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Wild Massive
Scotto Moore's Wild Massive is a web of lies, secrets, and humor in a breakneck, nitrous-boosted saga of the small rejecting the will of the mighty.
Welcome to the Building, an infinitely tall skyscraper in the center of the multiverse, where any floor could contain a sprawling desert oasis, a cyanide rain forest, or an entire world.
Carissa loves her elevator. Up and down she goes, content with the sometimes chewy food her reality fabricator spits out, as long as it means she doesn’t have to speak to another living person.
But when a mysterious shapeshifter from an ambiguous world lands on top of her elevator, intent on stopping a plot to annihilate hundreds of floors, Carissa finds herself stepping out of her comfort zone. She is forced to flee into the Wild Massive network of theme parks in the Building, where technology, sorcery, and elaborate media tie-ins combine to form impossible ride experiences, where every guest is a VIP, the roller coasters are frequently safe, and if you don’t have a valid day pass, the automated defense lasers will escort you from being alive.
Welcome to the Building, an infinitely tall skyscraper in the center of the multiverse, where any floor could contain a sprawling desert oasis, a cyanide rain forest, or an entire world.
Carissa loves her elevator. Up and down she goes, content with the sometimes chewy food her reality fabricator spits out, as long as it means she doesn’t have to speak to another living person.
But when a mysterious shapeshifter from an ambiguous world lands on top of her elevator, intent on stopping a plot to annihilate hundreds of floors, Carissa finds herself stepping out of her comfort zone. She is forced to flee into the Wild Massive network of theme parks in the Building, where technology, sorcery, and elaborate media tie-ins combine to form impossible ride experiences, where every guest is a VIP, the roller coasters are frequently safe, and if you don’t have a valid day pass, the automated defense lasers will escort you from being alive.
496 pages, Hardcover
First published February 7, 2023
84 people are currently reading
3897 people want to read
About the author
Scotto Moore
8 books95 followersScotto Moore is the author of BATTLE OF THE LINGUIST MAGES, a science fantasy novel, and YOUR FAVORITE BAND CANNOT SAVE YOU, a sci-fi/horror novella, both published by Tor.com. For fourteen years, he was an active playwright in Seattle, with major productions nearly every year during that time, and 45 short plays produced during that time as well. He wrote book, lyrics, and music for the a cappella sci-fi musical SILHOUETTE, which won the 2018 Gregory Falls Award for Outstanding New Play, presented by Theatre Puget Sound. He also wrote, directed and produced three seasons of the sci-fi/comedy web series THE COFFEE TABLE; and wrote and starred in the horror/comedy play H.P. LOVECRAFT: STAND-UP COMEDIAN!
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 156 reviews
January 17, 2023
3.0 Stars
This is a case where I desperately wanted to love a story but it just didn't happen. This story was just too zany and goofy for my personal tastes in science fiction. I hoped for a mind bending genre blender but instead it was way too silly for me.
The other challenge with this book was the length. My edition came in just under 500 pages which felt way too long given the tone and plot of this story. I personally feel that lighter humorous stories land better in a shorter package.
My struggle with this book is largely based on my reading preference so keep in mind that if you love over the top stories, you may enjoy this one more than me.
Disclaimer I received a copy of this book from the publisher.
This is a case where I desperately wanted to love a story but it just didn't happen. This story was just too zany and goofy for my personal tastes in science fiction. I hoped for a mind bending genre blender but instead it was way too silly for me.
The other challenge with this book was the length. My edition came in just under 500 pages which felt way too long given the tone and plot of this story. I personally feel that lighter humorous stories land better in a shorter package.
My struggle with this book is largely based on my reading preference so keep in mind that if you love over the top stories, you may enjoy this one more than me.
Disclaimer I received a copy of this book from the publisher.
February 12, 2023
Le sigh, I so badly wanted to love this one. Was sure I would love it, frankly, because the premise is so unique and sounds incredible. It started off a little too out there for me to really understand what was happening, but I gave it some time, because obviously you can't judge a book by a few pages. But look, I was confused. I felt like.. like I was somehow simultaneously getting too much and too little information? Like there were infodumps that made it feel a bit like a slog, but also, I hadn't the foggiest idea of what was happening.
So I set it aside, as one does. Intending on perhaps trying again. But then I read some reviews, and I saw several that stated that the ending was unsatisfying/didn't tie up very many ends, and that was when I had to call it. Nearly 500 pages, I was already equal measures confused and frustrated, and then I hear the ending won't satisfy me? Nah, life is simply too short.
Bottom Line: This is not a bad book, this is just not one that worked for me. Hopefully more patient folks than me can appreciate this very creative world.
You can find the full review and all the fancy and/or randomness that accompanies it at It Starts at Midnight
So I set it aside, as one does. Intending on perhaps trying again. But then I read some reviews, and I saw several that stated that the ending was unsatisfying/didn't tie up very many ends, and that was when I had to call it. Nearly 500 pages, I was already equal measures confused and frustrated, and then I hear the ending won't satisfy me? Nah, life is simply too short.
Bottom Line: This is not a bad book, this is just not one that worked for me. Hopefully more patient folks than me can appreciate this very creative world.
You can find the full review and all the fancy and/or randomness that accompanies it at It Starts at Midnight
October 2, 2023
3.5
This book is fun, especially if you like an interesting take on the multiverse idea. Reality is an unimaginably tall skyscraper, and each floor is a different dimension of reality. A large chunk of the building is ruled by the Association, a super state that started out with ideals but has turned into an autocratic surveillance-obsessed nightmare. A media conglomerate, Wild Massive, is also dominant, and operates like an independent city state. There is warfare between races. There are ancient overlords called Architects and Muses, which built and conceived of this entire thing, and there is an outside to the building.
Don't try to have it make sense. It doesn't. If you are looking for hard sci-fi, this is definitely not it. This is over the top science fantasy, that reminds me of Empress of Forever by Max Gladstone. Come here for the exuberance of the storytelling, not for the in-depth explorations of real science.
My main complaint with the book is the ending, which I found a bit of a let down. But overall, I had a lot of fun with this.
This book is fun, especially if you like an interesting take on the multiverse idea. Reality is an unimaginably tall skyscraper, and each floor is a different dimension of reality. A large chunk of the building is ruled by the Association, a super state that started out with ideals but has turned into an autocratic surveillance-obsessed nightmare. A media conglomerate, Wild Massive, is also dominant, and operates like an independent city state. There is warfare between races. There are ancient overlords called Architects and Muses, which built and conceived of this entire thing, and there is an outside to the building.
Don't try to have it make sense. It doesn't. If you are looking for hard sci-fi, this is definitely not it. This is over the top science fantasy, that reminds me of Empress of Forever by Max Gladstone. Come here for the exuberance of the storytelling, not for the in-depth explorations of real science.
My main complaint with the book is the ending, which I found a bit of a let down. But overall, I had a lot of fun with this.
April 26, 2025
This started with one interesting concept, then another one, and another one, and another, and another and another and and and—
It was a hate read by the end. Review to come when I can sort through my thoughts because this is five books in a trench coat and I’m still mentally screaming about it.
It was a hate read by the end. Review to come when I can sort through my thoughts because this is five books in a trench coat and I’m still mentally screaming about it.
February 13, 2023
By the description of the book, I thought I was going to love it. However, I’m afraid that wasn’t the case here.
The story is a mix of sci-fi and fantasy, and it has some interesting ideas. But my main problem is that it was way too much. In some parts, it felt like the author used all of his ideas and wanted to pack them in just one book. Unfortunately, I don’t think it worked well. The narrative felt disconnected in parts, and it didn’t allowed the characters to have a proper development.
Still, the author somehow managed to keep me reading until the end, even though sometimes I was lost and wondering what was going on.
