I throughly enjoyed the debut novel by Martin Singer entitled Gravity Gone - The Stone Mystery. The novel follows Ray and Tessa on a great adventure that combines science, mystery and a murder. I look forward to the next installment on what I hope will be a long series. ( )

This book needs to go through another few rounds of editing before it is ready for publication.

While the base story is OK, interactions between characters are stiff and awkward -- particularly between Tessa and Ray. They really don't seem to know each other well and constantly seem on the verge of a fight. Sommers & Fitz seem a little too off as well. Their actions don't seem to match their ascribed motivations at the end.

Additionally, there are nearly continuous grammar issues, broken sentence fragments and stilted character and setting descriptions. Many times the grammatical tense or POV will shift mid-sentence. Most of this should easily be correctable with another editing pass or two by a skilled editor.

The base story is OK, but the first half of the book suffers from slow pacing. I will give Martin credit for avoiding the trap of always having the characters make the stupidest decision possible in order to raise the stakes. The pacing picks up for the final third of the book, but the post-climax wrapup also falls a bit flat and needs to be tightened up.

I was also confused a bit by the inclusion of Uranium in the Fusion reactor description in the Prologue. While a bit of technological handwaving is expected in the genre, Fusion only works on elements below Iron in the periodic table so calling out an element at the other end seems threw my suspension of disbelief. ( )

Review of eBook

In 1977, the massive failure of the Magnetic Mirror Fusion test at Laubner Labs in Palo Alto California puts an end to the ultra-expensive cost of development. All the materials from the test site were collected, including some bluish-green stones, and sent to the storage site.

Years later, Ray Holland, an electrical engineer at Laubner Labs, acquires some of the unusual stones and develops an experiment called GG-1. But testing the GG-1 is not his top priority as he is about to marry Tessa Holmes. And, to complicate matters, two FBI agents begin poking around; Ray and Tessa have no idea why they are there.

After the wedding, Tessa and Ray get ready to test the GG-1. However, they find themselves ducking the persistent FBI agents who switch from investigating an accident at Chemco where Tessa once worked, turning their investigations to Ray and his experiments. And then Victor Mishkin pops up to question Tessa about her husband’s work.

Who is Mishkin and why is he so interested in Ray’s work? And what brought the FBI agents to the Hollands’ doorstep?

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With well-developed, believable characters and a strong sense of place, the mystery here is intriguing; the plot, filled with twists and turns, keeps the reader guessing. As the unfolding story pulls the reader into the Hollands’ lives, their ways of dealing with the intrusions into their lives are both clever and fascinating; many of their decisions are made while deciding what and where to eat. Somehow, however, it all comes together in a page-turning narrative that keeps readers invested in the telling of the tale.

There’s an undercurrent of urgency running throughout the story as questions mount about the FBI agents and Victor Mishkin plays cat and mouse with Ray and Tessa. Readers who enjoy a bit of science with their mystery will find much to appreciate here; most of the story threads are neatly tied up, but readers are likely to want to know what happens with Ray’s experiments. Might there be a second book?

Highly recommended.

I received a free copy of this book through the LibraryThing Early Readers program and am leaving this review voluntarily. ( )