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Whack Job
When world leaders burst into flame like a string of Lady Fingers, the President calls on a renegade former agent with a history of mental problems. Otto "Aardvark" White possesses a unique quality. He's lucky.
464 pages, Paperback
First published October 28, 2012
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67 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
August 6, 2015
This isn't entirely without merit, so giving it one star feels a bit harsh, but on the other hand Goodreads says that 2 stars means "It was OK", and nah, it really wasn't.
The characters here are caricatures, void of surprise and depth, and pretty much all of them are cliche. There's the square-jawed former-special-ops hero who seemingly by himself does more than the combined resources of CIA and FBI (and indeed rest of humanity!) are able to, the trophy girls who don't actually contribute anything of value, the ineffective opponents who somehow never manage to do anything at all and so on.
Worse, the plot is bullshit.
It starts like a classical mystery; leading men (mostly Americans, of course) start spontaneously burning to ashes in just a few seconds, and our hero is called in to investigate who is behind the immolations, and how they're done.
The answer? This happens because these people have a tiny alien spaceship in their head. The solution to this problem is to play a certain music to people, because the aliens (who look like spiders) are unable to tolerate that. There's no hint as to why that is, nor does the hero do anything sensible to figure it out; instead he asks a guy in an asylym who can (again; for reasons left entirely in the blue) "see" the aliens and somehow know that they go crazy from this music.
There's also a dog whose main talents are farting and unprovokedly licking things for no reason related to the plot -- yet which somehow STILL gets mentioned every time it happens, I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and for the licking of arbitrary things to actually MEAN something, but it turns out to just be random noise.
Our hero and a side-kick then "take the fight" to the aliens by teleporting to the alien home-planet equipped with a rifle and a backpack each, they do this by sitting on a alien machine, and entering into it a number that they (again, entirely unprovoked) found on a paper-note on the floor. Really.
Luckily the aliens on the home-planet are (again for entirely unexplained reasons, are you noticing a pattern here?) human-sized and not lice-sized, so our heroes are able to shoot and kill around a dozen of the aliens. What this accomplishes is unclear, but they call it a success anyway, and the book ends.
There's also numerous mentions of God and Jesus and those folks, but those mentions also don't really connect to the plot in any way, other than in explaining how much of a Good Christian American our hero is.
The characters here are caricatures, void of surprise and depth, and pretty much all of them are cliche. There's the square-jawed former-special-ops hero who seemingly by himself does more than the combined resources of CIA and FBI (and indeed rest of humanity!) are able to, the trophy girls who don't actually contribute anything of value, the ineffective opponents who somehow never manage to do anything at all and so on.
Worse, the plot is bullshit.
It starts like a classical mystery; leading men (mostly Americans, of course) start spontaneously burning to ashes in just a few seconds, and our hero is called in to investigate who is behind the immolations, and how they're done.
The answer? This happens because these people have a tiny alien spaceship in their head. The solution to this problem is to play a certain music to people, because the aliens (who look like spiders) are unable to tolerate that. There's no hint as to why that is, nor does the hero do anything sensible to figure it out; instead he asks a guy in an asylym who can (again; for reasons left entirely in the blue) "see" the aliens and somehow know that they go crazy from this music.
There's also a dog whose main talents are farting and unprovokedly licking things for no reason related to the plot -- yet which somehow STILL gets mentioned every time it happens, I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and for the licking of arbitrary things to actually MEAN something, but it turns out to just be random noise.
Our hero and a side-kick then "take the fight" to the aliens by teleporting to the alien home-planet equipped with a rifle and a backpack each, they do this by sitting on a alien machine, and entering into it a number that they (again, entirely unprovoked) found on a paper-note on the floor. Really.
Luckily the aliens on the home-planet are (again for entirely unexplained reasons, are you noticing a pattern here?) human-sized and not lice-sized, so our heroes are able to shoot and kill around a dozen of the aliens. What this accomplishes is unclear, but they call it a success anyway, and the book ends.
There's also numerous mentions of God and Jesus and those folks, but those mentions also don't really connect to the plot in any way, other than in explaining how much of a Good Christian American our hero is.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 13, 2014
Caveat: I only read through 20% of the book. Things may change dramatically after that.