Despite all of this, I don’t think it’s a terrible book. But I wish the author would have focused on less ideas instead of throwing them all in the plot.
I received a book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review, which I did.
The story is a mix of sci-fi and fantasy, and it has some interesting ideas. But my main problem is that it was way too much. In some parts, it felt like the author used all of his ideas and wanted to pack them in just one book. Unfortunately, I don’t think it worked well. The narrative felt disconnected in parts, and it didn’t allowed the characters to have a proper development.
Still, the author somehow managed to keep me reading until the end, even though sometimes I was lost and wondering what was going on.
Despite all of this, I don’t think it’s a terrible book. But I wish the author would have focused on less ideas instead of throwing them all in the plot.
I received a book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review, which I did.
did-not-finish
January 1, 2023This just wasn’t for me. The writing was so in-depth that I kept having to reread entire paragraphs to try to understand what was being described
Read
December 17, 2024DNF at 35%
I loved the blurb for this book - a giant building as a representation of a multiverse with each floor being a different slide of reality and elevators traveling between them for those who knew how to find the shafts and summon them? Yes, please! An Association of various species, civilizations, or floors controlling most of the bottom floors and reaching ever higher and higher up? And with probably nefarious intentions? Sign me up for this! A plot to destroy several floors or possibly a good chunk of this building? Heck, yeah!
Well, the more I read, the more disappointed I got. This is not a small book. It clocks are almost 500 pages, and I made it a quarter of the way through, and you know what? I still don't know what this story is supposed to be about. It's aimless. It's wandering and meandering all over the place. It's like the author had all these wonderful ideas and just dropped them all in the same pot and stirred it, hoping that it would make for a good soup. Unfortunately, it didn't, at least for me.
The whole book feels disjointed. I'm a quarter of the way through, and I still don't know what the stakes are, or if there even are any stakes. There are too many characters and most of their motivations are still unclear to me. I mean, I'm almost to the middle point, shouldn't I know what these different people want by now? I still don't know what Clarissa wants apart from being left alone in her elevator. Or why the shape-shifters are so hell-bent on destroying the Association. I mean, the only thing that is mentioned is that the Association took one of their own hostage. Isn't an all-out war a bit of an overreaction? Also, why did the Association suddenly eradicate all the Brilliant? What are they hoping to achieve or prevent by this? What do the other various human and non-human entities at play in this Building hope to achieve? I have no clue.
There is no central theme or danger to overcome that I am aware of. And thus, it just feels like a pointless romp through a variety of strange environments. Yes, they are varied and mostly amazing, but I came for a story, not a sightseeing tour.
Also, the tone of the book is off-putting - it gets serious when describing some of the things that happen, and some pretty messed up things actually happen. But then, all of a sudden, we get something humorous or ridiculous that completely clashes with what happened before. If the author was attempting to write a satire, he failed. For good satirical books that also have a lot of heart and tell compelling stories, I would suggest reading anything by Terry Pratchett.
As it stands, I will not continue with this story, because I'm bored, I don't care about the multitude of characters I am forced to follow, and it's way too long.
PS: I received an advanced copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
I loved the blurb for this book - a giant building as a representation of a multiverse with each floor being a different slide of reality and elevators traveling between them for those who knew how to find the shafts and summon them? Yes, please! An Association of various species, civilizations, or floors controlling most of the bottom floors and reaching ever higher and higher up? And with probably nefarious intentions? Sign me up for this! A plot to destroy several floors or possibly a good chunk of this building? Heck, yeah!
Well, the more I read, the more disappointed I got. This is not a small book. It clocks are almost 500 pages, and I made it a quarter of the way through, and you know what? I still don't know what this story is supposed to be about. It's aimless. It's wandering and meandering all over the place. It's like the author had all these wonderful ideas and just dropped them all in the same pot and stirred it, hoping that it would make for a good soup. Unfortunately, it didn't, at least for me.
The whole book feels disjointed. I'm a quarter of the way through, and I still don't know what the stakes are, or if there even are any stakes. There are too many characters and most of their motivations are still unclear to me. I mean, I'm almost to the middle point, shouldn't I know what these different people want by now? I still don't know what Clarissa wants apart from being left alone in her elevator. Or why the shape-shifters are so hell-bent on destroying the Association. I mean, the only thing that is mentioned is that the Association took one of their own hostage. Isn't an all-out war a bit of an overreaction? Also, why did the Association suddenly eradicate all the Brilliant? What are they hoping to achieve or prevent by this? What do the other various human and non-human entities at play in this Building hope to achieve? I have no clue.
There is no central theme or danger to overcome that I am aware of. And thus, it just feels like a pointless romp through a variety of strange environments. Yes, they are varied and mostly amazing, but I came for a story, not a sightseeing tour.
Also, the tone of the book is off-putting - it gets serious when describing some of the things that happen, and some pretty messed up things actually happen. But then, all of a sudden, we get something humorous or ridiculous that completely clashes with what happened before. If the author was attempting to write a satire, he failed. For good satirical books that also have a lot of heart and tell compelling stories, I would suggest reading anything by Terry Pratchett.
As it stands, I will not continue with this story, because I'm bored, I don't care about the multitude of characters I am forced to follow, and it's way too long.
PS: I received an advanced copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
March 31, 2023
DNF 25%
Стеб над бюрократией, норкоманский лор, в котором может произойти все, что угодно, и наглейшее выламывание четвертой стены.
Я поймала вайбы моих любимых The Locked Tomb и Keys to the Kingdom, так что кредит был большой.
Увы, после многообещающего начала сюжет и персонажи растворились в пересказе инфодампов.
Пролистала до финала и решила завязать.
Sad.
----
Спойлеры.
Кроме мира мне очень нравился сюжет, вернее, его потенциал.
☆ разумные лифты между параллельными реальностями.
☆ Организация Обьединенных Миров, которая героически поддерживает порядок в одних мирах и по-тихому геноцидит в других.
☆ Карисса, после геноцида оставшаяся без дома. К счастью, один лифт приютил ее в себе вместо кота. К несчастью, Карисса случайно оказывается в Диснейленде - а там крутят аттракцион, посвященный геноциду, причем народ Кариссы там в роли злодеев, и теперь Карисса вспомнила про месть.
☆ Табита, сценаристка Диснейленда, автор того самого аттракциона. Табита умеет видеть важные, но непонятные события из будущего и пытается достроить к ним контекст, а жизнь не хочет впихиваться в трехактную структуру (или... или хочет? Или Табита не видит будущее, а создает его?)
☆ и Риндес, разведчик-метаморф. Его (ее?) народ сумел поймать агента Организации, и теперь Риндес копирует внешность агента, копирует личность агента, зашивает в себе бомбу и отправляется в штаб Организации. Но копия личности агента внезапно оказалась халком и периодически пытается захватить тело Риндеса, а возлюбленный (ая?) Риндеса перед миссией кричит, что начальство все врет и бомба уничтожит не только штаб Организации, но как минимум тысячу соседних миров.
Как бы я хотела, чтобы эту книгу написал другой автор.
Стеб над бюрократией, норкоманский лор, в котором может произойти все, что угодно, и наглейшее выламывание четвертой стены.
Я поймала вайбы моих любимых The Locked Tomb и Keys to the Kingdom, так что кредит был большой.
Увы, после многообещающего начала сюжет и персонажи растворились в пересказе инфодампов.
Пролистала до финала и решила завязать.
Sad.
----
Спойлеры.
Кроме мира мне очень нравился сюжет, вернее, его потенциал.
☆ разумные лифты между параллельными реальностями.
☆ Организация Обьединенных Миров, которая героически поддерживает порядок в одних мирах и по-тихому геноцидит в других.
