John Dies at the End by David Wong

STOP.
You should not have touched this book with your bare hands.
No, don't put it down. It's too late.
They're watching you.

My name is David Wong. My best friend is John. Those names are fake. You might want to change yours.

You might not want to know about the things you'll read on these pages, about the sauce, about Korrok, about the invasion, and the future. But it's too late. You touched the book. You're in the game. You're under the eye.

The only defense is knowledge. You need to read this book, to the end. Even the part with the bratwurst. Why? You just have to trust me.

THE IMPORTANT THING IS THIS:

• The drug is called soy sauce, and it gives users a window into another dimension.
• John and I never had the chance to say no.
• You still do.

Unfortunately for us, if you make the right choice, we'll have a much harder time explaining how to fight off the otherworldly invasion currently threatening to enslave humanity. I'm sorry to have involved you in this, I really am. But as you read about these terrible events and the very dark epoch the world is about to enter as a result, it is crucial you keep one thing in mind:

NONE OF THIS IS MY FAULT.

Um, yeah. It really draws you in, doesn't it? The old "stop, wait, don't do it" - which just guarantees that you will, of course, open the book and read it to the end. Which I did. And now I'm trying to determine just how I feel about said book.

The writing isn't bad, although at times this really does read a bit stream-of-consciousness-y. OK, let's be blunt: it rambles. There are also jumps forward in time that had me a bit confused, as well as wondering what really happened. There are a lot of characters on the canvas, and I had trouble keeping up with them.

The biggest problem I had with this novel is that I'm still not sure what happened. Very disappointing when you finish a 466 some page book only to realize you're still not sure who the bad guys were and what really happened. Plus there's no real ending, per se. It just sort of stops.

I read some reviews on Amazon, just to see if I was the only one who closed this sucker and went "Huh????" I'm not. In fact, it would appear that you either love this book or hate it with the passion of a thousand suns (or some such thing). I find myself sitting firmly on the fence. I really did like some of the characters, and as I said, I thought some of the writing itself was pretty good. Wong, or should I say, Jason Pargin (the author's real name), has a way with words. But I felt like there were way too many words for this story. Tighter editing might have kept the story line on track better, which might not have left me scratching my head as much.

I guess the best way to give a rating/review of this book is to let you know there's a sequel out. But I'm not interested in checking it out. And that, in my humble opinion, speaks volumes.