But for the heroine's icktastic backstory. (Also having a teen come along that was in a similar (but less gross) situation was a little too on the nose.) And my not really feeling that the hero and heroine had much of a relationship beyond sex. It wasn't as bad as other books, there was a bit more talking and they had chemistry, but let's just say that all of the "this is more than sex" declarations both made read as protesting too much like other books I've pointed out in the past. I must praise the sex scenes though! No cringe-inducing euphemisms. They were clear and most of them were of a judicious length—not too long. (Except one where there was a confusing chapter break in the middle.) I'm still flirting with making the rating a three instead of that half. We'll see.

I'm not calling this a DNF right now for whatever reason. I can't explain it. I think I want to see what happens with other parts of the story, and I like the hero, but I just can't deal with this shit now. I'm yelling at the book and making wild hand gestures and it's just stressing me the hell out.

The ex dickbag showed up and she let him stay, too. He has now declared that they aren't leaving until things are better between Ro and her sister. Because she's pregnant and deserves to enjoy this time in her life or whatever the fuck. AND SHE LETS HIM SAY THIS SHIT AND AGREES TO SIT DOWN WITH THEM AGSGDHWNDJCNCSKSNCIEWMNSCOWICNEGANI!!!!!!!!! WHAT IS THAT?! And this one is even worse because the sister is a straight up asshole all around. I mean, even more than you have to be to do this kind of thing to your own sister.

Who knows if I'll ever be able to deal with this. Because I frigging hate this so much. Every time. WHY DO ROMANCE AUTHORS THINK WE WANT TO READ THIS CRAP?? Why is this a continuous trope? Why do heroines ALWAYS forgive? 

DO ANY OF YOU APPRECIATE THAT?! DO YOU?

That's a real question, because I have to know who actually likes reading a heroine getting shit on and then forgiving and forgetting because that's super cool or whatever the hell.

The sister has shown up unannounced, it has not even been a full page and I'm ready to set everything on fire. Remember this is the sister who married the heroine's, Ro's, finance while she was at war. Hobag sister has already bitched at Ro for cutting her out of her life. Said she needs to get over it, because she's pregnant with ex-dickbag's baby (his name is Dick, but it's just so apt in many ways). Bitched about where Ro lives being 'so far from civilization'. And demanded Ro let her in . . . AND SHE DID.

Nope. NOPE. If Ro just accepts this and helps this idiot out I swear to God it's DNF time. I don't have the patience for this even though I've had this book on my TBR forever and the author will be at the reader luncheon next month.

No, that was Contact. That movie was annoying as hell.

I can't say the alien situation in this book was all that much better.

There is a lot that's enjoyable about Kline's writing. Even with sucky first person and all. He may be headed into overkill with the pop culture references but they are still fun references. And Wil Wheaton's narration is just plain great. He's not the best with accents, unfortunately, but he brings a lot to the characters and sound effects, etc.

There is a lot of preamble before the story actually gets going. It takes place over two days and a lot happens so some of hat beginning could have been cut to get into the action quicker and give more time to areas that need it.

The biggest problem with this book is plausibility. Obviously it's SF/F so you have to suspend disbelief. That's not the problem because everything you question about the alien backstory our protagonist, Zach, questions as well. Still, lampshading something that doesn't make sense without resolution doesn't make it better. It's like when Supernatural admitted to jumping the shark with Papa Winchester's third son in the title of the episode. That doesn't make it okay!!

At the end when

Well, okay, good. But that still leaves the reader in a state of WTF!? at the end. I also had a problem with Zach being allowed to make a choice for everyone.

Also, of course, I really hated what went down with

Sorry this review isn't as helpful to you if you don't want to read spoilers. It's just one of those times it's impossible to talk around what happens.

There are definitely fun aspects to the story but I didn't enjoy it as much as I did Ready Player One.

Only a few pages into this book and it's not going well already. Our heroine was just perfectly okay with her fiancé having married someone else while she was deployed and breaking up with her after. Yes, it's probably true that in the end this is the best thing as they didn't really belong together, but that doesn't negate the betrayal and unmitigated assholery it takes to do something like that. Yet she was even apologizing for not being enough!!

She did, at least, get pissed off when she found out the woman her fiancé married was her sister. 

But good lord, am I going to have to sit through another bullshit forgiveness storyline here? Probably, because she'll come to terms with it like all the others especially since she wasn't initially pissed off at the fiancé. Siiiiigh. I hate that.

*hopes she'll be pleasantly surprised anyway*