This is very much a Boys' Own Adventure sort of yarn, with the manly square jawed hero, a man of action, doing things while pretty ladies admire his boldness and his ineffective and morally corrupt enemies are helpless to stop him. And there are people who like that. This is a good book for them. Not so much for me.
Also, he writes in short sentences. Sometimes the sentences overlap. The detail is sometimes confusing. Here is an example. The commando team sneaks up to Qadaffi's palace fortress. They break in through the door. And Otto shuts the door. Yeah, Otto shutting the door gets a sentence. The state of the door will not later be a plot point. Weird.
This is very much a Boys' Own Adventure sort of yarn, with the manly square jawed hero, a man of action, doing things while pretty ladies admire his boldness and his ineffective and morally corrupt enemies are helpless to stop him. And there are people who like that. This is a good book for them. Not so much for me.
Also, he writes in short sentences. Sometimes the sentences overlap. The detail is sometimes confusing. Here is an example. The commando team sneaks up to Qadaffi's palace fortress. They break in through the door. And Otto shuts the door. Yeah, Otto shutting the door gets a sentence. The state of the door will not later be a plot point. Weird.
July 29, 2019
This book started out way better than it ended. I can't really say too much about the problems I had with the story without giving major spoilers. The original premise is somewhat believable - that people are spontaneously combusting - in what seems a planned and targeted manner. The book seems to take a reasonable approach by suggesting that this shouldn't be possible without a huge energy source. Then it turns left and somehow discredited people are given huge security clearances and tasks at the whim of one person. Technology that can't possibly exist is routinely handed out and things that are way more unlikely than the original spontaneous combustions bring the plot into the unreal - in totally unbelievable ways.
Don't be fooled by the first few chapters or you might end up finishing the book just hoping that the writing will turn around - it doesn't.
Don't be fooled by the first few chapters or you might end up finishing the book just hoping that the writing will turn around - it doesn't.
May 25, 2019
More than a thriller
Mike Baron creates old-school thrillers about people who take action and don't whine. The descriptions are detailed without being wordy, an amazing accomplishment, and he puts you thoroughly inside the head of all kinds of diverse characters. This book starts as a classic thriller at the edge of science fiction and ultimately evolves into something much more. You will enjoy living with these characters and end the book hungry for more. Highly recommended!
Mike Baron creates old-school thrillers about people who take action and don't whine. The descriptions are detailed without being wordy, an amazing accomplishment, and he puts you thoroughly inside the head of all kinds of diverse characters. This book starts as a classic thriller at the edge of science fiction and ultimately evolves into something much more. You will enjoy living with these characters and end the book hungry for more. Highly recommended!
April 17, 2018
the story was OK. but i was not drown to read it
dnf
April 22, 2023Got about a quarter to a third in.
Not my thing
Not my thing
May 11, 2024
whack job
Description over action is not a good formula for sci-fi thrillers. whack job is such a disappointment in that. It seems to follow that initial Formula.
Description over action is not a good formula for sci-fi thrillers. whack job is such a disappointment in that. It seems to follow that initial Formula.
February 17, 2014
The author is able to write a book, which you can read, and the writing is good (not the actual content though) so that's 1 star. But the story, I don't need to get god pushed down my throat, if I wanted that I could just read the bible also with one part of the plot stolen from Tim Burton's Mars attacks and some aliens and their mode of transport which even I think is ridiculous.
After reading sci-fi/horror for 40 years, I have read a lot of really bad novels, but this get into the bottom 10.
Cannot be recommended to anyone, unless you are a godfearing, sci-fi reader with a taste for the truly bizarre.
After reading sci-fi/horror for 40 years, I have read a lot of really bad novels, but this get into the bottom 10.
Cannot be recommended to anyone, unless you are a godfearing, sci-fi reader with a taste for the truly bizarre.
September 14, 2014
I enjoyed the pacing and the clever, very much unexpected, villain.
April 26, 2015
The plot is, even for a thriller, deeply implausible in places - but it's good fun, gallops along and took me with it.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews