Adam Rowan

4.8 stars...THE CRYSTALLINE CRUCIBLE is a treat. Reviewers spend a lot of time thinking of kind ways to say "Only a few people will like this book"; it gives us great pleasure to discover the books that deserve to be reprinted and probably made into movies. This work of comic fiction is one of them.

Max is not a typical case of Asperger's Syndrome but he's definitely an eccentric genius. He has friends, cares very much about people and causes, but has peculiar taste and uses it to push people away. He has a labor job at a grocery store. He needs extra money so, when we meet him, he's breaking the tusk off the stuffed mammoth in the museum as part of a treasure hunt game. If he finds the treasure he can keep the neighborhood library open.

His best friend and quiz show teammate, Rosie, has tried to discourage his treasure hunting, but finds herself joining the game when she's laid off from her job as a preschool math teacher because a greedy corporation wants to do something more lucrative with the building.

Also on their team are Rosie's boyfriend Brad (he and Max don't like to admit they're jealous, so they just dislike each other intensely) and Khalil, who is only in their small town because he's in trouble--being blackmailed into working for a criminal gang. Max never does like other young men. By the time the story's over, however, he'll claim one of these two as his best friend "after Rosie." As the treasure hunting competition, the quiz show competition, and the gang's activities heat up, they'll save each other's lives at their own risk, and, though opposite in temperament, they will bond.

I laughed out loud on average once to a chapter. In the final analysis the plot is serious, but the characters--especially Max--are comedy characters, each one exaggerating a trait to the point of absurdity. One-line witticisms abound. Characters move around enough, and enough cars are driven too fast and enough things blow up, to give the story comedy film potential. I'm not sure whether one of the stunts would work in real life, but it's the sort of thing that ought to work in comedy.

Anyone who enjoys comedy should read this one. It's heartwarming at the end with laughter all the way.

I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.… (meer)