☆ Карисса, после геноцида оставшаяся без дома. К счастью, один лифт приютил ее в себе вместо кота. К несчастью, Карисса случайно оказывается в Диснейленде - а там крутят аттракцион, посвященный геноциду, причем народ Кариссы там в роли злодеев, и теперь Карисса вспомнила про месть.
☆ Табита, сценаристка Диснейленда, автор того самого аттракциона. Табита умеет видеть важные, но непонятные события из будущего и пытается достроить к ним контекст, а жизнь не хочет впихиваться в трехактную структуру (или... или хочет? Или Табита не видит будущее, а создает его?)
☆ и Риндес, разведчик-метаморф. Его (ее?) народ сумел поймать агента Организации, и теперь Риндес копирует внешность агента, копирует личность агента, зашивает в себе бомбу и отправляется в штаб Организации. Но копия личности агента внезапно оказалась халком и периодически пытается захватить тело Риндеса, а возлюбленный (ая?) Риндеса перед миссией кричит, что начальство все врет и бомба уничтожит не только штаб Организации, но как минимум тысячу соседних миров.
Как бы я хотела, чтобы эту книгу написал другой автор.
October 23, 2023
Wild Massive's best trait is how incredibly original it is. An alternate set of realities which is a massive skyscraper full of elevators taking people to different places? Owned now by a corporate and angelic committee? With atrocities being committed and a media empire determined to present history as fiction but also not sweep them under the carpet??
It's -- incredible. The characters and writing are fantastic as well -- everyone has strong motivations and unique behaviour and it's a charming, charming read.
The one thing that keeps it from being a five star read for me is simply that the POV switches carried SO much history with them that I found it something that took me a long time to get through, because each break felt like a place to put the book down -- if that makes sense.
Nevertheless fantastic.
It's -- incredible. The characters and writing are fantastic as well -- everyone has strong motivations and unique behaviour and it's a charming, charming read.
The one thing that keeps it from being a five star read for me is simply that the POV switches carried SO much history with them that I found it something that took me a long time to get through, because each break felt like a place to put the book down -- if that makes sense.
Nevertheless fantastic.
July 26, 2023
If Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy is an intricate arrangement of blocks to create a maze which, when viewed from above, spells out a rude word, then this book uses those blocks to make a random mess that, when viewed from above, forms a QR code to a broken webpage.
I wanted to like this so much from the description but the infodumps the author wrote for every single little idea they thought was clever weren’t even funny :(
I wanted to like this so much from the description but the infodumps the author wrote for every single little idea they thought was clever weren’t even funny :(
dnf
February 13, 2023disappointing :( what started as an incredible concept of different worlds contained as floors in a massive building accessed by elevators became horribly bogged down by politics and an excruciating pace
March 10, 2023
Another book for the book club - another book I did not enjoy very much. I wanted to enjoy it, but I think the book is just not for me. There is way, way, WAY too much going on. If a book is going to take 500 pages, I'd like it to earn that - and unfortunately, I don't think this did. The author clearly has a lot to say and a lot churning in their mind, but putting it all in one book has robbed any of the stories from shining. One must ask - where, oh where, is an editor when they're needed most? This should have been 250 to 300 pages max and should have focused on just one part.
When I read the Acknowledgements and saw that this is sort of meshed together from three or four different things, I basically slapped my head and said, "of course, it is," out loud to the coffee shop. It's painfully apparent.
Some of my gripes up front... I found the naming of characters to be really... weird. "Pivotal Moment," "Epiphany Foreshadow," "Allegory Paradox." I don't think this is even explained away as translation, as so many things in this book half-are. Towards the end of the book, when certain artifacts are named after literary tropes, I started to REALLY roll my eyes. I think these are all intended to be sort of tongue-in-cheek funny, but they just annoyed me. Another gripe... Do you ever read a book and see something and think, "Oh, this author has clearly just binged a bunch of so-and-so or this-and-that." Well, me too, and it happened big time in this book. I have no way of knowing for sure if the character of Nicholas Solitude was created after watching just a little too much Doctor Who, but WOW does it seem like it.
I think I also really bumped against the author's writing style. I found the switches between first person and third person very strange. The dialogue OFTEN does not ring true - people just do not speak in the way they do in this book. Example: "For what it's worth," CHARACTER said, "I greatly prefer that you're not dead." "The circumstances are appealing to me as well." The WHAT? People do not talk like this. The character repeating this isn't even a robot or something where you could sort of pretend that it's just a weird characterization. This happens over and over again. The dialogue just doesn't ring true for me and it really stopped me from getting into the story.
Speaking of getting into the story. I got so irritated on page 290 that I picked up a pencil and wrote a note below my little sticker mark (how I typically mark bits in books). At page 290, the author takes several paragraphs to go into the background history of something that is almost completely irrelevant to the story and is never revisited again. This just KEPT happening all throughout the book. EDITOR - where are you? WHY are huge swaths of this book devoted to telling me about things that have no impact on the story? If it's worldbuilding - SHOW, don't TELL. The book loves to tell me things, but skips over so much of the showing. At 300 pages, this book should have been starting to wrap up.
The author also seems to love firing off tweets in the text. I noticed this with The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz as well. If you're writing speculative fiction - I kindly ask that you remember you're writing a BOOK. You don't need to contain your social commentary to 180 or 250 characters mid-stride. SHOW ME the consequences of what you're upset about, SHOW ME why things are not working right, SHOW ME how they can be better. Here are some examples of the author firing off a tweet:
"At the age of fourteen, I knew the Building existed, but no-body I knew really liked to talk about it. They didn't teach us about it at school. I lived in one of those Americas where they printed textbooks with blank pages so that school boards could just decide on the fly what repressive bullshit they felt like teaching."
Any idea how much weight that string of sentences has on the story? None - absolutely none. This happens frequently, where the author will say how bad a thing is, but do nothing to show WHY or HOW it is bad, or WHAT can be done better. This isn't social commentary, it's tweeting. The author also calls Earth-floors hell worlds at one point which I think is also supposed to be funny. Unfortunately, all it does is sort of illustrate the total lack of clarity around how this world works. Everything is in a big building, that you can go outside of where there are folks and spaceships... But there are infinite floors that are world-sized (question mark??), and infinite, but not infinite... Certain modes of transportation open interdimensional rifts... but they still need to be aimed manually? I don't get it.
I really hate to rag on this book so intensely. There were parts that I liked, but I had to work to like them. How I wish this book were 300 pages and that the author worked with an editor.
In the spoiler below, I call attention to an opportunity to END the book radically on page 441.
When I read the Acknowledgements and saw that this is sort of meshed together from three or four different things, I basically slapped my head and said, "of course, it is," out loud to the coffee shop. It's painfully apparent.
Some of my gripes up front... I found the naming of characters to be really... weird. "Pivotal Moment," "Epiphany Foreshadow," "Allegory Paradox." I don't think this is even explained away as translation, as so many things in this book half-are. Towards the end of the book, when certain artifacts are named after literary tropes, I started to REALLY roll my eyes. I think these are all intended to be sort of tongue-in-cheek funny, but they just annoyed me. Another gripe... Do you ever read a book and see something and think, "Oh, this author has clearly just binged a bunch of so-and-so or this-and-that." Well, me too, and it happened big time in this book. I have no way of knowing for sure if the character of Nicholas Solitude was created after watching just a little too much Doctor Who, but WOW does it seem like it.
I think I also really bumped against the author's writing style. I found the switches between first person and third person very strange. The dialogue OFTEN does not ring true - people just do not speak in the way they do in this book. Example: "For what it's worth," CHARACTER said, "I greatly prefer that you're not dead." "The circumstances are appealing to me as well." The WHAT? People do not talk like this. The character repeating this isn't even a robot or something where you could sort of pretend that it's just a weird characterization. This happens over and over again. The dialogue just doesn't ring true for me and it really stopped me from getting into the story.
