Fantastic book! I could not put this book down. I absolutely love the story and the writing flows easily. Please continue to write more books. I would definitely recommend this

A Long, Slow Slog to a Cliffhanger

This is a novelization of a popular podcast series. It appears that the podcast recording scripts were independently published in 2019 in three volumes, but they seem to be out of print and practically unavailable, (except possibly through the marspatel.com website). I guess this book is the replacement wider-release novel, and since it comes to an abrupt cliffhanger end, (and I do mean abrupt), I imagine there are more novels planned.

The premise behind the story is interesting. Two members of a gang of six really smart kids go missing, and the question is why. Were they abducted, or did they choose to go somewhere? How does this fit into the schemes of billionaire inventor/nutcase celebrity podcaster Oliver Pruitt, who is a weird cross of Elon Musk and the pirate radio guy Wolfman Jack from the movie "American Graffiti"?

Well, it takes us hundreds of pages to get to the final twenty or so pages that answer some basic questions. Before that and beyond that, you'll have to wait.

There isn't much in the way of action. The kids aren't particularly well fleshed out. They're smart because we're told they're smart. (The fact that after a minor earthquake one kid knew what a subduction zone was didn't scream young Einstein to me.) They spend a lot of time telling each other that they are each other's buddies. The kids are also pretty emo, with our two main characters, Mars Patel and Caddie, having lots of issues for no particular reason. There is a lot of repetition, lots of peripheral filler, and lots of loose ends. I'm not in love with Elon Musk type characters, so the hero worship of Oliver Pruitt, (for no reason more convincing than the fact that the book requires it), was not a strong point for me.

So, this read a lot younger than I expected, but it didn't strike me as a very effective attention holder for younger readers. That doesn't seem like a good combination, but there might be more patient readers out there than I suspect.

(Please note that I received a free advance will-self-destruct-in-x-days Adobe Digital copy of this book without a review requirement, or any influence regarding review content should I choose to post a review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)