A sci-fi thriller set in the near future: 2048, to be exact. Mars has been visited, and it's time for humanity to build a permanent base there for the ease of future astronauts. But how to do it? Robots are expensive and prone to breaking down, whereas human labor is even more expensive and when they break down there's likely to be lawsuits from family members. Xenosystems Operations, the company who has contracted with NASA to build the base, hits on the perfect solution: convict labor. After all, it's not like they can escape; they'll be on fucking Mars, and there's not a lot of spare oxygen or rocket ships for them to steal. XO runs a private prison in California (named Panopticon; subtle, Morden), so all they have to do is select a team of seven people with life-sentences who are willing to serve the rest of their time on Mars, give them a few months of training, and send them on a one-way journey – even once the base is built, they'll be a need for maintenance and janitorial services, since astronauts have more important things to do than unclog drains or charge batteries. In exchange, the prisoners get work they can be proud of and a bit more freedom in their daily lives.

Frank is our narrator and main character. Sentenced to life for murdering his son's drug dealer, Frank is a former construction worker, an obviously useful background. He and his team of six other prisoners, each with their own specialities (transportation, plumbing, electricity, computers, hydroponics, and a doctor), plus an XO employee to be their guard/boss, quickly find out that XO has cut every possible corner to save money. They have no redundant supplies in case of wear or mishap; broken or missing necessary parts; barely enough food to get them through; problems with producing their own oxygen, water, and power; and not enough training for emergencies. Unsurprisingly, this quickly starts to take its toll, and people die in easily preventable accidents. Except by the third death, Frank suspects that they're not just accidents – someone on the team is deliberately murdering the others. He has no one he trusts, help from Earth is months away, and in the harsh environment of Mars the smallest mistake can kill, so Frank is left to figure out the murderer by himself before he's the next victim.

Morden is an excellent writer of tension; there's several wonderfully dramatic scenes involving characters in spacesuits running out of time on their oxygen supplies that were heart-pounding and thrilling. Unfortunately he's not a great author of mysteries. The murderer is SUPER obvious, so much so that it makes Frank look dumb for taking so long to figure it out. At the point where Frank discovers a bunch of empty oxycontin packets around the murderer's bed and <i>still</i> doesn't think it might be him, I had to groan out loud. (Of course, being a drug addict doesn't make one a murderer, except that this is totally the kind of book where it does.) I also had problems with Morden's science writing; I think he expects his average reader to know more about space than I, at least, do. There was a lot of techno-jargon I didn't know, and I never could manage to picture what the base Frank and the others built was supposed to look like.

On the other hand, I am highly predisposed to like a book that's this critical of the use of convict labor for corporate profit, and the excerpts scattered throughout of XO's private communications really make it clear how far down the path of evil a bit of greed and pure capitalism can get you. Hooray for a nice dose of contemporary politics in my escapist reading!

I do want to note – because I didn't know before reading it – <i>One Way</i> is not a stand-alone. A sequel is due out soon. Nonetheless, <i>One Way</i> ends at a good point, with almost all of the plot threads wrapped up. You won't feel like you've gotten only half of the story if you read this book alone.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2400736863

One Way is obviously trying to capitalize on the renaissance of Mars fiction, but if I had to liken it to an Andy Weir novel, it wouldn’t be The Martian —it has more in common with Artemis . This is a story of survival on Mars, yes, but it’s also a mystery wrapped up in corporate intrigue. S.J. Morden starts by asking what might happen if we sent convicts to construct a Mars base … and then what might happen if someone started killing them all off. There are certainly some intriguing ideas here, but in general I wasn’t greatly enthusiastic about this one. Thanks to NetGalley and Orbit for the eARC of this novel.