Speaking of getting into the story. I got so irritated on page 290 that I picked up a pencil and wrote a note below my little sticker mark (how I typically mark bits in books). At page 290, the author takes several paragraphs to go into the background history of something that is almost completely irrelevant to the story and is never revisited again. This just KEPT happening all throughout the book. EDITOR - where are you? WHY are huge swaths of this book devoted to telling me about things that have no impact on the story? If it's worldbuilding - SHOW, don't TELL. The book loves to tell me things, but skips over so much of the showing. At 300 pages, this book should have been starting to wrap up.
The author also seems to love firing off tweets in the text. I noticed this with The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz as well. If you're writing speculative fiction - I kindly ask that you remember you're writing a BOOK. You don't need to contain your social commentary to 180 or 250 characters mid-stride. SHOW ME the consequences of what you're upset about, SHOW ME why things are not working right, SHOW ME how they can be better. Here are some examples of the author firing off a tweet:
"At the age of fourteen, I knew the Building existed, but no-body I knew really liked to talk about it. They didn't teach us about it at school. I lived in one of those Americas where they printed textbooks with blank pages so that school boards could just decide on the fly what repressive bullshit they felt like teaching."
Any idea how much weight that string of sentences has on the story? None - absolutely none. This happens frequently, where the author will say how bad a thing is, but do nothing to show WHY or HOW it is bad, or WHAT can be done better. This isn't social commentary, it's tweeting. The author also calls Earth-floors hell worlds at one point which I think is also supposed to be funny. Unfortunately, all it does is sort of illustrate the total lack of clarity around how this world works. Everything is in a big building, that you can go outside of where there are folks and spaceships... But there are infinite floors that are world-sized (question mark??), and infinite, but not infinite... Certain modes of transportation open interdimensional rifts... but they still need to be aimed manually? I don't get it.
I really hate to rag on this book so intensely. There were parts that I liked, but I had to work to like them. How I wish this book were 300 pages and that the author worked with an editor.
In the spoiler below, I call attention to an opportunity to END the book radically on page 441.
February 15, 2023
I think I may just not have been in the mood for this. It's a wild and whimsical ride that feels like it has Doctor Who and maybe TTRPGs at its core, with a love of television and clever timey-wimey and parallel universe (para-welly-telly?) shenanigans. As an audiobook, there are many sections that feel like info dumps, since every twist (and there are many) that need explanations. Anyway, I'm sure many will enjoy this, but I'm on to something that feels a mite more solid.
![Profile Image for Kelly {SpaceOnTheBookcase].](/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.gr-assets.com%2Fimages%2FS%2Fcompressed.photo.goodreads.com%2Fusers%2F1672255572i%2F4799500._UX200_CR0%2C0%2C200%2C200_.jpg&w=128&q=75)
February 24, 2023
Wild Massive is the kind of book that I want to see turned into a TV Series or Movies. It has so many different pieces and layers that there is always something captivating going on. Overall I thought it was really well done.
Thank you TorDotCom for gifting me a copy.
Thank you TorDotCom for gifting me a copy.
March 26, 2024
Couldn’t do it. Wanted to like it, gave it a fair shot, but at some point the writing became so sloppy and amateurish. Cool premise but poor execution. DNF
July 30, 2023
Unfortunately, I couldn’t bring myself to finish this book. I had to stop around 35% of the way through the e-book ARC. This book was ultimately not for me, it seems. Simply put, I got quite bored with the plot and didn’t have enough of a reason to read at my low level of engagement for the next 65%. No element of the plot, or characters introduced up until that point, were interesting or intriguing enough to propel me forward. I’m usually okay with somewhat slow pacing, but in a sci-fi novel like this, I was looking to be more engaged by the point I ended up quitting at.
I’ll start out with what I liked/the positives: this has really unique concept and is wildly imaginative as a premise (what drew me to the book in the first place was the plot description). The theme park setting, when it was featured, was very exciting. The most fun I had during my journey with this book were the theme park scenes, actually. The elevators to different worlds? Another really fun world-building element that I found engaging. I also thought the dialogue was very well-written—I even found myself chuckling aloud sometimes.
Now to the things I did not particularly enjoy and what ultimately brought me to my decision to stop reading before finishing the book. I found the most issue in the characters and their (lack of) development, as well as the (at times) overly descriptive writing that ultimately hindered my ability to understand what was going on instead of enhancing it. There are quite complex sci-fi concepts used in this book, and their descriptions and explanations were a little muddled and confusing at times—to the point where multiple pages were simply taken up with long, unclear explanations. My eyes found themselves skimming and glazing over until those sections were over because I was overwhelmed by the information and had trouble picturing what it was trying to describe. Ultimately, I had a lot of trouble imagining many of the scenarios in my head, which obviously lessened my enjoyment of the plot. For examples, all of the intricacy to the “replica” concept kind of dragged on over time and became more of a nuisance to read about, rather than being interesting or intriguing. Jumps in time (ex. from the present, back to the past, back to the present) were not as clear as they could’ve been and confused me at times. Ultimately, I found this book to be too much explanation and exposition of the sci-fi concepts and not enough plot; a lot of telling and not showing. Which, in sci-fi CAN be fine and work well, but I didn’t find that it did here. There were too many sections that were just on the verge of being exciting and propelling you through the story, and then there would be another long exposition slump. I found the overall pacing to be all over the place. In my opinion, there were too long of gaps between the sub-plot (the past) and the main plot, to the point where I would find myself forgetting what had happened previously in the present with our main character and had to go back and re-read things frequently to remember (which isn’t fun; it breaks up the reading experience in a bad way). In terms of the characters, there just wasn’t anything about their personalities that sucked me in and made me want to ultimately find out their fates.
I’m quite disappointed that I didn’t end up liking this book, as I obviously was excited enough for it from the description/premise in order to ask for an e-ARC on NetGalley. The author is clearly talented and has a lot of really great ideas for world-building, I just thought it wasn’t executed in a fun-to-read way.
I’ll start out with what I liked/the positives: this has really unique concept and is wildly imaginative as a premise (what drew me to the book in the first place was the plot description). The theme park setting, when it was featured, was very exciting. The most fun I had during my journey with this book were the theme park scenes, actually. The elevators to different worlds? Another really fun world-building element that I found engaging. I also thought the dialogue was very well-written—I even found myself chuckling aloud sometimes.
Now to the things I did not particularly enjoy and what ultimately brought me to my decision to stop reading before finishing the book. I found the most issue in the characters and their (lack of) development, as well as the (at times) overly descriptive writing that ultimately hindered my ability to understand what was going on instead of enhancing it. There are quite complex sci-fi concepts used in this book, and their descriptions and explanations were a little muddled and confusing at times—to the point where multiple pages were simply taken up with long, unclear explanations. My eyes found themselves skimming and glazing over until those sections were over because I was overwhelmed by the information and had trouble picturing what it was trying to describe. Ultimately, I had a lot of trouble imagining many of the scenarios in my head, which obviously lessened my enjoyment of the plot. For examples, all of the intricacy to the “replica” concept kind of dragged on over time and became more of a nuisance to read about, rather than being interesting or intriguing. Jumps in time (ex. from the present, back to the past, back to the present) were not as clear as they could’ve been and confused me at times. Ultimately, I found this book to be too much explanation and exposition of the sci-fi concepts and not enough plot; a lot of telling and not showing. Which, in sci-fi CAN be fine and work well, but I didn’t find that it did here. There were too many sections that were just on the verge of being exciting and propelling you through the story, and then there would be another long exposition slump. I found the overall pacing to be all over the place. In my opinion, there were too long of gaps between the sub-plot (the past) and the main plot, to the point where I would find myself forgetting what had happened previously in the present with our main character and had to go back and re-read things frequently to remember (which isn’t fun; it breaks up the reading experience in a bad way). In terms of the characters, there just wasn’t anything about their personalities that sucked me in and made me want to ultimately find out their fates.
