Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Review: Shovel Ready by Adam Sternbergh #Giveaway



Title: Shovel Ready (Spademan #1)
Author:
Adam Sternbergh
Publisher: Crown (Random House)
Release Date: January 14, 2014
Acquired Via:
Publisher

The futuristic hardboiled noir that Lauren Beukes calls “sharp as a paper-cut” about a garbage man turned kill-for-hire.

Spademan used to be a garbage man. That was before the dirty bomb hit Times Square, before his wife was killed, and before the city became a blown-out shell of its former self.

Now he’s a hitman.

In a near-future New York City split between those who are wealthy enough to “tap in” to a sophisticated virtual reality, and those who are left to fend for themselves in the ravaged streets, Spademan chose the streets. When his latest client hires him to kill the daughter of a powerful evangelist, he must navigate between these two worlds—the wasteland reality and the slick fantasy—to finish his job, clear his conscience, and make sure he’s not the one who winds up in the ground.


My Review

Shovel Ready has put me in a really weird position, bloggerwise. I received a copy of it months ago to review, and I started reading it immediately. I was taken with the protagonist, Spademan, and I wanted to see more of the dark, dirty world he was in the more I read. That being said, the writing style was strange, so I took my time with it. (Don't go in looking for quotation marks.)

Anywho, I would take breaks from the book as I read it. The time spent between readings usually consisted of me comparing Shovel Ready to Escape from L.A.. There were so many parallels, except for the virtual reality part. I think. It's been a long time since I've seen the movie. Then the length of time between readings lengthened to the point where I stopped entirely. I don't even know where the book is anymore.

I'll give Shovel Ready - I was on track to love it. It showed a lot of promise. Now however many months later, I'm mostly giving up hope on it. I highly recommend giving it a chance if it's your thing because my friends have loved it. You should definitely read it if you like Snake Plissken - Spademan is a dead ringer for him.

- DNF -

Buy Links
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Book Depository | Fishpond



Giveaway

Due to an error at the publisher, I was sent two copies of Shovel Ready. They were kind enough to give me the go-ahead to give one of them to a lucky winner here at Bibliophilia, Please. So do your thing on the Rafflecopter form below.

Enter to win a hardcover copy of Shovel Ready!
US ONLY
Ends at 12:01am CST on March 1st

a Rafflecopter giveaway
To satisfy FTC guidelines, I am disclosing that I received a copy of the novel through Blogging for Books from Penguin Random House in exchange for an unbiased review. It has in no way affected the outcome. All expressed opinions are awesome, honest, and courtesy of me.

6 comments:

  1. I haven't read this author/book yet and it sounds intriguing!!! Thanks for the awesome spotlight!

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  2. I have not read the book. What interests me is that it is futuristic, and the story sounds great.

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  3. haven't read it; the garbage man part

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  4. Haven't read it. Not sure it's my kind of book but I'd like to sample it, anyway, thanks.

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  5. Sorry I haven't read the book yet but I am interested in it because of the futuristic and noir aspect of it and I do love futuristic books. Thanks for the great giveaway

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  6. Well I haven't read it. It's kinda out of my Normal Genre, but I read almost everything and this sounds good.

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You are going to put words in my box?! *squeezes you* Now I shall stalk YOUR blog!