tim white

I read this series 6 or 7 years ago and enjoyed it. A video about the Shrike recently came up in my YouTube feed and rekindled my interest in it again, so i decided to download the audiobook. It's still a great story and the Shrike is without a doubt one of the most interesting and enigmatic antagonists in sci-fi.However i was reminded of 1 part that almost had me close the book and not pick it back up. There are a couple things that show up in dialog again and again that I find so frustrating that it can cause me to instantly lose all interest in continuing to listen or read it. During Saul's Canterbury POV, he meets with the head of the Church of the Shrike. The first several minutes of their conversation consists of the church leader inquiring about Saul's reason for wanting the meeting. "Are you interested in joining the church?" "Well, if it will help with...." "Does your daughter wish to join?" "Well, if it would help with her problem we would seriously consider it." "Is this about...?" Etc.. This pointless fencing contest continues for quite some time. If they had met on a street corner this conversation would be understandable, at least to a point. Here however, Saul went specifically to this church, to speak to this person about a specific subject. The way that the head of the church has to pull teeth to get Saul to get to the point, goes quickly from unnecessary to unbelievable. Literally. I know this may come across as petty, but i can't imagine that I'm the only reader who would find this so annoying as to cause them to put down the book. I REALLY wish that if a writer uses this type of dialogue, they would limit it to less than 10 minutes of the story. The only thing more anything is when they have a character do this by hemming and hawing and dumbing over their words for the entities of a conversation. Having it in an audiobook causes it to stand out even more.