I’m quite disappointed that I didn’t end up liking this book, as I obviously was excited enough for it from the description/premise in order to ask for an e-ARC on NetGalley. The author is clearly talented and has a lot of really great ideas for world-building, I just thought it wasn’t executed in a fun-to-read way.
December 25, 2022
* Thaks a million to Goodreads Giveaways and Tor Publishing for providing me with an Uncorrected ARC of 'Wild Massive', by Scotto Moore, that should be hitting the shelves on February 7th, 2023.*
What can I say? I enjoyed this book greatly. It was fun, full of action, a real roller coaster (wink, wink) of emotions and adventure. The worldbuilding is exciting and so original, and we have an ample cast of characters, that are both mythical and relatable, terrifying and hilarious, even if not always as intended.
I just can't bring myself to give it the full and wonderful five stars that the enjoyment provided actually deserves, mostly because I felt like the author was hitting the floor running, as a lot of the background for this world, characters and stories comes from some of his multimedia previous works; and also, that ending... after so many pages and so many shenanigans... Don't get me wrong, it was sure fitting and still kind of satisfying in itself, but I felt cheated, when so many crucial characters to the story were just left behind and unaccounted for.
Yes, I do want to know what happened to Rindasy, Tabitha and Clarissa. I need more of this. So basically: it was highly entertaining, but if this is supposed to be a just one book thing, it clearly wasn't enough.
What can I say? I enjoyed this book greatly. It was fun, full of action, a real roller coaster (wink, wink) of emotions and adventure. The worldbuilding is exciting and so original, and we have an ample cast of characters, that are both mythical and relatable, terrifying and hilarious, even if not always as intended.
I just can't bring myself to give it the full and wonderful five stars that the enjoyment provided actually deserves, mostly because I felt like the author was hitting the floor running, as a lot of the background for this world, characters and stories comes from some of his multimedia previous works; and also, that ending... after so many pages and so many shenanigans... Don't get me wrong, it was sure fitting and still kind of satisfying in itself, but I felt cheated, when so many crucial characters to the story were just left behind and unaccounted for.
Yes, I do want to know what happened to Rindasy, Tabitha and Clarissa. I need more of this. So basically: it was highly entertaining, but if this is supposed to be a just one book thing, it clearly wasn't enough.
March 8, 2023
Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of this title in exchange for an honest review.
The first 10% of this book sucked me in, I loved it and I thought I was going to love this entire story.
I very much enjoy the premise, a giant skyscraper where each floor could contain an infinite number of worlds. Genius. Carissa lives a comfortable life in an elevator with an AI as her only companion when her peaceful life is suddenly interrupted by a strange being who lands on the roof of her elevator and sets her off on a big adventure. And then this book seemed to lose focus and lost me in the process.
This book suffers from wanting to be everything all at once. The author is clearly very creative and has a huge imagination, but there are too many ideas to keep up with in this novel. It's a bit at odds with itself, feeling light hearted and silly while also being a story about an incredibly high stakes adventure. I do think that this novel would translate to film much better than it does as a book.
The first 10% of this book sucked me in, I loved it and I thought I was going to love this entire story.
I very much enjoy the premise, a giant skyscraper where each floor could contain an infinite number of worlds. Genius. Carissa lives a comfortable life in an elevator with an AI as her only companion when her peaceful life is suddenly interrupted by a strange being who lands on the roof of her elevator and sets her off on a big adventure. And then this book seemed to lose focus and lost me in the process.
This book suffers from wanting to be everything all at once. The author is clearly very creative and has a huge imagination, but there are too many ideas to keep up with in this novel. It's a bit at odds with itself, feeling light hearted and silly while also being a story about an incredibly high stakes adventure. I do think that this novel would translate to film much better than it does as a book.
February 26, 2023
This book automatically gets at least three stars because it has the amazing trope that I love forever, which is, of course, immortal creators of the universe in an office setting. There are so many fun ideas: office politics between infinitely powerful beings, all the theme parks/their corresponding media monopoly, the multiverse as an infinite building, etc. I’m obsessed with little elevator cloudlets, and many details like this added richness and joy.
That being said. The plot didn’t, and probably couldn’t, stand up to so many worldbuilding details crammed together. Rather than starting from the premise (this random supernatural creative agency created the multiverse on the form of the Building), it seems that Wild Massive is comprised of a bunch of fun, exciting ideas forced to cohabitate, even if they don’t make sense together and muddy the plot past comprehension.
I finished this in a day and had lots of fun!! Sadly, I also kept imagining how to improve things.
That being said. The plot didn’t, and probably couldn’t, stand up to so many worldbuilding details crammed together. Rather than starting from the premise (this random supernatural creative agency created the multiverse on the form of the Building), it seems that Wild Massive is comprised of a bunch of fun, exciting ideas forced to cohabitate, even if they don’t make sense together and muddy the plot past comprehension.
I finished this in a day and had lots of fun!! Sadly, I also kept imagining how to improve things.
May 21, 2023
5.0 / 10 ✪
https://arefugefromlife.wordpress.com...
Welcome to the Building, so named as it’s the one and only, the only collection of universes and floors and elevators of its kind, or so the stories go. There are rumors about life outside the building; its lobby and parking lot, and where exactly the front-end staff go when they leave at night, but no one seems to know for sure. What people do know is that the Building is an infinitely tall skyscraper with no end—except that it does have a top floor. And a basement. Somehow.
Carissa is an explorer, with her own elevator and cloudlet AI. A psychic known as a Brilliant, she is the last survivor of her kind—feared and hunted by the Association, she wanders the building in search of adventure.
Rindasy is a Shai-Manak, a race of sorcerous, mysterious shapeshifters that inhabit a rainforest utopia on a previously unmapped floor. One of the few sentients mad enough to defy the Association—and inhabiting a single floor as it is—the Shai-Manak have been at war with the Association for fifty years, a war that has more or less turned into a stalemate.
That was all before Rindasy set out on her mission: to destroy an Association weapons’ lab with a device called a pearlet, capable of taking out not just one but dozens of floors at once. And before another Shai-Manak landed on Carissa’s elevator car.
What follows is a whirlwind of madness, plots and intrigue, looming war for the Building, all centered upon Wild Massive, a magic-based theme-park designed to tell the history of the building and the Association.
—
Okay, so this one is nuts. I mean, if you read the description or any kind of sample, this shouldn’t surprise you. From the blurb alone, it sounds insane. The only question is: is it a good or bad insane? Well, I’m here to tell you… it may not be bad, but it’s certainly not good. It’s just too much.
We have two shapeshifters, a psychic, a teenager that can see the future, and an all-out war between the Association and the Shai-Manak. A Wild Massive theme-park with magic and rides based on the past and future, and a propensity to stick-it to the man. Oh, and the Explorer’s Guild is trying to make it to the Top Floor, to explore and map the Chasm and contact the entity that resides there. And all of this happens before shit really goes sideways.
It turns out there are Muses that guide the course of the future of the Building. A Management that technically guides and controls the Muses. A magic system that was impossible to predict, let alone understand. A thrilling conclusion that I had to read twice, but still didn’t make any damned sense.
Seriously there’s so much going on in this that it’s easy to lose any concept of what’s going on. And lose it I did. I’m not really sure when and where, exactly, but lose it I did, so that I was almost completely lost by the time I reached the end. An ending that I actually read three times, a conclusion I read twice, and then skipped around a bit in a desperate attempt to make any sense of it all. Which, I did, after some time.
