Mystery of the Maya by R.A. Montgomery
My rating: 1 of 5 stars
For this one, I made an attempt at crowdsourcing. I posted the decision points on a forum and asked people to help make the right decisions.
The story is about a dude who disappeared while doing some kind of reporting on Mayan temples.
So you go to check things out, you meet the requisite creepy guide who seems to know more than he’s letting on, and you immediately stumble on some kind of transporter beam taking people to a space ship.
You go into the beam, and here’s what the text says:
Gaining confidence, you step into the transporter beam and are carried up into the spacecraft. You hear nothing as you shoot up and away into the far reaches of the universe, to the planet Merganatic and the great Congress on Intergalactic Life. You wonder why the Mayan sites were chosen as contact points. Their brutal and complex society seems an odd choice for other planets. Who knows what lies ahead?
THE END
Okay. So in this “adventure” you make a few choices about which sites to check for your missing friend, then you go into a SPACESHIP, and that’s the end of the story.
Let me say that again. The story ENDS when you go into a spaceship and things get exciting and cool.
There was this thing Kurt Vonnegut said about writing, that you should start your stories as close to the end as possible. In a way, this story succeeded AND failed. Yes, it didn’t take long to get to the ending. But at the same time, I feel like the thing we’re calling the ending is really the beginning in this case.
I didn’t die. I also solved the mystery of the Maya, or A mystery of the Maya, I guess. But it was unsatisfying, to say the least. This book, it’s like if Star Wars started where it did, and then ended when the group decided to go and save Leia. You go through all the boring stuff, the moving characters around stuff, and just when it gets good, that’s when it’s like, “And then, what happened after that? Who knows? Use your imagination!”
Oh, I should also mention the cardinal sin, this book starts with an “It Was Only A Dream” moment. So it’s not that the whole story is bad, just the beginning AND the ending, and the stuff in the middle.