Space Patrol

Choose Your Own Adventure #22

by Julius Goodman, Ralph Reese (Illustrator)

You are the commander of Space Rescue Emergency Vessel III. You have spent almost six months alone in space, and your only companion is your computer, Henry. You are steering your ship through a meteorite shower when an urgent signal comes from headquarters—a ship in your sector is under attack by space pirates!

Genres: Gamebooks, Choose Your Own Adventure, Science Fiction, Fiction, Young Adult, Childrens, Fantasy

128 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published July 1, 1983

Reviews

[Josiah · Rating 1 out of 5]

Welcome Julius Goodman to Choose Your Own Adventure with his first of three books in the main series. Space Patrol casts you as a police commander, keeping order in Earth's solar system by hunting down pirates. Your current six-month duty shift is almost up, which will leave you the next six months to relax away from the job, when a distress call comes in through your ship's computer, Henry, requesting help near Saturn. Your ship, the SREV III, is a bit farther away than the SREV II, but do you want to take the call yourself for a final dose of excitement before you're on leave for the next half year?

Accept the call, and you find the ship that sent it being assaulted by pirates. A sneak attack on the pirates is dangerous but could be the right move; arrest them, and you'll cruise off to choose your next mission. Follow another help signal and you may find yourself battling to save a ship of innocents from an armed antagonist...but is the situation what it seems? If you never receive that distress call, you'll wander the solar system with nothing to do, but what if Henry suddenly vanishes from your ship's systems? You'd better solve the mystery or you'll be a sitting duck for aggressors who would love to eliminate a Space Patrol agent. In another story route, your SREV III is damaged by pirate lasers. You might launch a life-pod and board the ship the pirates were attacking, to calm the situation and assist any victims. You could play it safe and wait aboard your ship, but either way you'll never catch the bad guys now.

If you had the SREV II take that initial call, you have time to perform a hull inspection of your SREV III, but could get caught outside the ship in a radiation storm. Trying to finish the repairs is a lethal risk, but play it safe and you'll then have a choice to patrol among either the inner or outer planets. Heading inward, you receive transmission from a Dr. Armand Grotch. He suspects his ship contains a crewman infected with Venusian Swamp Fever, known to kill millions of humans in mere days. It's your horrific duty to escort Grotch's ship and crew to fly directly into the sun, but perhaps there's an alternative solution. Acting on information given by "patient zero" on Grotch's ship, you could proceed to the asteroid belt and investigate his claim that terrorists there are spreading killer viruses. You might infiltrate the terrorists, but if they discover your identity it means instant death. Maybe you'd rather search a terrorist base on Pluto's moon Charon. The ship that greets you seems untrustworthy; you'll have to outwit them through use of your ship's defensive screens.

Much earlier, if you chose to delay the SREV III's hull inspection and watch a holo program instead (Star Wars—Episode 42!), your sensors may be damaged in the radiation storm. Avoid that by taking cover near an asteroid; you notice a glowing doorway on its surface, but your chief at HQ will order you to stay away. The doorway is a mysterious alien relic, and you are forbidden to meddle with it. Explore anyway, and the echoing voice of a race called the Xu'ka invites you in. You can leave at any time, but Space Patrol leadership may have a nasty reception in store because you disobeyed orders. Stay within the door and you might wind up on a Xu'ka spaceship, but how daring do you wish to be in exploring the final frontier of sentient existence?

Space Patrol has a fun premise, but the book is lackluster. Internal consistency comes and goes, sometimes vital information is held back until after you've made the decision you needed it to inform, and the story at times is ridiculous. For instance, it's hard to believe a movie studio would film a scene on location that depicts a serious space crime without first notifying Space Patrol. It's hardly your fault for reacting to the crime in progress. I rate Space Patrol one and a half stars; lacking excitement and good sense, it's a suboptimal start to Julius Goodman's Choose Your Own Adventure tenure.

[DivaDiane SM · Rating 3 out of 5]

I remember loving these so much when I was in middle school. Maybe it was the novelty of reading different developments to a story that started out the same. I loved choosing different paths. This particular one is not awesome. It seemed overly simplistic and always came down to one choice basically being bad (and the protagonist dying) and the other good. There was no way to determine if a given choice was smart or not.
My son enjoyed it for a little while but quickly lost interest. Maybe when he's older and reading them independently he'll like them better.