Frank is serving a life sentence for murder. When the parent company of the company that owns his prison offers him a chance to serve the rest of his sentence on Mars, he decides to accept. Little does he know that he’s getting into a training regimen that has a life in supermax at the end of it if he flunks out. And when he does make it to Mars, the rest of his fellow crew mates start dying mysteriously one by one. Can Frank find the killer, and stop them, in time? Or is he doomed to die on Mars well before his time?

As far as protagonists go, Frank is all right, I guess. Morden tries to give us a sympathetic character: Frank is in prison because he killed his son’s drug dealer. He’s a man who knows that what he did is considered unacceptable, but he did it anyway, and he does not regret that if it saved his son’s life. Throughout the novel, we’re supposed to see that Frank’s strong moral compass sets him apart from the other convicts. Frank has made his peace with his situation, and that’s what allows him to keep it together throughout the vicious training regime and beyond. Still, Frank seems rather one-dimensional beyond this part of his character. We don’t learn much about him as a person other than his former occupation and a bit of his family life. Morden tries to allude to how Frank’s time inside has changed him, made him slightly harder and warier—but all of that feels stereotypical, shorthand familiar to anyone with a movie/TV/book view of what prisons are like.

The first part of the book, with the preparations for going to Mars, was pretty fascinating for me. I liked watching Frank and his fellow crew undergo their training. I liked seeing their struggle, the way they slowly started to work together, the way Morden sets up the antagonism with Brack. It’s the second part, on Mars itself, when One Way shifts into mystery mode, that Morden starts to lose me.

It’s just not a very compelling mystery. So people start dying. The suspects are few, and while it might not be obvious who is doing it right at first, it also doesn’t feel … urgent. This is compounded by the reveal towards the end about the role of the company in the mystery (I’m not going to spoil it). In general, this dimension of One Way underdelivers. As someone who enjoys mysteries, that’s a little disappointing, and I certainly wouldn’t pick up this book based solely on that promise. If you like Mars stories, then sure, there might be something for you here—but somehow I don’t think it will be enough.

Creative Commons BY-NC License

Eight convicts, one job, and a one-way ticket to Mars. Frank Kittridge is serving time for killing his son’s drug dealer, thus, only being eligible for parole in 85 years. He’s keeping his head down and staying out of everyone’s business until Xenosystems Operations operatives visit Frank in jail giving him an opportunity of a life time, a one way trip to Mars, to build the first ever correctional facility in space. Once him and the seven other convicts build the prison, they will serve the remainder of their sentence in outer space. Frank and his team embark on the adventure and everything seems to be going relatively well, until one by one the convicts start turning up dead. With their supplies dwindling and his friends being murdered, Frank has nowhere to go and no option to hide.

The premise of this novel was amazing and it was something unique in the book community, but for me, it seemed that was about it for this book. The plot came across as lacklustre, and the characters were one-dimensional.

The novel seemed like it needed more editing before its release. If some of the grammatical errors were part of a style of writing that was supposed to add more to the story line, it went straight over the my head as the reader. Half of the time I was distracted by the errors and not paying attention to the story (or lack there of).

“Big set of panels, dish, antennae. Other machinery he didn’t yet know the function of” (Mordern 36).

This quotation doesn’t seem like a major flaw in writing, but it seems short, incomplete, and grammatically incorrect sentences were a regular throughout Morden’s work, giving off the impression of a juvenile narrator, which was not the case here.

Frank Kittridge was a one-dimensional character, there were glimpses into his past and how all he wanted in life was a happy family, however that was it. I wished we learnt more about the other characters and the burden of their crimes—Alice, a doctor, serving time for multiple doctor assisted suicides, was the most interesting in my opinion. She was a strong, smart, woman who deserved more than the one-dimensional perception the book gave her.

This novel is considered a sci-fi mystery, which is relatively true. There is a murderer amongst the team (well, many if you include why the convicts are in prison to begin with) which gives off a “who dunnit” feel, however, that’s all that really happens in the book. People are dying but it was so glazed over and not emphasised in the dialogue that honestly, it felt like nothing happened during the whole 358 pages.

