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A review by sreddous
Vortex on Vertu Prime (The Portal Adventures) by Andrew J. Harvey
adventurous
emotional
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
The most engaging thing about this book is the plot -- this has a really really creative sci-fi plot! It’s super interesting to see the "future consequences" of a character’s actions really come back to haunt them. This is a mature and well-detailed book especially for middle-grade readers, and I believe that younger readers will feel respected by the more-complicated details while overall this still has genre- and age-appropriate topics and tones.
There’re some pretty cute quotations that make this sci-fi world feel grounded – stuff like "Edward looked as though he wanted to stamp his foot, not something that was advisable in zero-g." made me chuckle out loud! This has a really fun overall tone.
If I could say there's one thing I wish was different, it's that in general there's too much dialogue, in my opinion. This seems to be a trend especially in the beginning and middle -- a lot of things happen in the first chapter really through dialogue, especially once we meet the mom, and I found myself confused. Then we get a little too much dialogue once we first arrive at the station too, and they’re talking about food and such – while I definitely want people to talk about day-to-day things like food, I think it’d be more interesting to have more exposition describing what Tania is seeing and feeling to really get us ‘onto the base with her’. A time I found myself feeling 'disconnected' is around page 100, where Edward is starting to blame himself for things that have happened – Tania is the POV character in that section, but these scenes are so important and so plot-driving that it made me wish Edward was the POV character in these scenes, to make his realizations more emotionally engaging. Windracer and Mark get some POV chapters, but I found myself wishing that more chapters/scenes were Edward’s! Basically, I think a little more exposition instead of direct dialogue wouldn't have slogged down the plot and would have made things more immersive.
Overall, this is a fun experience, a really creative sci-fi premise!
There’re some pretty cute quotations that make this sci-fi world feel grounded – stuff like "Edward looked as though he wanted to stamp his foot, not something that was advisable in zero-g." made me chuckle out loud! This has a really fun overall tone.
If I could say there's one thing I wish was different, it's that in general there's too much dialogue, in my opinion. This seems to be a trend especially in the beginning and middle -- a lot of things happen in the first chapter really through dialogue, especially once we meet the mom, and I found myself confused. Then we get a little too much dialogue once we first arrive at the station too, and they’re talking about food and such – while I definitely want people to talk about day-to-day things like food, I think it’d be more interesting to have more exposition describing what Tania is seeing and feeling to really get us ‘onto the base with her’. A time I found myself feeling 'disconnected' is around page 100, where Edward is starting to blame himself for things that have happened – Tania is the POV character in that section, but these scenes are so important and so plot-driving that it made me wish Edward was the POV character in these scenes, to make his realizations more emotionally engaging. Windracer and Mark get some POV chapters, but I found myself wishing that more chapters/scenes were Edward’s! Basically, I think a little more exposition instead of direct dialogue wouldn't have slogged down the plot and would have made things more immersive.
Overall, this is a fun experience, a really creative sci-fi premise!