[Remo · Rating 4 out of 5]

La serie de Elige tu propia aventura es, literalmente, un clásico de nuestra infancia. He releído algunos, años después, y me parecen un poco cortos de miras, limitados en las posibilidades, pero cuando tenía 10 años cada uno de ellos era una maravilla lista para ser explorada hasta que hubiera dado todo lo que tenía dentro.
Al final siempre sabías que ibas a recorrer todos y cada uno de los caminos posibles. La emoción estaba, por tanto, en ganar y pasarte la historia al primer intento. Si no podías, pues nada, seguro que en el intento 18 acababas encontrando el camino. A veces los autores iban "a pillar", poniéndote los resultados buenos detrás de decisiones que eran claramente anómalas.
Recuerdo haber aprendido tanto palabras como hechos y datos en estos libros. No nadar contra la corriente cuando quieres llegar a tierra, dónde colocarse cuando un avión va a despegar, un montón de cosas interesantes y un montón de historias vividas, decenas por cada libro, que convirtieron a las serie en una colección fractal, donde cada vez podías elegir un libro nuevo entre los que ya tenías.
Llegué hasta el tomo 54 y dejé de tener interés por la serie, pero la serie siguió hasta superar los 180 títulos. Tal vez mis hijos quieran seguir el camino que yo empecé. Si quieres que lo sigan, pasa a la página 7.

[Callum · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is pretty much entirely my nostalgia talking when I say that this is my favorite CYOA book. Though I can't entirely credit it for my love of RPG's and game-books, I'd have to say it played a role. When I think of the wonder of sci-fi; things like Venusian exploding fever and emerald cities built into the sides of meteorites invariably come to mind. It's for that reason that, regardless of its quality, I would give this book five stars. (Let's all be honest, star ratings have very little relevance on the content of a review.) To critique it a little bit- there are quite a few moments where there is no obvious right answer, the choices are sometimes little more than coinflips with no agency on the part of the player. For that matter, most of the choices are binary, and rather than branching they usually end immediately in either a good or bad ending. This means a lot of the choices are basically pointless when it comes down to actually playing. For that reason, along with the absence of game-book elements like items or stats or dice- means that this book is really only going to be entertaining by merit of nostalgia or novelty. If you play game-books for fun, or never read this one in particular as a child, I can't really recommend this.

In summary: I loved this book as a kid, and it has stayed with me through my entire life. Just for that, I have to give it full stars. At the same time, I can't really recommend it. It's a fairly novel little CYOA book.

[Jackson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Once again, another good book made by the same people. You are creating your own ending to the story and choose your own path to see if you get a good ending or a not so nice ending. So in this book your a space traveler all up and alone in space. You have to chose where you want to go and just explore around in these books. I give my rating a 4/5 stars; the books theme was a bit more creative in my opinion. The author could have added more detail in this book. But at the ending there is always more room for improvement. Good job keep up the great work.

[Kelly (miss_kellysbookishcorner) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although pretty much everyone has read a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book at some point, I can honestly say this one was my first. As an avid reader, I maybe should have chosen something a little more advanced and a tad more my style. It's not that I didn't enjoy it, it just didn't entertain me as much as a it should have. My first time through was a failure too, as I only read a total of 4 pages, and so I started again for a second time with more success. Would definitely be interested in checking out more Choose-Your-Own-Adventures in the future.

[Damian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like this book and I would read it again. I like the concept of flipping through the pages and exploring new stories. I like how there is a ton of different endings, some good and some bad. This author lets you choose the experience and adventure you want to go through. If you mess up you are able to restart to the starting point and retry your options.

[Anna Shaw · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this for work since we’re creating a choose your own adventure RPG type game. An interesting way of writing, I’ll give it that! I’ve never read one of these choose your own adventure type before, I can see how kids would really like it. Short, simple, and lots of possibilities. Seems tricky to write, though…

[R J Royer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am going to be honest with you and say that I only read to four endings but I really enjoyed them. The book is amazing if in sad shape. I really appreciate that the was purchased in the 80's and is showing its age but it is so much fun.

[Dana Arbelaez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Did three different endings before putting it down; what a fun read with my son!! I picked this book up for 10¢ at a library book sale, and I will be hunting for more. Childhood relived, and it’s for a Summer Reading Challenge. This is my kind of fun.

[Poiboy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Retro reading! Pretty much all the CYOA books from the 80s were excellent for the time period. Anyone reading them now should adjust opinions for this 41 year old book :). Simple fun that any under 10 year old could enjoy. As they get older, they could try Fighting Fantasy books lol.

[Jakob · Rating 5 out of 5]

I bought this book again after having read it as a kid, this things such a fun conceptual space exploration story even as an adult, and the choose your own adventure style will never feel outdated, if not just underutilized.

[Willy Boy · Rating 5 out of 5]

read it to death - carried around a copy until it disintegrated.

[Tim Murray · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was so much better in my memory

[EmmmettSaltsman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eh, It's fine

[Nate · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nothing of interest. Just a very generic space story. Yawn.