Unfortunately, One Way was a major let down for me. The blurb for this novel sounded like a sci-fi novel mixed with Agatha Christie except that couldn’t be farther from the truth.

To save money, a group of prisoners with the needed skills, and life sentences, become the Mars crew. They are tasked with getting the habs ready for NASA. But can they work together and overcoming the many obstacles? Told from the perspective of one of the prisoners, Frank, this is a really interesting book. The only negative for me was the very end.

A fish nor foul mash up of hard-ish sci-fi and crime thriller that doesn't really satisfy on either front; it's super plot driven, as is most of these genres, so a reader can expect some for real exposition and little believable dialogue. I think, for me, where this falls down is the sort of foreboding email extracts/memos that begin the chapters. It just made me think the author couldn't handle multiple narratives rather than, "Oooooh, SABOTAGE!". Honestly, though, this would probably make a great limited series on SyFy.

Mars has always been identified as the next frontier for space exploration, and in recent years the interest toward the red planet increased exponentially, with the probability of a manned mission drawing closer and closer. It's no surprise then that genre literature turned again its focus on the colonization of Mars as humanity's next step toward building a new home away from our birthplace: One Way is one such story, and since it's based on Mars it does of course address the vital theme of survival in a hostile environment, but it adds an interesting premise and twist.

It's no secret that a manned mission toward another planet, and the construction of a scientific and residential base there, require not only careful planning and anticipating any kind of danger the astronauts might face, but also a huge budget that must provide for anything the exploring team might need to survive and thrive. One Way postulates that NASA would sub-contract the actual building of the base to Xenosystems Operations, a private corporation whose CEOs decide that the best way to make the operation profitable while keeping the costs down would be to send convicts to Mars as a workforce. Enter our main character, Frank Kittridge, sentenced to life imprisonment for murder: Frank, like the other six convicts who will constitute his team, is given a choice between languishing in prison until he dies or doing something constructive with his time - once on Mars he will still be a prisoner (after all, where would he escape to?), but he will get the opportunity of redeeming himself through work.

The group of detainees is put through some training (I'll come back to this in a short while) and sent to Mars in suspended animation together with a guard who will supervise their work. Once reached their destination, though, the work gang discovers that not all the necessary supplies are there, and that they have to face a few dangerous treks across the Martial soil to retrieve them, and what they have does not exactly respect the required quality standards. Which is not at all surprising when any kind of Evil Corporation is involved… That's not their biggest problem anyway, because one by one the convicts start dying in freak accidents, and it soon becomes clear that there is a killer in their midst, bent on eliminating them one by one.

As far as premises go, this is an intriguing one - even though it would have been preferable if the theme of the killer eliminating the inmates one by one had come as a surprise and not as a blurb revelation - but unfortunately it did not prevent me from being somewhat disappointed with the overall story, or the characterization.

For starters, Frank and his companions are given only a very basic training in the kind of challenges they will face once on Mars, or in the way they must operate the equipment: granted, their mission is on a restricted budget, and we learn from the memos interspersed between chapters that XO is trying to cut every possible corner, but still it seems counter-productive to send insufficiently trained people in a situation where the slightest mistake, or lack of proper knowledge, can kill them. It's clear they are expendable, and no one can ignore this simple fact - not even the convicts themselves - but still they are being sent to build a base where astronauts and scientists (people that certainly are considered more valuable) will need to live, and survive: if the "cannon fodder" is unable to provide a safe environment for the second wave of colonists, what will the outcome be? It made little sense to me that NASA would rely so heavily - and blindly! - on such a crooked arrangement without checking regularly on their progress…

Once the dead bodies start to pile up, there is no surprise in discovering that they are not accidents (we were informed of this from the very start, remember?), so there is no room for doubt, since the first tragic "accident", that something is indeed afoot, and that one of the other seven people on Mars must be responsible - except for Frank, of course, because the story is told from his point of view, and we know he's not the murderer. In my opinion, this choice further detracts from the building of suspense, because we readers know that our p.o.v. character was not involved in any of the deaths: observing the events from a remote perspective, or turning Frank into an unreliable narrator, would have increased the tension and made the murder mystery less predictable.

