This is an Action Comedy that takes readers from the ridiculous to the more ridiculous without pausing to catch our breaths. It is smoothly written, creatively conceived, and thoroughly enjoyable.

At the beginning the humour takes the stage, with most of it concentrated on the characters. It’s the style of story that starts with several separate groups of people and follows their paths until they intersect. During this part, the action moves slowly due to the necessary (and entertaining) character description.

Once the characters are up and running, the plotline takes over to get them thoroughly enmeshed in each other’s lives. This takes a fair amount of creativity as well, moving into “almost unbelievable” at times. But it’s comedy, so what the heck.

Then the characters all come to a crashing conflict with each other, and the action takes over. Once again, nobody wants the facts to get in the way of a good story (a trebuchet with a 70-foot arm is a star), and things really get going. Off the rails, as it happens.

Coincidence piles on top of a very loose sense of Geography (They fly across the whole of Europe and Asia in “several hours” in a two-engine Flying Boxcar) and characters switch alliances and personalities at the whim of the plot.

A Harrison Ford-Anne Heche-type winter-summer romance anchors the character arcs. These two characters are pretty much the only sane people in the whole story, so we bond closely with them. They’re not super realistic, but they’re great fun.

I haven’t had a better read in a long time.

(5 / 5)