed editor Nicholas Morine
helped trim the fat and punch up the action.” Mr. Morine must then be held
equally accountable for the result.
FYI:
In February
1967 at the age of nineteen years and six months, I debarked the MSTS Gordon
onto an LST and landed in Da Nang as a member of the 3rd Marine
division. I find this novel’s cartoonish depictions of real-world horror
viscerally offensive. As stocks editor (now retired) of Bloomberg’s Tokyo
bureau I interviewed analysts, strategists, traders and economists and attest
that no such person as Kaufman has ever existed. He is described as both an
analyst and financier. Analysts have deep and current knowledge with narrow
scope. Financiers hire analysts. I am the author of Dollar Down and Tokyo Enigma,
have a humble appreciation for good writing and disdain only for writers too
lazy to study the craft.
Anyone interested in the DRC, might read Jason K Stearns’ Dancing in the Glory of Monsters. It was
published in 2012, but remains an enlightening work. Those following current
debate over the Dodd-Frank Act might watch what happens with Section 1502
dealing with DRC conflict minerals. It has been both praised and damned.
Format/Typo
Issues:
Numerous:
Rating: *
One Star
Reviewed
by: Sam Waite
Approximate
word count: 45-50,000 words