The characters - with the exception of Frank, who enjoys a little more depth than the others - range from the bland to the stereotype, without reaching any greater definition, and ultimately look like mere props set there to move the story along: we have the sharp-tongued doctor with a dark shadow over her past, who is far more caring than her acerbic demeanor shows; there is the young tech wiz who can do miracles with a keyboard and couple of power cords; the big man covered in threatening tattoos who is revealed as the gentlest soul on the planet; and so on… And then there is Brack, the guard sent to keep the convicts in line: there could be no more obtusely mean creature in the whole Solar System, and he's such a distillate of the worst one could find among prison guards and/or drill sergeants, that he ends up being a caricature rather than a character.

Despite these misgivings, I kept on reading because One Way is still an entertaining story once the Inner Critic is temporarily moved aside, and the final section of the novel finally gains the momentum and the thrill that it sorely needed, closing with an open ending that could go either way and that opens the door to a sequel. Is it enough to motivate me to look for it? Maybe. I would not mind visiting Mars again and seeing what happens next…

A New Twist on a Space Murder Mystery

4.5 out of 5 stars

One Way has been on my radar for some time - I ended up picking this book up to read (non-requested review) which I have very little time for anymore.  My wife and I started another book on a drive home from DC and we just couldn't get into it.  We put One Way on and were instantly hooked.  Literally the first 3 minutes were more intriguing than the hour we had given another book.

Morden knows how to build both suspense and intrigue as he builds the world, the characters, and the mistrust throughout.  You follow one main character but are introduced to numerous others.  Frank is one of those characters that in the beginning you don't know if he is going to be a good or a bad guy - and you're told right away that he's a convict.  You're also told pretty early on why he's a convict.  While I'm not a parent - I could completely understand the crime that Frank committed.

Once the Earth part of the story was over - this entire book read like the synopsis said.  It combines And Then There Was One and The Martian.  And it references and I think pays a little homage to The Martian a couple times (there was at least one scene where duct tape was mentioned.  I thought for sure one of them was going to mention Mark but they didn't.  I kept thinking to myself that this could have honestly been the prequel to The Martian.  It was built in such a way that the convicts sounded like they were building the HAB that the characters in The Martian were going to live and work in.  While I understand that the science and technology needed to power a Martian base would be the same - it felt so similar.

So, that bodes well for fans of The Martian.  And if you like a good "whodunit" murder-mystery an are looking for something set in a new and unique environment you should check out One Way.

Overall, I thought that One Way was a well thought out and paced combination of a science fiction and murder mystery book.  It has elements that a lot of people would enjoy and will have me thinking about it when it comes time to vote for my best books of 2018.

Definitely looking forward to the sequel. Good for fans of The Martian but with a grittier tone, less science and humor, more interpersonal conflict (obviously...not being alone on the planet). My only complaint: the characters are nominally American but several persistent phrases and usages (such as using "we've [an idea, e.g.] " instead of "we have" or "we've got") sound very British. Maybe needs to be 'brit-picked' in fanfic terminology, but in reverse.

I thoroughly enjoyed this story and cannot wait for book 2.

When the XO corporation, trying to work out how to satisfy their contract with NASA to get a Mars base up and running, is having a hard time figuring out the automation of base construction and rules out robots, they figure human workers are the way to go. How about pulling some convicts from among the prisoners in their private prison subsidiary? Makes perfect sense.



In S.J. Morden's One Way, the work crew to build and prepare the Mars base for NASA's astronauts and scientists is "a high-tech chain gang." "They might be wearing spacesuits rather than shackles, but that didn't fundamentally alter what their relationship was." Given the choice of completing their life sentences in dreary prisons or serving out their terms on Mars, this motley crew takes a chance with life on the red planet. Little did they know that a life sentence would become a death sentence.