The problem is, while it may actually make some kind of sense at the end, it certainly doesn’t seem in any way fulfilling. Seriously, upon preparing this review I reread the conclusion AGAIN and my continued reaction to it was “WTF did I just read???”
The story wasn’t actually bad to this point, however. It was actually rather adventurous and unique (very unique), wild and crazy, exciting and… crazy. Interesting and immersive—until it wasn’t.
Other than the obvious confusion, my main problem was that once I finally lost track of what was happening—I just didn’t care. About the story, the conclusion, what happened or might happen. I couldn’t figure everything out, but just couldn’t summon enough energy to care.
Audio Note: Suzy Jackson, as always, made an impressive attempt to keep me invested. She even managed it for a while. Through the entirety of the book, once. Through all the madness and mayhem. Through several attempts to understand the conclusion, through several additional attempts to figure out just what had happened at the end. Keep having her narrate things—she’s awesome!
TL;DR
Wild Massive is… insanity. If you read the blurb, this shouldn’t be surprising. The problem is, it’s not necessarily a good kind of insanity, more so one that makes any kind of fulfilling sense. I read the conclusion so many times that I really, really should have figured something out. Which I did. The problem being—while they’re all quite interesting and strange in their own right (with some emphasis on strange)—none of these things that I figured out added up to a complete and coherent story. In my review process, I read several other reviews, and from what I can tell, this is pretty much the norm. If you understood it (and that’s a big “if”) you’re likely to really enjoy Wild Massive. But otherwise… um, my review is about par, maybe even a little higher than most. So… read at your own risk, pretty much.
https://arefugefromlife.wordpress.com...
Welcome to the Building, so named as it’s the one and only, the only collection of universes and floors and elevators of its kind, or so the stories go. There are rumors about life outside the building; its lobby and parking lot, and where exactly the front-end staff go when they leave at night, but no one seems to know for sure. What people do know is that the Building is an infinitely tall skyscraper with no end—except that it does have a top floor. And a basement. Somehow.
Carissa is an explorer, with her own elevator and cloudlet AI. A psychic known as a Brilliant, she is the last survivor of her kind—feared and hunted by the Association, she wanders the building in search of adventure.
Rindasy is a Shai-Manak, a race of sorcerous, mysterious shapeshifters that inhabit a rainforest utopia on a previously unmapped floor. One of the few sentients mad enough to defy the Association—and inhabiting a single floor as it is—the Shai-Manak have been at war with the Association for fifty years, a war that has more or less turned into a stalemate.
That was all before Rindasy set out on her mission: to destroy an Association weapons’ lab with a device called a pearlet, capable of taking out not just one but dozens of floors at once. And before another Shai-Manak landed on Carissa’s elevator car.
What follows is a whirlwind of madness, plots and intrigue, looming war for the Building, all centered upon Wild Massive, a magic-based theme-park designed to tell the history of the building and the Association.
—
Okay, so this one is nuts. I mean, if you read the description or any kind of sample, this shouldn’t surprise you. From the blurb alone, it sounds insane. The only question is: is it a good or bad insane? Well, I’m here to tell you… it may not be bad, but it’s certainly not good. It’s just too much.
We have two shapeshifters, a psychic, a teenager that can see the future, and an all-out war between the Association and the Shai-Manak. A Wild Massive theme-park with magic and rides based on the past and future, and a propensity to stick-it to the man. Oh, and the Explorer’s Guild is trying to make it to the Top Floor, to explore and map the Chasm and contact the entity that resides there. And all of this happens before shit really goes sideways.
It turns out there are Muses that guide the course of the future of the Building. A Management that technically guides and controls the Muses. A magic system that was impossible to predict, let alone understand. A thrilling conclusion that I had to read twice, but still didn’t make any damned sense.
Seriously there’s so much going on in this that it’s easy to lose any concept of what’s going on. And lose it I did. I’m not really sure when and where, exactly, but lose it I did, so that I was almost completely lost by the time I reached the end. An ending that I actually read three times, a conclusion I read twice, and then skipped around a bit in a desperate attempt to make any sense of it all. Which, I did, after some time.
The problem is, while it may actually make some kind of sense at the end, it certainly doesn’t seem in any way fulfilling. Seriously, upon preparing this review I reread the conclusion AGAIN and my continued reaction to it was “WTF did I just read???”
The story wasn’t actually bad to this point, however. It was actually rather adventurous and unique (very unique), wild and crazy, exciting and… crazy. Interesting and immersive—until it wasn’t.
Other than the obvious confusion, my main problem was that once I finally lost track of what was happening—I just didn’t care. About the story, the conclusion, what happened or might happen. I couldn’t figure everything out, but just couldn’t summon enough energy to care.
Audio Note: Suzy Jackson, as always, made an impressive attempt to keep me invested. She even managed it for a while. Through the entirety of the book, once. Through all the madness and mayhem. Through several attempts to understand the conclusion, through several additional attempts to figure out just what had happened at the end. Keep having her narrate things—she’s awesome!
TL;DR
Wild Massive is… insanity. If you read the blurb, this shouldn’t be surprising. The problem is, it’s not necessarily a good kind of insanity, more so one that makes any kind of fulfilling sense. I read the conclusion so many times that I really, really should have figured something out. Which I did. The problem being—while they’re all quite interesting and strange in their own right (with some emphasis on strange)—none of these things that I figured out added up to a complete and coherent story. In my review process, I read several other reviews, and from what I can tell, this is pretty much the norm. If you understood it (and that’s a big “if”) you’re likely to really enjoy Wild Massive. But otherwise… um, my review is about par, maybe even a little higher than most. So… read at your own risk, pretty much.
February 18, 2023
Woo! Finally got around to reading the ARC I won in a Goodreads giveaway almost 6 months ago!
So, the 10 second review is take Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, rip it apart, scrape about 75% of the absurdist humour away (not to say Wild Massive isn't funny - it is - it's just a drier funny. Less pratfalls and more moments where you go "Wait, what did I just f*cking read?" And when things get serious, they stay more or less so.) while keeping the concept of an infinitely improbable variety of trouble your heroes can get into, Load into merchandising t-shirt cannon, and fire on full automatic until the air is full of pages.
Many of the less enthusiastic reviews are that Moore gets really deep into explanations of what's going on - and I would say that's a positive, as opposed to what some of the other reviewers have said. What I felt made the book was digging into some of the more ridiculous floors and goings-on in this infinite multiverse.
Side note - it would be helpful if you had a bare-bones-basic understanding of multiversal theory before digging in. Not essential, but I did feel there were a few points where someone unfamiliar with the conventions of the genre could get lost.
We have a bunch of players in the story - Carissa, Rindasy, Andasir, Tabitha, and so on, but they are truly just players in a much larger, centuries-spanning narrative of "The Building". Accordingly, each has unique attributes that make them interesting, but none truly grab hold of the plot and run away with it - this is a plot-based story, despite the unique characters.
Intrigue? This book has heaps of it - you really don't understand what has really been going on until about 50 pages from the end, and when the reveal happens, it goes even a step beyond that into 'what the f*ck' territory.
However, my main criticism of the book does come from the ending. The book seems content to lose itself for much of its runtime in exploration of the world (which is amazing), but the pace changes abruptly in the final fifth of the book, rocketing forward so fast and coming to such a messy conclusion that it feels a bit rushed.
We lose a bunch of characters pretty ignominiously (which is fine), abandon a few others, and it's like the protagonist shifts in the final 30 pages completely, and we realize that we've actually just been watching the closing act of someone else's story this entire time.
But it's by no means a deal-breaker - and it definitely left me wanting to know more about the Building and its Denizens.
The writing style itself is slick - characters don't hesitate to speak their mind, and much of what is said is either ludicrously improbable (scratching that sci fi itch), or outright relateable (often in relation to the improbability someone else just fired off).