[Robert Brockway · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favourite CYOA as a kid. Highly recommended.

[Caleb Garstecki · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hit me right in the childhood.

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the only CYOA I remember owning as a kid not because of the story or endings, but because I loved that spaceman's suit on the cover

[Alain del Risco · Rating 3 out of 5]

Paragraphs tend to be short per page, nevertheless, I enjoyed it.

[Tjoel2 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read December 2025

[Mateo R.]

* Figuras recurrentes: Extraterrestre.

[David Sarkies · Rating 2 out of 5]

Another space adventure
16 October 2012

Okay, this is the last of the Choose Your Own Adventure books that I am going to offer up a review on simply because I really do not know how many that I have read, and have probably started commenting on books which I haven't actually read. In reality it has been such a long time since I read any of these books, and because these books do not really constitute any essential knowledge that I actually need to retain, I have ended up flushing it out of my mind.
Now, I really don't want to talk about this book but rather about space exploration in an of itself. It is sad that I do not see as much human ingenuity actually going into attempting to establish proper space facilities to enable us to expand out into the solar system and to begin to utilise the resources that are available out there. Okay, I am doubtful that we will be able to find fossil fuels on any of the other planets that we visits, though it is interesting that I read an article about a planet made entirely of diamond (and for those who do not know, diamonds are derivatives of coal). However, there are many other resources, such as iron ore, that are likely to be available out there.
Some suggest problems with water, but as some moon probes have discovered there is actually water on the moon, though there may be difficulties actually extracting it. However, the fact that it is present means that it is not as necessary to transport water from Earth up there. Also, since we do have water recycling technology, this makes it easier to actually create a sustainable habitation up there. As for food, well food has a very good property in being able to multiply exponentially, and even then, we can turn vegetable waste, through composting methods, into good soil that can then be used to grow more food. As well we can also use hydroponic techniques to produce food.
Some might suggest that there are problems with energy supply, well solar power is more than possible, particularly since we don't need to worry about the weather. Also, I would be more inclined to consider nuclear power in space since a nuclear accident on the moon is not likely to be as problematic as it would be on Earth.
However, there is one big problem that needs to be addressed, and that is gravity. The fact that gravity on the moon is much less than on Earth, it means that people who live on the moon are going to have problems when they want to return to Earth. A spacestation would not pose that problem since one can start the station spinning so as to create artificial gravity, but that is not as possible on the moon since the moon's gravity is determined not by centrifical force, but rather by the mass of the object.
However the main problem (much more than the gravity problem) is the economic will power. People simply do not want to invest in things in which it will take a lot of time for the returns to generate. Our capitalist society is more interested in profit than it is in progress. The only reason the Americans ended up with a space program is because the Russians were beating them hands down. The Russians were not constrained by a profit motive which meant that they were able to funnel resources into a space program, which meant that the Americans were forced to do so as well. Maybe we need another superpower to begin doing this again to force the Americans to act (not that the Americans actually have any money).he Americans to act (not that the Americans actually have any money).

[Savion Stfleur · Rating 2 out of 5]

I know I rated this book 2/5 but it is still good. It is exciting makeing your turn from page to page but, I only turned 5 pages. The book is very descriptive especially when it described the way that I died when I gave the controls to the robot. The reason why I rate this book 2 stars is because I hated that it was so short and that I died a stupid death. I recommend this book to anyone who is not easily tempered, likes and adventure books and the final frontier.

[Petercsm730 · Rating 2 out of 5]

You're the commander and pilot of a Space Rescue Emergency Vehicle along with your only other passenger Henry, your computer. You'll encounter pirates, conspiracies, viruses, and alien artifacts (though not really any aliens). And good news for Pluto fans, it's a planet again in the 23rd century! They're also on Episode 42 of the Star Wars movies (though that's not necessarily good news...)

Space Patrol (Choose Your Own Adventure #22) by Julius Goodman reminds me of that minivan you get stuck behind that drives 10 miles under the speed limit but then (slowly) runs the red light. That's because there are times when the book seems to be in a rush to just get through one conflict so it can move onto another. And then other times it dwells on some minor plot point for many pages that goes nowhere at all. For example one path finds you having to decide the best way to approach a pirate spaceship. After making your decision it's quickly wrapped up in a couple of pages in an unconvincing (even for a CYOA book) manner. In fact in one rushed ending I was for some reason bluffing pirates that I had something called 'swamp virus' hidden in a hollow tooth! I certainly would've liked a choice on that one! And yet later on you waste a bunch of pages and choices because you used the term 'forget it' to your computer Henry and it leads to three (3!) endings. All of them dull. Actually, they're mostly non-endings. There are a lot of non-endings in this book, which is always a disappointment.