One by one the prisoners begin to die, each death looking less and less like an accident. They don't know who they can trust, and have no recourse for getting out of their extraterrestrial prison. Morden's descriptions of life and work on Mars rings true. The construction of the base, the transport of materials, the requirements for day-to-day existence, all seem very realistic and well-researched and thought out. His academic and scientific background certainly have informed his story telling.



One Way is realistic, suspenseful, and irresistible. Sci-fi lovers who enjoy near-future stories which are a small technological step from present reality will love the set up and authenticity of One Way. In this setting, Morden sets a gripping whodunit that will keep you reading and has me eager for a sequel.





Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

Frank Kittridge is given a way out of his life sentence. He can go to Mars as part of a construction crew made up of other convicts. Seems a great choice but: 1. it is a one way journey; 2. Using convicts is a way to cut costs; 3. Once the job is done they are no longer needed and 4. Accidents just keep happening. I liked the premise but knew from the first who was guilty and how he covered his tracks. I found that the bo0k dragged along until the finish - a finish that only set up the next book in the series. I will continue the series just to see what happens to Frank. I do think fans of the Martian would like this as it has some of the same problems that need to be solved.

I received a free copy of the book in return for an honest review.

If you’re going to be in prison for the rest of your life, but you’re given the choice to remain in prison or take a one way trip to Mars, what would you do? That is a decision eight convicts have to make. A group of people who have committed unlawful acts decide Mars and possible death would be better than staying in prison, facing solitary confinement or getting killed.
They have to prepare Mars for the NASA astronauts who will be coming after the base has been built, and food sources have been established. But the question is, why would prisoners be picked to establish a base on Mars? Sure they’re cheap and will continue to serve their prison sentence out in service of the base. But there’s more.

In each chapter you get to see the inner workings of XO, the company who is building the base. The only way I can explain each of these entries told through journal entries, video clips, and audio recordings is corporate greed. It shows every way they’re willing to cut corners, cut costs and how much they don’t care for the human life that will be building their base.

It was quite chilling and something we see in today’s society. What I loved about this was how real the science was behind the mission. It all felt like the science could be entirely possible and the added mystery to a mission to Mars? Oh boy, I did not see that ending coming.

You end up liking certain characters so much because Frank is our main story teller and you feel sympathetic towards him the entire way through the book. Each of the convicts has their talents, utilize them to survive being on Mars and then murders start happening.

The beginning was a bit slow, but it was necessary to establish who and what made up this story. But I started flying through this because it was that good.

One Way is a science fiction/crime novel about a team of convicts that are sent on a one way trip to the planet Mars to begin setting up facilities for future manned missions. The cons found themselves in this precarious situation as a result of industry biting off more than they can chew when they won the bid to get man to Mars. The story is told from the point of view of Frank, the team lead whose responsibility it is to get his eight person team to work together successfully to meet their objectives. The author also folds in the history of the company from them winning the bid to executing the work and uncovering the challenges and shortfalls with their original plan to coming up with and executing the new plan to send the convicts. The team successfully makes it to the planet and suddenly things start falling apart. Equipment and personnel challenges arise and the crew finds themselves trying to survive. They also find themselves mysteriously dying. Frank takes it upon himself to try to solve all these problems. It was very clear to me that the author had an engineering/scientific background. While I appreciate the inclusion of this detail in this kind of story, I felt like it was a bit overdone. This made it hard for me as a reader to remember that this is also a murder mystery. I felt the character development was there with Frank. My recommendation would have been to balance the aspects of the story out a bit more.

An engrossing read following the trajectories of Frank Kittridge and Bruno Tiller.
One Way: both the definition of a trip for those with absolutely no power, and for one who has absolute power.