I'm going to age myself a bit here - but one writing choice did come across as pretty jarring when I first started reading because there's no warning it's coming. Moore fully embraces the concept of neopronouns in this work - specifically, referring to non-gender binary characters as ze, zir, or zis. Which does make sense considering that in an infinite multiverse filled with shapeshifters and non-humanoids, a gender binary is not at all guaranteed.
But for me, with a binary education and a binary familial life, and -let's face it - a binary vocabulary, it was a little off-putting in the beginning, and broke the flow of about the first "Episode" as I got used to it. I'm pretty sure this is the first book I ever read that just used them, no explanation given. I admit - at first I thought it was a typo - this was an ARC after all.
But by the end, it was like second nature reading it.
Anywho - that's all I've got. I liked it, despite a slightly messy ending, and if Moore were to revisit the world of the Building in another story, I'd probably be onboard. Which seems to be a fair bet, as much of what went into this book has already appeared in his webcomics and in theatre. So we may not be done with it yet.
After all - we don't know
So, the 10 second review is take Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, rip it apart, scrape about 75% of the absurdist humour away (not to say Wild Massive isn't funny - it is - it's just a drier funny. Less pratfalls and more moments where you go "Wait, what did I just f*cking read?" And when things get serious, they stay more or less so.) while keeping the concept of an infinitely improbable variety of trouble your heroes can get into, Load into merchandising t-shirt cannon, and fire on full automatic until the air is full of pages.
Many of the less enthusiastic reviews are that Moore gets really deep into explanations of what's going on - and I would say that's a positive, as opposed to what some of the other reviewers have said. What I felt made the book was digging into some of the more ridiculous floors and goings-on in this infinite multiverse.
Side note - it would be helpful if you had a bare-bones-basic understanding of multiversal theory before digging in. Not essential, but I did feel there were a few points where someone unfamiliar with the conventions of the genre could get lost.
We have a bunch of players in the story - Carissa, Rindasy, Andasir, Tabitha, and so on, but they are truly just players in a much larger, centuries-spanning narrative of "The Building". Accordingly, each has unique attributes that make them interesting, but none truly grab hold of the plot and run away with it - this is a plot-based story, despite the unique characters.
Intrigue? This book has heaps of it - you really don't understand what has really been going on until about 50 pages from the end, and when the reveal happens, it goes even a step beyond that into 'what the f*ck' territory.
However, my main criticism of the book does come from the ending. The book seems content to lose itself for much of its runtime in exploration of the world (which is amazing), but the pace changes abruptly in the final fifth of the book, rocketing forward so fast and coming to such a messy conclusion that it feels a bit rushed.
We lose a bunch of characters pretty ignominiously (which is fine), abandon a few others, and it's like the protagonist shifts in the final 30 pages completely, and we realize that we've actually just been watching the closing act of someone else's story this entire time.
But it's by no means a deal-breaker - and it definitely left me wanting to know more about the Building and its Denizens.
The writing style itself is slick - characters don't hesitate to speak their mind, and much of what is said is either ludicrously improbable (scratching that sci fi itch), or outright relateable (often in relation to the improbability someone else just fired off).
I'm going to age myself a bit here - but one writing choice did come across as pretty jarring when I first started reading because there's no warning it's coming. Moore fully embraces the concept of neopronouns in this work - specifically, referring to non-gender binary characters as ze, zir, or zis. Which does make sense considering that in an infinite multiverse filled with shapeshifters and non-humanoids, a gender binary is not at all guaranteed.
But for me, with a binary education and a binary familial life, and -let's face it - a binary vocabulary, it was a little off-putting in the beginning, and broke the flow of about the first "Episode" as I got used to it. I'm pretty sure this is the first book I ever read that just used them, no explanation given. I admit - at first I thought it was a typo - this was an ARC after all.
But by the end, it was like second nature reading it.
Anywho - that's all I've got. I liked it, despite a slightly messy ending, and if Moore were to revisit the world of the Building in another story, I'd probably be onboard. Which seems to be a fair bet, as much of what went into this book has already appeared in his webcomics and in theatre. So we may not be done with it yet.
After all - we don't know
March 14, 2023
First I want to thank NetGalley and RB Media for providing me with an advance copy of this Audiobook.
Wild Massive is a very accurate title for the latest book by Scotto Moore. Just wrapping your mind around the world it's set in takes some doing. Wild Massive takes place inside a Multiverse spanning building. Each world takes up a single floor and there are elevators that traverse the hundreds of thousands of floors. The title of the book comes from a series of theme parks that can take up entire floors of the building. The story itself is a bit tongue in cheek and felt a bit like the tone of a Terry Pratchett novel and it has elements of sci-fi and fantasy with mind bending tech, psionic warriors, and shape shifting wizards. Accompanied by an absolutely amazing narrator for this audiobook there are a lot of great things to enjoy about Wild Massive.
The big hang-up that I had with the book was with just how big it is. In order to try and get the reader around all the nuances of the fantastic world there are a number of sections that felt like the reader is being told how to experience the world instead of letting some of that happen naturally within dialogue and character development. This makes the early chapters of the book feel a bit sluggish on pace even though there are also a number of side-stories that are taking place. There is also a point in the book where the narrative style changes perspective. I know some people are grinding their teeth even thinking about changing narrative style mid book , but it happens and though it was jarring it made since to change perspective in the story.
I saw a lot of reviews that couldn't really get past the opening chapters of this book and I can understand why they might think that. However, the story idea is so creative and I kept wanting to know more. I won't give away any plot details about the end of the book, but I will say that the book does seem to double down on some of the more ridiculous elements like a string of supremely obvious naming conventions that make the end of the book feel like a very different book from the beginning and lost my attention. I think ultimately this book suffered from an over abundance of narrative ideas and not enough fuel for any one of them to truly take off in my opinion.
All of that said, if you are a fan of a more tongue in cheek sort of SFF or are fans of Terry Pratchett or Douglas Adams you should give this book a try. I also strongly recommend the audio book as Suzy Jackson does an absolutely amazing job.
Wild Massive is a very accurate title for the latest book by Scotto Moore. Just wrapping your mind around the world it's set in takes some doing. Wild Massive takes place inside a Multiverse spanning building. Each world takes up a single floor and there are elevators that traverse the hundreds of thousands of floors. The title of the book comes from a series of theme parks that can take up entire floors of the building. The story itself is a bit tongue in cheek and felt a bit like the tone of a Terry Pratchett novel and it has elements of sci-fi and fantasy with mind bending tech, psionic warriors, and shape shifting wizards. Accompanied by an absolutely amazing narrator for this audiobook there are a lot of great things to enjoy about Wild Massive.
The big hang-up that I had with the book was with just how big it is. In order to try and get the reader around all the nuances of the fantastic world there are a number of sections that felt like the reader is being told how to experience the world instead of letting some of that happen naturally within dialogue and character development. This makes the early chapters of the book feel a bit sluggish on pace even though there are also a number of side-stories that are taking place. There is also a point in the book where the narrative style changes perspective. I know some people are grinding their teeth even thinking about changing narrative style mid book , but it happens and though it was jarring it made since to change perspective in the story.
I saw a lot of reviews that couldn't really get past the opening chapters of this book and I can understand why they might think that. However, the story idea is so creative and I kept wanting to know more. I won't give away any plot details about the end of the book, but I will say that the book does seem to double down on some of the more ridiculous elements like a string of supremely obvious naming conventions that make the end of the book feel like a very different book from the beginning and lost my attention. I think ultimately this book suffered from an over abundance of narrative ideas and not enough fuel for any one of them to truly take off in my opinion.
All of that said, if you are a fan of a more tongue in cheek sort of SFF or are fans of Terry Pratchett or Douglas Adams you should give this book a try. I also strongly recommend the audio book as Suzy Jackson does an absolutely amazing job.
