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Thrusts of Justice by Matt Youngmark plugs deep into childhood nostalgia with this choose-your-own-adventure book written for adults. Set in a unique (and slightly tongue-in-cheek) superhero universe, this book gives a laid-off journalist from Clevel...more
Thrusts of Justice by Matt Youngmark plugs deep into childhood nostalgia with this choose-your-own-adventure book written for adults. Set in a unique (and slightly tongue-in-cheek) superhero universe, this book gives a laid-off journalist from Cleveland the chance to step into the role of superhero just in time to save the world from certain doom. The journalist, of course, is “you.”
The book opens with you and your fellow unemployed journalists drowning your sorrows while discussing the possibility of launching your own news website. Your drunken plans to form a startup are thrown off course when a disembodied voice warns of impending doom just before an explosion draws your attention outside. There you see a smoking crater in the middle of the street where three figures are visible. The supervillain known as the Ox has just broken through the wall of a bank with unmarked bags of cash. The dark and ominous hero known as the Nightwatchman slinks off from the scene. And at the bottom of the crater is the legendary Cosmic Guardian who had disappeared in the 90s. You know any one of these three could be a great news lead, but where could it lead?
If you like strange powers from radioactive meteorites, continue on to the next paragraph. If you like brooding antiheroes like Batman, skip to the paragraph after that. If you like interstellar police forces, like the Green Lantern Corps or the Nova Corps, continue on to the third paragraph after this.
Trying to find out what Ox is doing in Cleveland, you sneak closer to the scene of the crime. But rather than finding clues, you fall into the crater and black out. When you wake up, you have strange goo-like powers that allow you to change shape, walk on walls and hurl goo. Does great power come with great responsibility? Or a great opportunity for profit?
Trying to follow Nightwatchman leads you to one of his secret lairs. There you find Nightwatchman’s suit abandoned. Donning it, you find yourself able to pose as the dark hero. Though you lack his martial skill, you have access to his wonderful toys and can use them to figure out what happened to the real Nightwatchman.
Trying to follow the Cosmic Guardian, you find him dying. He passes on his armored superhero suit to you, Can you figure out what the Cosmic Guardian was doing? Can you figure out how to operate the suit? Can you do this before the other Cosmic Guardians catch up with you?
I went through the effort to read every branching path in the book I could. I think I got all 90 of them, but I might have missed some. The timeline and cosmology of the book remains the same throughout, it is simply the course you chart through the narrative that changes how things unfold. The story is told with a dose of snarky humor and regular nods to comic book tropes.
As said before, this is a choose-your-own-adventure book for adults. This mostly means that it uses some strong language, though nothing that you couldn’t hear on prime time television. It also has no qualms about giving the reader a hard time about some of their choices. My favorite was when you avoid being a superhero and the section opens with, “You’re reading a choose-your-own-ending book about superheroes, and immediately decide not to become one?”
All told, the book is just plain fun. I read the book through the Kindle app on my phone, which added hyperlinks and a “back” button to make navigating the different branches much easier. And, in fact, the author encourages you to do so. The primary risk I could see for readers is that they just don’t find the author that funny. I laughed pretty hard through the book, but humor is subjective and this might not appeal to everyone. The Chooseomatic website offers a free 70-page sample of Youngmark’s previous book, Zombocalypse Now, so you can decide for yourself if you enjoy the style.(less)
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(This review was originally written for Clockwork Reviews. You can read it here or there.)
In The Ruins of Noe, the sequel to her debut novel Brigitta of the White Forest, Danika Dinsmore outdoes herself in the crafting of this new book. All of the el...more
(This review was originally written for Clockwork Reviews. You can read it here or there.)
In The Ruins of Noe, the sequel to her debut novel Brigitta of the White Forest, Danika Dinsmore outdoes herself in the crafting of this new book. All of the elements that made Brigitta wonderful continue on in this book. It is still just as magical and engaging as the first book, exploring the trials and struggles of the now adolescent protagonist. But the book also distinguishes itself from its predecessor with a darker tone and more mature themes that keep pace with Brigitta’s growth into adulthood.
The fairies of the White Forest rely on the intervention of the Ethereals, the invisible Ancients who help keep the elements in balance in the sheltered realm of the forest. But when the spirit of a dead Elder does not move on and a child is born without a destiny, the Elders who rule the forest realize that something has gone wrong. The Ethereals no longer intervene in their lives, and may not be able to protect the Forest.
High Priestess Ondelle decides to return to the ruined city of Noe, which was the home of the fairies until an apocalyptic event forced them to flee and take shelter in the White Forest. With her she takes Brigitta, who some believe to be the prophesied fairy who will help make things right. In Noe, many illusions the fairies had about the past are shattered. Fairies had been left behind in the flight to the White Forest and their survivors had built up two feuding kingdoms ruled by cruel tyrants. Brigitta is soon alone and friendless in a strange world that would rather have her dead, forced to find a way to solve her problems alone.
As mentioned before, this turned out to be a darker tale than the first book in the series. In Brigitta of the White Forest, there were tense moments but Brigitta was able to solve problems in the end, so that life was returned to mostly normal in the White Forest. In The Ruins of Noe, awful things happen to some characters and are not fixed. By the end of the book many problems remain unfixed. While some of this is to leave room for future sequels, the tone of the book at the end is that there may not be solutions. And while the first book was about learning self-reliance and taking a step towards adulthood, the second book was about having to take on tasks before you’re ready and growing up fast.
In that manner this book also approaches an older audience than its predecessor. Brigitta of the White Forest had a very strong Middle Reader energy, where the story depended on making friends and solving problems. The Ruins of Noe begins to push outside of that towards “young adult” or “teen fiction.” The story has less obvious solutions, hints at a world more complex than previously realized, and begins hinting at a romantic storyline that will see more attention in later books.
I loved this book, despite the anxiety it induced as I worried about the fate of the characters. For young readers who have grown older since Dinsmore’s first book came out, this could be an excellent stepping stone as their tastes and maturity grow.(less)
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