Finished Reading: The Tech
by Mark Ravine

My rating: 3 / 5
Genre: Procedural, thriller

A seemingly ragtag group of FBI agents are thrown onto a new team together, headed by Alexandra Cassidy. On her first day, a bank robbery forces her to hit the ground running. But the team is able to close the robbery case surprisingly quickly. And the next case. And the next. It is soon apparent that there is more to meet the eye, both with these different cases, and with the office’s IT guy.

On the surface, The Tech comes across like a police procedural-type story. And pretty early on, the IT guy, Mike, is shown to be somewhat of a high-tech super hero. But the further I got into the story, the more it just felt weighed down by so many things. By the point I began to realize that the cases are connected, I was struggling to keep going. I think this is mostly chalked up to a lack of depth in many areas.

I never felt much of a connection with any of the characters. In the first chapter, we’re told about each of the 5 members of Alexandra’s team, and I had a very difficult time keeping them separate in my mind throughout most of the book. That may be partly because their personalities, backgrounds (somewhat), and even their looks, are kind of just dumped on us all at once. And this continues to be the case in varying degrees with each new character introduced. I’m not given much chance to find out who they are for myself.

The interactions between the different team members were stilted as well. And all I can really say about Mike is that I was pretty sure I got what his deal was from early one…and I never liked him. He was essentially a vigilante, and there was never really any repercussions for the liberties he took.

The main thing the story has going for it is the intricacies of the plot. The author clearly mapped out his ideas in detail, and the threads can be seen tying it all together. I have a lot of respect for the work that went into the story. However, I think it needed further editing and refining. I didn’t care for the style, which might have just been personal preference, but it felt very redundant at some times and full of contradictions at other times. I don’t know how well I followed the details of the story, sticking instead to a wider view.

I’ve read a lot of self-published books recently. Though this book was published by someone other than the author, it has the feel of a self-published book. The thing is, I can give a lot more allowance to a self-published book, because those authors don’t have the resources of a publishing company behind them. But this book felt like it needed a lot more editing work. I don’t know how any paid editor lets a book get past him with two characters in close proximity being named such similar names as John and Don (I still don’t really know which of those guys was which). I personally wouldn’t be able to recommend this book to be read by others, however, please note that the book has all positive reviews besides mine (at the time of me posting this). So if it does sound interesting to you, please read the other reviews and consider checking out the book.

I received a copy of this book for free from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

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