December 14, 2024
Imagine an elevator that could drop you into a new world with every ding of an opening door. Welcome to Wild Massive, a sci-fi epic set in the Building, an infinitely tall structure where each floor holds a fantastical and unpredictable universe. Traversing through it is Carissa, the sole survivor of a genocide who lives in an elevator and is doing her best to stay hidden from the Association—a sprawling, authoritarian bureaucracy that’s consumed most of the Building’s worlds into its rigid control. When her routine of quiet survival is interrupted by a collision with a shape-shifting sorcerer, Carissa is offered a dangerous opportunity: revenge. Together, Carissa and the sorcerer embark on a perilous journey through wondrous and treacherous worlds, avoiding the Association’s iron grip at every turn. But their adventure doesn’t go unnoticed. A popular multiverse-wide reality show, centuries in the making, turns their attention to Carissa, aiming to turn her journey into the ultimate series finale. Balancing themes of power, bureaucracy, and the commodification of reality, Wild Massive delivers ambitious world-building with an unnerving closeness to our own world. While the story spans fantastical multiverses, its focus remains on the character’s emotions and humanity, and the relationships that bind people—even in the face of destruction. Moore’s writing is sharp, evocative, and daringly on the nose. This isn’t just a sci-fi adventure; it’s a bold exploration of the worlds we create and the ones we let consume us.
October 4, 2023
Having been underwhelmed by Moore's "Battle of the Linguist Mages," which passed the fifty-page test but went radically off the rails, I approached this book in the spirit of "impress me." That I finished this novel and have basically positive feelings about it demonstrates that I must have been impressed; it was a near run thing though. For the story that Moore is telling this novel is really about 100 pages too long, and does get bogged down in it's overlapping plots to no real point. Also, many of the characters are just place-holders to actuate plot points, and inspire no affection, anger, or even have much of an impact as allegorical symbols. That said, the characters that Moore actually does seem invested in developing did inspire caring, and the narrative payoff did feel like it was worth the investment of time. What this book demonstrates is the limits of cool ideas as a justification for reading genre fiction, but I do expect to be giving Moore's next novel a chance.
Actual personal rating is 3.5.
Actual personal rating is 3.5.
December 24, 2022
Wild Massive had so many incredible ideas in it that it was difficult to keep up. I loved the concepts and the (sometimes literal) worldbuilding, and I feel like if the world had been any less extreme the book would not have held together at all. As it is, I struggled to see the plot through the cool factor. I would have preferred this story as either a short story or a series, which surprised me because I usually do prefer stand-alone novels.
Carissa lives in an elevator. She doesn't stay there for long in the book, instead spending most of her time stepping onto different floors (any size from entire planets to a single room) and taking on the massive Association alongside a Shai-Manak shapeshifter.
This is only one of at least three main plot lines that are intertwined, complete with POV and time shifts between sections. There are other devices that introduce yet more POV characters, and one particularly fun gimmick that caused me to erase a line about the style feeling "like fanfiction." I had difficulty feeling close to any of the characters because of the frequent switches, and often mixed them up due to name changes throughout the plot and frequent use of terms like "the shapeshifter" despite the presence of multiple characters fitting that description.
The pacing is breakneck and never lets up. I would have loved this if not for one specific writing quirk: important information is always given right after the reader needs it, not before. For example, there is a scene where a telepathic voice whispers a name the reader does not recognize inside the POV character's head. The character immediately realizes what's going on because the name is the fake name she gave earlier... but the reader was never told what the fake name was during that previous scene. This happened constantly and I felt too many steps behind to enjoy myself.
On the more positive side, Wild Massive really reminded me of all the books I enjoyed as a child. I was brought back to the way I felt when I read From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, Keys to the Kingdom, Animorphs, and even Artemis Fowl. I was once again excited about the possibilities of the a world much larger than I had ever dreamed, doing impossible things that had secretly been possible all along. Wild Massive lives up to its promise of being, well, wild and massive, and the awe-inspiring scale and friendly elevators were worth the read.
If you are looking for a slow and thoughtful read, this book might not be for you, but if you know what you're getting into and just want to see where the world takes you: enjoy the ride!
I received an advance e-copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest, unbiased review.
Carissa lives in an elevator. She doesn't stay there for long in the book, instead spending most of her time stepping onto different floors (any size from entire planets to a single room) and taking on the massive Association alongside a Shai-Manak shapeshifter.
This is only one of at least three main plot lines that are intertwined, complete with POV and time shifts between sections. There are other devices that introduce yet more POV characters, and one particularly fun gimmick that caused me to erase a line about the style feeling "like fanfiction." I had difficulty feeling close to any of the characters because of the frequent switches, and often mixed them up due to name changes throughout the plot and frequent use of terms like "the shapeshifter" despite the presence of multiple characters fitting that description.
The pacing is breakneck and never lets up. I would have loved this if not for one specific writing quirk: important information is always given right after the reader needs it, not before. For example, there is a scene where a telepathic voice whispers a name the reader does not recognize inside the POV character's head. The character immediately realizes what's going on because the name is the fake name she gave earlier... but the reader was never told what the fake name was during that previous scene. This happened constantly and I felt too many steps behind to enjoy myself.
On the more positive side, Wild Massive really reminded me of all the books I enjoyed as a child. I was brought back to the way I felt when I read From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, Keys to the Kingdom, Animorphs, and even Artemis Fowl. I was once again excited about the possibilities of the a world much larger than I had ever dreamed, doing impossible things that had secretly been possible all along. Wild Massive lives up to its promise of being, well, wild and massive, and the awe-inspiring scale and friendly elevators were worth the read.
If you are looking for a slow and thoughtful read, this book might not be for you, but if you know what you're getting into and just want to see where the world takes you: enjoy the ride!
I received an advance e-copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest, unbiased review.
February 4, 2023
Wild Massive is a really appropriate title for this book. There are so many big, crazy ideas in this book that it definitely lives up to the name. Unfortunately that's also part of the problem. Too many big ideas all smushed together and forced to coincide in a single novel so none of them gets room to breathe. I think the author had the ability to tell a good story for all these ideas, but didn't have the room. It ended up just not being enough of anything, and overall a disappointment. But for the ideas and the obvious writing talent behind them, I'm comfortable bumping my rating up to 3.5
Want to read
March 4, 2023A good review from Ernest Lilley nearby (and at https://amazingstories.com/2023/02/sc... ):
"a vast, sprawling, wildly audacious, and totally charming ride (in an elevator) throughout the labyrinth of a cheerfully impossible skyscraper of unusual (infinite) height."
--but a batch of so-so or worse reviews from others. Maybe?
Published Feb 7, 2023
"a vast, sprawling, wildly audacious, and totally charming ride (in an elevator) throughout the labyrinth of a cheerfully impossible skyscraper of unusual (infinite) height."
--but a batch of so-so or worse reviews from others. Maybe?
Published Feb 7, 2023
February 11, 2023
This is a lot like Linguist Mages where there’s so much going on and so many layers of meta.
Ultimately while I think it’s a better work of craft, I also find it much more frustrating in how it goes at the end. YMMV a lot. Worth giving it a shot if you liked Linguist Mages or if this is your first book by the author.
Ultimately while I think it’s a better work of craft, I also find it much more frustrating in how it goes at the end. YMMV a lot. Worth giving it a shot if you liked Linguist Mages or if this is your first book by the author.
June 29, 2023
Really interesting.. immediately drops you into a complex world but surprisingly easy to follow. I would have liked a little more in the conclusion
December 11, 2023
Astronomically creative. It's got all the complexity and joy of Douglas Adams but tied to a lot more grounded characters. Big, bold & beautiful.
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