This book is a mixture of “The Martian” “John Carter from Mars” and some generic fantasy/sci-fi tropes. The pacing is strange in places, and the narration is flat: the guy just can’t do voices.
To be honest, I probably shouldn’t have liked this book as much as I did. But it was *fun.* In terms of recent releases (stuff out in the past 2 years), this book had some REALLY fun plot twists and turns, a protagonist who, while super-competent, isn’t *totally broken*, and some great nods to other books in the genre. One character is named “Grok.” Heh.
Look, if you can get past the narrator’s monotone and the shallow characterizations, this book is SUPER fun. As brain candy, it’s a solid 4.