2035: The contract for the robotic and fully automatic systems construction of a permanent settlement on Mars has been awarded.
2047: Seven convicts are on their way to construct the Mars settlement.

Those with power set the rules. Given time and greed the rules change, and those who feel they are now gods see people as pawns. When given permission it makes it easier to take the shortcuts, to rationalize anything.

Hard science fiction with a well paced story.

Ahoy there me mateys! I received this sci-fi eARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. So here be me honest musings . . .

one way (S.J. Morden)
Title: one way
Author: S.J. Morden
Publisher: Orbit Books
Publication Date: Tomorrow!! (hardback/ebook)
ISBN: 978-0316522182
Source: NetGalley

This book was a fun and entertaining read. To save money, a corporation decides to train convicts to be the first exploratory crew on Mars. It is a one way trip. Their purpose is to build and set-up the living quarters for the NASA scientists that follow and then be the maintenance crew for the station. Except that once they get to Mars, they start to die one by one and it doesn't seem to be an accident.

The good:
- Frank - I very much enjoyed Frank as the primary perspective. He does not always make the best decisions (i.e. why he went to jail) but he is intelligent and likeable. I was certainly rooting for him.
- Concepts- I loved the idea that the subcontractors are trying to save money and use the convicts and other horrible ideas to stay under budget.
- Characters - In general, I liked all the other convicts. They are not really fleshed out at all but I enjoyed all of them in various ways.
- Mars - I liked the descriptions of the planet and the science of the set up of for the dwelling fabrications. It makes me realize, yet again, that I am not meant to ever be a space explorer. I will stick to the sea!
- Build-Up - this is a slow build-up book with a lot of training and introduction. It takes a decent amount of time to even get to Mars. Now I love this kinda start but others may not. It was a fast read even with the slow build-up.
- Writing Style - I enjoyed the author's writing and manner of speech.

The not as good:
- Mystery - The book claims to have one. It is no mystery. Even though I didn't know it was supposed to be a who-dun-it tale, the bad guy and the set-up were obvious from the start.
- Bad-Guy - A boring cookie cutter two-dimensional figure. So very stereotypical.
- Characters - I would have liked more insight into each of the characters rather than just seeing them as generic "types." But as they are only seen through Frank's eyes, it wasn't a major problem.
- Mars - There is not much description of the planet itself or really what it feels like to live there. The danger of oxygen loss is the most prevalent danger. Besides murder of course!
- Epistolary Prologues to the Chapters - These were short segments like transcripts, documents, etc. from the XO Corporation that were interspersed between chapters. I enjoyed some of them but they didn't appear to be in order and were such small snippets. Many were just confusing. I did want the information about why and how XO made its choices but don't know if it would have been better served in their own chapters or as an appendix or short story or something.
- Ending - an abrupt set-up for the sequel. It annoyed me that it stopped there but I still want to know what happens next!

This is a light thriller read with very little mystery but is fluffy good entertainment. A very quick, likeable read but nothing earth-shattering (Hardy har har!). I will likely pick up the sequel.

So lastly . . .
Thank you Orbit!

Goodreads' website has this to say about the novel:

ONE WAY opens at the dawn of a new era – one in which we’re ready to colonise Mars. But the contract to build the first ever Martian base has been won by the lowest bidder, so they need to cut a lot of corners. The first thing to go is the automatic construction… the next thing they’ll have to deal with is the eight astronauts they’ll sent up to build it, when there aren’t supposed to be any at all.

Frank – father, architect, murderer – is recruited for the mission with the promise of a better life, along with seven of his most notorious fellow inmates. As his crew sets to work, the accidents mount up, and Frank begins to suspect they might not be accidents at all. As the list of suspects grows shorter, it’s up to Frank to uncover the terrible truth before it’s too late.