The art by Ralph Reese is detailed though some of the outfits look like old school Cylons mixed with Boba Fett.

Some other things I learned while reading this were:

1) That the symptoms of Venusian Swamp Fever are: 'Five minutes after contact the victim's temperature soars. After fifteen minutes his limbs fall off. After twenty-five minutes his body starts to expand until he is as round as a ball. Then he blows up, releasing trillions of viruses to infect other people.'
2) Barbeque is a synonym for rotate.
3) In the 23rd century we can race across the solar system in minutes but there are no prosthetic limbs for amputees.
4) At one point you tell your computer you don't have time to spy and the very next decision you make results in you.. spying.
5) A second chance ending leads to you realize you had stored all your knowledge of the universe in your big toe. So wear comfortable shoes.
6) The greatest scientific minds can't open an alien artifact gateway but you can with an exclamation of 'holy smokes'.

[Adam Duclos · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was one of my favorite Choose Your Own Adventure books from when I was in grade school. You were basically a space cop, hanging out in the solar system somewhere in your space ship with only your space ship's computer for company. Right from the start the entire story was up in the air. Depending on some super random decisions at the start of the story you could end up fighting pirates in orbit, taking down terrorists in the outer system, finding ancient alien artifacts and saving a ship full of people from a terrible space disease. Or, you could be shot and killed by pirates, get blown up by alien artifacts, caught by terrorists and used to grow fungus, or catch terrible space diseases... or caught by your own people accidentally and have your brain stuck in your toe. I might have mixed that last one up with the "Interplanetary Spy" book, but I swear, the Venusian Flu haunted me for a while when I was a kid!

Nope! Here's the toe!

http://youchosewrong.tumblr.com/post/...

And also:

http://youchosewrong.tumblr.com/post/...

[Caterpickles · Rating 4 out of 5]

What The Five-Year-Old thought: “It’s many different books but they are all put together and you flip to pages because the book says so. You make decisions and the book makes decisions about the pages you go to. I loved it! I loved the different story, different story, different story, different story, all the time it was a different story. It’s fun to have different stories every time.”

What Mommyo thought: “I loved these as a kid. And they are just as much fun as I remember now that it’s 30 years later and I’m reading them with The Five-Year-Old. So much fun to let her make her own decisions and reap the consequences of bad (or merely indifferent) choices. As a parent, I also appreciate the immediate feedback for the concept that all decisions have consequences. And that not all of those consequences are good or bad. Some of them simply completely change how your day plays out. The seemingly infinite contortions of the storyline based on The Five-Year-Old’s decisions means that even though we’ve been through the book 8 or 9 times, we don’t feel done with it yet. Great for road trips.”

[Shala Howell · Rating 5 out of 5]

What The Five-Year-Old thought: "It's many different books but they are all put together and you flip to pages because the book says so. You make decisions and the book makes decisions about the pages you go to. I loved it! I loved the different story, different story, different story, different story, all the time it was a different story. It's fun to have different stories every time."

What Mommyo thought: "I loved these as a kid. And they are just as much fun as I remember now that it's 20 years later and we're reading them with The Five-Year-Old. So much fun to let her make her own decisions and reap the consequences of bad (or merely indifferent) choices. The infinite contortions of the storyline based on those decisions means that even though we've been through the book 8 or 9 times, we don't feel done with it yet. As a parent, I also appreciate the immediate feedback for the concept that all decisions have consequences. And that not all of those consequences are good or bad. Some of them simply completely change how your day plays out."

[Mark Austin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ah, Choose Your Own Adventure, that paper bridge between that 5th grade fantasy map (see my Hobbit review) and my life-changing discovery of Dungeons & Dragons in the 7th grade.

Some of them were great, some punishing, some arbitrary, but they revealed to me for the first time that I could make choices and that they had immediate effect the course on my (fictional) reality. For a kid whose home life felt largely hopeless and inescapable, the empowerment of making my own way by the power of my own choices and facing consequences traceable directly to my decisions - wow!

While day-to-day reality seemed to deal out arbitrary, unpredictable punishments regardless of my actions, here was a place where I could experiment and learn and grow in safety and if I was punished there was always a why.

[Monica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Elige tu própia aventura más sci fi!..¡qué más se puede pedir!. Una aventura divertida, en la que eres un vigilante del espacio y te verás envuelto en miles de situaciones, algunas peligrosas y otras no tanto...motines, averías y rescates, niños perdidos, invasores, etc.. Julius Goodman es un autor muy parecido a Montgomery (siempre pensé que quizá era el mismo autor, bajo seudónimo), ya que dota de cuerpo y entidad a sus argumentos. Uno de los mejores libros de la serie, dentro de sus últimas publicaciones.