Justin Sirois

I hate to give independents 1-star reviews, but this book is the worst. To be honest I forced myself to read up to page 200 and then skimmed it from there (about another 150 pages).

Let's start with the good stuff. It's ambitious. There are a couple neat ideas. There's some really nice art.

I believe the copy I have is a "new combined" edition, a really nice-looking hardcover. But the interior layout is a disaster. There's basically no page layout. It's as if a text file was just loaded in. There will be a title for a paragraph or section at the bottom of a page and then the body text on the next page. There are charts that are cut in half with one line on one page and the rest on another page. There's so much white space that the book could have been half the number of pages that it is. There are grammatical errors and cut and paste errors, the maps are extremely basic and ugly.

On to the actual story. The world doesn't seem to be Earth, but then then Catholicism seems to be referenced a lot as well as ancient languages from Earth. Those anachronistic elements distracted me constantly as I wondered what world it was and how these things fit together. Then there was all the sex stuff, which just seemed like it was edgy for the sake of edginess. The adventure seemed to be setup to railroad characters through a story and many of the encounters seemed like pointless grinding, though some were pretty original.

So yeah, this definitely didn't work for me.… (plus d'informations)

[b: So Say the Waiters|23006140|So Say the Waiters, Book 1 Episodes 1-5 (So Say the Waiters #1)|Justin Sirois|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1408705040s/23006140.jpg|21858021] has been on my radar for years, but only now have I tracked it down and read it. It's been such a long wait that I can honestly no longer recall just what it was about this book that initially got me to put it on my to be read pile - but whatever it was, I was happy to go into the book with no clear notion of what to expect. The ignorance allowed me to approach this book without preconceived notions, and man, was it a fun ride that I was in for.

The basic premise of his book, that there is an app called KidnApp that allows you to be kidnapped within 48 hours of submitting an application, is one that seems eerily plausible. It's just to the side of what currently exists, but the ramifications for people peering into your life, the lack of privacy, etc. all have a nice parallel in day to day life. The book reads like a more updated [b: Fight Club|5759|Fight Club|Chuck Palahniuk|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1357128997s/5759.jpg|68729], but minus the misogyny. While the book has typos that need to be brushed up and the writing might do with a once-over the seeds of something great are all there - and the concept alone makes finishing the trilogy (?) worthwhile in my book.

I eagerly look forward to what's done next with this property. It'd make a killer television show, and I'm glad it's been optioned. The concept, the characters, the setting... it's all there and ready to be something great.… (plus d'informations)

Since there is no time-lag between installments, this review is for all three books in the So Say the Waiters 'trilogy'; a story that revolves around the world of consensual kidnapping.

Henry is a government employee whose job is suffering due to financial troubles resulting from his recent split with his fiancee. Dani is a tattooed rocker-chick bartender that participates in the KidnApp community. She is building her reputation as a 'waiter' - someone who waits for a kidnapper to grab them and fulfill the wishes they outlined in their app profile. Henry, (who starts off as an annoyingly whiny and weak-willed character), just happened to go to school with one of the co-founders of KidnApp and is invited to work for the company with an eye toward a management position. First, he will need to build his reputation as a Taker. His first take, coincidentally, happens to be Dani. However, someone else snags her first so Henry ends up rescuing her instead of taking her. From their first meeting, they build a partnership that will take them places neither one ever imagined.

While the story has some issues with pacing and continuity, the overall concept is cool and the implementation is eminently readable. For a self-published work, there are surprisingly few typos and there is adequate back-story to keep things interesting as the story progresses. In fact, Sirois imagines a pre-internet network of Takers & Waiters that operated using a much more... analog system of communicating. Seemingly far-fetched, it still plays pretty well within the scope of the narrative and leads directly to the development of the mobile app used by the KidnApp community. It also provides a workable background for the development of Haymaker, the antagonist character.

At the time I am writing this review, books 1 & 2 are free for Kindle while book 3 is $4.99. All three books, (which is really one book), for $5.00 is a fair price in my opinion.… (plus d'informations)