You're A Scientist! (Make Your Own Mistakes) (Volume 1) by Phil Edwards

Make Your Own Mistakes #1

by Phil Edwards

You are just a lowly beaker cleaner...until fate intervenes. When the Fake Science Laboratories come calling, you answer—and it turns out to be the greatest adventure of the last 15 minutes. Can YOU make the mistakes that will save/destroy/do nothing notable to the lab? Can YOU turn the pages? Can YOU really read? If so, please prove it by shouting “I can read!” at the nearest scientist.

Genres: Science Fiction, Humor, Fiction

Paperback

Published January 1, 1675

Reviews

[Kaethe · Rating 5 out of 5]

I missed the choose-your-own-adventure books their first time around. Happily, there are clever writers like Edwards giving me a second chance. I had this on my Kindle and it made a delightful change from the other stuff I was reading at the time.


Personal copy

[Raluca Daniela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Saw this free ebook advertised on the Fake Science Facebook page and decided to try it out. It was a fun little Choose your own Adventure book, set in the Fake Science Lab, where you started out as a beaker cleaner with 5 basic choices (Explore space/Become a biologist/Become a chemist/Become an earth scientist/Become a physicist). The choices branched out in many fun and unexpected ways and while most of the ends were bad ones (where the lab mortician usually comments something random about your silly death), I did reach some good ends too. In fact, the true ending (and quite a hilarious one indeed) could be reached in more than one way.

I think what I most liked about this book was how it wasn't afraid to take all those cliches about scientists and science fiction books and movies and turn them into something witty and subtle that pokes fun at its own genre. For example, you, the main character, are totally incompetent and obsessed with your little friend (lover?) the sponge (that you have been separated from), but the book treats that as something perfectly rational. Throughout your (mis)adventures, you encounter plot devices such as portals, conspiracies, dinosaurs, a genetically modified revolutionary mouse, evil colleagues and, most important of all, lots of (fake) science. The choices play in such a way, that the secret story behind the Fake Science Lab only becomes complete if you get all the endings.

All in all, this book was a fun way to spend a couple of evenings reading and it definitely made me grin throughout all chapters at its own subtlety.

[Jennifer Robb · Rating 3 out of 5]

This reminds me of the "Choose Your Own Adventure" books my brother and I used to read when we were preteens. You get a scenario and then are asked to make a choice. In the book versions, it provided a page number to turn to. In the eBook version (this book) you click on the link and it takes you to that section. Make the wrong choice and your story ends. The bad thing is, there's no way to go back to where you made your previous decision to choose a different path. (For example, one time a choice I made meant the story ended after less than 10 pages! But I still had to start over at the beginning because I didn't have a way to get back to the previous choice. (In the books, you could keep a finger in the page you came from to go back if you desired--or remembered.)

[J. Boo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Amusing Choose-Your-Own-Adventure parody. You are an unintelligent -- to put it mildly -- beaker cleaner abruptly promoted at the Fake Science laboratory, and you spend the rest of the book trying to rescue your favorite sponge. Currently free on Amazon in Kindle form.

[Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

I laughed a lot during this book and sometimes quite loudly. The combination of fake science and certain death proved quite entertaining, and it was well worth the zero dollars I spent to acquire it.

[Gevera Piedmont · Rating 4 out of 5]

A funny create-your-own-adventure book about a weirdo and his friend the sponge.

[Rich Meyer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not a bad take on the Choose Your Own Adventure genre, it's also a decent parody. I'm a fan of the folks at Fake Science, and this continues their strange brand of humor.

[Eric · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a lot more fun than I was expecting!