Abandoned by Booklikes

This is one book that was up for a group read on Goodreads Horror Aficionados group. So glad that I jumped in and got this book last minute. I really didn't want it to end. And even re-read a little bit of it today. Which of course led me to realize there were some "logic" issues, and oh yeah I still really hate one of the characters a lot more after the second read.

So first off I am going to start with the good and then just go into the bad.

The good:

This story rocks. For me, nothing makes me happier than a very good science fiction novel with some elements of horror in it. This book has that in spades. In fact, the horror elements really don't come out to play until almost the very end of the book, and for me, I didn't find them horror as much as I thought it was a nice nod back to Lovecraft who I like to read, but I also don't just lump in with horror as I do now when I think of "horror" books.

I loved each one of the characters (well not two of them) and thought the nice callback to The Scooby Gang and heck even Buffy the Vampire Slayer in parts was pretty awesome. I know that a lot of reviewers compared this book to the show LOST and I a still a bit baffled by that. Yes there is a central mystery that the characters are trying to solve, but no one was going around with a Messiah complex and or just generally being a jerk with love triangles all over the place.

The main character of this book, Nate is for all intents and purposes, our book's Shaggy/Fred hybrid. I really liked Nate. He is an ordinary guy, living a dead end job who doesn't know what he wants to do, but knows that his life as it is is just becoming tedious. Until he moves into the Kavach Building located in Los Angeles. With an unbelievable low amount of rent that includes utilities, Nate feels like his life may be making a turn for the better. Until he notices that his apartment is set up strangely, and that lights don't work very well in the kitchen, and there are mutant green cockroaches running around. From there, Nate starts to meet other renters that live in the Kavach Building. Running into his neighbors Veek and Xela they start to poke around the Kavach Building and bring into other neighbors, newly arrived publisher Tim, gif boy Robert, and husband and wife Debbie and Clive. From there we get the main crew in our Scooby Gang with some hanger ons included here and there.

The book keeps the mystery going for a really long while and I loved every bit of it. Once the characters start to realize the impact of certain things and words and the reader clues in as well, I was so happy.

The writing was great. I laughed a few times at the characters' dialogue with each other. They really did become a family in a way in just a few short weeks because of the mystery of the building they inhabited drawing them in. Though at times sometimes the writing became a bit clunky when someone was trying to explain something else to another character.

I thought the way the book ended was great, though a little too happy endings for me for the most part though. I don't see way that this book could have a sequel though, though for once, I could imagine this book becoming a movie or it's own television series. I was that engaged with it from beginning to end.


The not so good:

I just can't with the fact that as important as the Kavach Building is that anyone was allowed to inhabit it. Then again I think back on how The Dark Tower was set up and how the Turtle Corporation came to being and then I got it. It still made me roll my eyes a bit, but I don't want to spoil for other readers.

There are other logic issues that I had a lot of problems with. I mean is it cool to imagine stepping into a door that takes you elsewhere? Yes. But you can't tell me a door can do what this one was doing in this book.

I thought one of the characters was placed there specifically for how important the building was, but that seemed to go nowhere when we get to the ending.

One of the two characters I didn't like was a bad guy and the other one is one of the hero's of this book (Veek) and I hated her. Seriously. I am not down for any character slut shaming another female character because she's jealous of her and how maybe one of the other guys may like her. I was just over it. I felt like I opened up a New Adult freaking book anytime we got into this character's head. Hey fate of the world is up for grabs but you can just call this other woman a bitch? Whatever. I was sick of her and was hoping she would get taken out by the end of the book. And if it was just this female character she acted jealous of I would have said, okay, still a jerk, but I could have given her some leeway. But nope, she gets angry and jerky when another female character comes up with some answers based on some research she did. So pretty much because she doesn't feel happy with how she looks she tears down other women. Bah.

Other than these issues, I really did enjoy 14.