HAVE WORMHOLE, WILL TRAVEL - Tony McFadden

From waaaay back in my ARC queue...

Sabrina, Jackie, and Mandy are your typical, modern women who love to get together and catch up on what's happening in their lives. Right now they are talking about Callum and Jacob, two men who've caught their eyes - not just for their looks, but because something seems 'off' about them. After much debate and discussion, the women are convinced that Callum and Jacob are vampires.

Once finally confronted, though, the men admit that they aren't 'normal' men, but they are not vampires.  They are aliens. They have been sent to watch over the Earth (just as other operatives have been sent to other developing planets) and its intelligent life and to report back to their planet when the life is capable of interstellar travel.

It happens that in a lab at a university in Australia, the phenomenon known as wormholes has now been artificially created.  Tests are still underway, but the creative team behind the wormholes has made great strides and they believe that they can control the wormholes well enough that man can travel to distant planets.

This is not good news, however, as it means that the Earth and mankind will be obliterated by Callum and Jacob's race. Unless, that is, Callum can convince his people that Earth is worth saving.

This seemed like a decent concept and there are a few good things here.  The dialog feels quite natural and the stakes are high.  But that's about all I can say that's positive.

The dialog does feel natural, but natural isn't always best for fiction.  We don't need a lot of 'extra' dialog just to showcase a writer's ability.  We need to move the story forward. We spend way too much time trying to set up the idea that Callum and Jacob are vampires.  I'm not sure of the purpose of this.  Are we, the readers, supposed to believe this and then be surprised? That doesn't work.

We never get enough background on, well, anything. Who really are Callum and Jacob?  Aliens, okay, but from where? If their people are going to wipe out the Earth wouldn't it be good, as a reader, to get to know a little more about them?  

The idea that the fate of billions of people rests on one alien convincing his far-away planet that earth is worth saving lends this to be a bit of a space opera and borderline comic, which is fine, but we still need more information.

We also spend a little more time on the process of the wormhole.  It's start out this way, and I thought I was going to get a pretty good sci-fi story, but then we left that to follow the 'vampire' story, which turns out to be something completely different.

All in all, this book just doesn't work.

Looking for a good book? Have Wormhole, Will Travel by Tony McFadden struggles to decide what kind of book it is. 

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.

2 stars

* * * * * *

Have Wormhole, Will Travel

author: Tony McFadden

publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

ISBN: 9781491272015

paperback, 277 pages

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