To visit the author’s website go to:
S.J. Morden – Author

To buy the novel go to:
one way - Book

To add to Goodreads go to:
Yer Ports for Plunder List

This was very predictable. It was not necessarily a mystery, it was pretty clear from the beginning what was going on. That being said, I did finish it, and would perhaps be interested to see where a series would go.

I am giving One Way by S.J. Morden a 3.75/5 stars. I thought that the concept for this book was very interesting and unique, which made me inclined to pick it up and read it. For the most part, I did really like the book. The setting was fairly well fleshed out, though I didn't understand some of the more technical terms referring to various machines and parts. The idea of setting up a base on Mars in the near(ish) future was rather intriguing. I really liked seeing how the characters adapted to the environment and what happened to them. I didn't see a lot of the twists coming in this book. Some were more obvious, but others came out of nowhere but actually made complete sense. The only thing I didn't like about this book is that I felt like the characters weren't as fleshed out as I wanted them to be and how they treated each other. I wanted to know so much more about these dynamic characters. I also didn't like how they treated each other, but they were convicts so I suppose it makes some sense. I just felt that, if they were going to be a team, they had to build better relationships with one another. Overall, I enjoyed this book and will definitely be picking up the next installment! I recommend this book to anyone looking for a more realistic sci-fi book set on Mars.

I received a free copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

One Way by S. J. Morden

Pros: interesting characters, fast paced, tense

Cons: a little obvious

In an attempt to save money, XO recruits convicts to man its mission to Mars and build its NASA contracted habitat. But Mars is a dangerous place and ‘accidents’ happen.

I really enjoyed this book. Frank’s an interesting narrator who knows about as much as the reader with regards to what’s going on. A lot of the mystery and suspense surrounds the aspects of the mission that the ‘crew’ aren’t aware of as they’re rushed through training and shipped off to Mars.

I thought there was a good mix of characters in terms of personality and the reason they were behind bars. I did wonder why Brack was so obviously antagonistic towards the convicts, considering he needed the group to work together. Yes, they needed to stay in line, but he generally did more harm than good with his comments.

The depictions of life on Mars were great. A lot of care was obviously taken to point out the very real dangers of living and working there.

Due to a lack of attention, it took me a while to realize that the opening quotes weren’t in chronological order as I’d expected. Pay attention to the dates so you can piece together the history of XO’s planning for - and problems regarding - the Mars mission.

The story is fast paced. While I figured out one mystery quite early, the ending was still very tense and suspenseful.

Received from NetGalley for my honest review.

Meh. That's my review, Meh.

This book is supposed to be about a murder mystery on Mars. It took 30% before they were even ON Mars and that first 30% was soooooooooooo dull. It was just the MC, Frank, training to go to Mars. I was as bored as he was. 2 stars for the first 30%.

Then Mars, and it picks up pretty quickly. Wooooo! There were some good parts in the last 70% of the book, mainly each time someone got killed off. But, those times took minutes, so the rest of the time was just dull and boring. Periods of time was skipped just to move things along but still. Ugh!

And the mystery? Yeah. Not so much one. I kept hoping I was wrong because, hello ~ obvious! But I wasn't. Not a bit. And I liked one part, when they all were open and honest, but that didn't last because the not-a-mystery had to ruin all that.

So, ended like I expected, but not like I hoped, and left it for another book?! Ah, nope. Think I'll skip that one, this one was enough dullness to last me while.

I thought about rating a 2 but the ways that each person turned up dead was pretty unique, so I bumped it up because those parts were good. The only parts that were.

I liked this book , the plot is not a very complex one but if you like sci fi, thriller and adventure books then you will like this book, I have seen comparisons between this book and "the martian" , but I dont think that is the case , while they both happen in Mars this book is less technological focused than the martian , this book focuses more in the adventure side of the book . Hard criminals are offered a chance to go to a new planet and live out their sentences setting up a human colony on Mars , but when "weird" accidents take the lives of some of them , everyone is a suspect, are they being killed by one of them or are they not alone?....Read it and find out.