Gravity Games by John Matsui
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

When presented as a Foodie Thriller with a title like this and a flashy meteorite on the cover, just what the hell am I supposed to think? Is it Kitsch? A comedy come-on with either a virtuoso display of genre-mashing or a literature equivalent of Sharkanado?

Oh, lordy, I never would have guessed that it all ties right back in to a very well crafted mystery with extremely interesting characters right up and down the line, from Nate Sherlock, the man with the eidetic nose, his horribly patient and brilliant female sidekick who might blow up waiting for him to make a move, the social justice warriors who con the world, or fantastically crafted villains ranging from the top .01% to a nasty biotech guy who messes with the lives of other "specially sensed" people and their roles in governmental investigatory teams.

The characters could have been enough to carry this novel, mind you, but no, it's also a plot of very finely crafted gears and super-satisfying games that had me chortling and had me nodding my head when it came to the big issues, too.

It was fun, fascinating, and I haven't had this much fun with antigravity in... um... EVER!

This was my first book by John Matsui, and while neither of the currently released titles are that closely tied to one another, there *was* a walk-on of Late Bite's MC that put to rest ANY reservations I might have had about reading what otherwise appeared to be an urban fantasy gimmick. I'm actually quite afraid that I've just gone off the deep end with only one read and this author has just become one of my automatic reads from here on out.

Yup, instant fanboy.

I'm soooooo happy that the author asked me to review his stuff. I probably never would have picked this up, otherwise, and my life would have been much poorer for it. I can't believe how much fun I had.

You know when I mentioned that it was a mash-up? It was. From Foodie Thriller to Government Conspiracies to one hell of an awesome Con Game, all the while having all the trappings of SF, fantastic characters, and really tight plot? The novel not only shifted gears effortlessly, it even made it reasonable and not at all unusual in a bad way. I was hooked with any one of the baits, and yet he kept giving me awesome morsels to chew on anyway, adding and adding to the pile until I'm just a greedy greedy foodie, myself, until I gorged myself and sighed at the end and said, "More, please?" Oh yeah, I'm good for more. :) And I'm RIGHT ON to the novel of his that I missed. I'm ready for a Late Bite, because, I'm, like, late. :)

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