Jack Blank and the Secret War (ARC)

I was really lucky to score a advanced reader copy of Jack Blank and the Secret War by Matt Mykusch (read my interview with him here), this is the sequel to the amazing book The Accidental Hero (previously published as Jack Blank and the Imagine Nation).

Summary: Picking up a year after the events of Jack Blank and the Imagine Nation, Jack and his fellow students are now well into their School of Thought training and are "sidekicking" for official, card-carrying super heroes. But, even though Jack feels more at home in the Imagine Nation, he’s still hiding secrets from his friends Skerren and Allegra, both about his shocking connection to their enemy Revile and about his “Top Secret” school assignment, which involves investigating the Rüstov computer virus that affects the Mechas. Jack is busy trying to find out how far the Rüstov sleeper virus has spread, working to find a cure, and striving to avoid the dire future that Revile warned him about. Meanwhile, Jonas Smart is working just as hard to discover what Jack is hiding from everyone. When a rogue Secreteer—the protectors of secrets of inhabitants of the Imagine Nation—starts selling secrets to the highest bidder, Smart is ready and waiting. Jack knows that if Smart finds out the truth about him and Revile, he’s as good as dead. When Jack discovers that the Secreteer causing all this trouble also has information about his father, the distractions really start piling up. If Jack is going to help prevent a second Rüstov invasion, keep Smart from discovering his secrets, and find out what a shadowy, half-mad Secreteer knows about his long-lost father, he'll need to learn to trust his friends, and to find the true path toward becoming a hero himself.

I loved the first Jack Blank adventure so I had high expectations for this one, and Matt Myklusch fulfilled everyone of them and maybe more. I thought that all the characters were all very colorful and decorated. Even the villans could be my favorite characters because of the way Myklusch crafts them. When I read the first Jack Blank book I had no idea what it was going to be like, but for this one I thought that maybe I wouldn't like it as much because I knew a lot about the world already, instead I was pleasantly surprised about how much Matt adds and changes to the story with it still having all the fun stuff readers loved about The Accidental Hero. I did think this book was maybe a bit on the confusing side because there are a lot of things going on, which does make you stop and just keep everything in check. Other then that I don't think I have really anything else to complain about. This book had a fair few amount of suspense and plot twists, my favorite kind of book!

This novel was a fun action packed sequel that will win leave readers hanging for the next. Matt Myklusch has done it again!

5/5

Book Battle Update:This is my second book read in the book battle! More to come!

This book is released August 9, preorder it on Amazon.

And the Winner Is...

The Winner for a Signed copy of The Accidental Hero by Matt Myklusch is...

MELINA FROM READING VACATION!

The winner will have 48 hours to respond, after 48 hours without a response a new winner will be picked.

Giveaway Reminder

Hey guys! Just a quick reminder to enter the giveaway for a signed copy of The Accidental Hero by Matt Myklusch. Enter on this post. Don't miss your chance to win this awesome book! The giveaway ends June 14, so make haste!

Interview with author Matt Myklusch and Giveaway

Hi readers, so I got the pleasure to interview Matt Myklusch, author of The Accidental Hero. And without further ado, here goes the interview:

How did you get inspiration for your book?

The inspiration came from the thousands of comic books that fired up my imagination when I was a kid. I read tons of comics growing up, and they always made me want to grab a pencil and paper as soon as I was finished reading. I would either draw my favorite characters from the Marvel or DC comic book universes, or I’d make up my own. Most of the time I wanted to make up my own. I always say that I’m easily inspired. I see something I like, and I say to myself, “I want to do something like that.” A lot of the heroes and villains in THE ACCIDENTAL HERO are characters I created a long time ago.

At what age did you start to write?

The first time I wrote something for real was in college. It was my junior year, and I was determined to write a screenplay over Spring Break. At the time, I didn’t know anything about screenwriting or even how to structure a story properly. I just knew that screenplays were supposed to be about 120 pages and that sounded manageable.

Three bad screenplays (and several years) later, I switched to novels. I wrote a novel with a friend of mine that we weren’t able to sell, but we had a lot of fun writing it and I learned a lot in the process. After that, I sat down to write THE ACCIDENTAL HERO and finally broke through with that story. All in all, it was about a 15 year journey from that Spring Break screenplay to the start of the Jack Blank Adventures.

Who are some of your favorite authors?

My tastes are all over the map. I don’t read a ton of books from the genre I write in, which I suppose is good, as I am less likely to get influenced that way. I’m a big fan of Tom Wolfe, Tom Clancy, Stephen King, JK Rowling, Neil Gaiman, Joe Hill, and Michael Harvey. I love a good detective story, and I think Michael Harvey has created the modern day Phillip Marlowe with his Michael Kelly character. It’s only a matter of time before we see that Private Investigator prowling around Chicago in the movies.

Can you tell us anything about the next book in your series "The Secret War"?

When we last left Jack Blank, he was holding onto some pretty big secrets-- both about himself, and about the Rustov’s plans to invade the Imagine Nation. Jack has become something of a celebrity hero in Empire City, but he’s still weighed down by the burden of secrets. He hasn’t even told his best friends Skerren and Allegra the whole truth about himself yet.

When the heroes of the Imagine Nation discover an attack by Rustov sleeper agents is imminent, everything changes. Jack is forced to trust his friends in a race against the clock to fight back mass hysteria, find the enemy spies, and thwart the Rustov plans before it’s too late. Along the way, he’ll come one step closer to becoming the hero – or villain – he is destined to be.

A few other tidbits you can look forward to… We’re going to travel outside of Empire City and see more of the Imagine Nation in this book. We’re also going to see how the heroes and villains who live there interact with the Real World, and how it’s all swept under the rug. We might even find out something about Jack’s father, but you’ll have to read the book to get the details.

When did you start reading comics?

The first comic I remember reading was Captain Carrot and his Amazing Zoo Crew. That came out in 1982, so I must have been about five years old when I started. After that, I read a lot of classic superheroes: Spider-Man, Superman, Batman, Captain America, and such.

When I was nine, I read my first X-Men comic book. It was Uncanny X-Men # 211. I remember the exact issue because it was the start of what is now a famous storyline called “The Mutant Massacre.” There was a cool team of villains called The Marauders that got introduced in that issue, and they all had awesome powers and code names. The X-Men team lineup at point in time was a great one as well (they have good years and bad years… kind of like SNL casts). It was a great jumping on point, and I think that is about the time I started drawing my own superheroes. Like I said, I’m easily inspired.

Anything us you'd like to tell us about yourself? Your books? Life in General?

Let’s see… I’m a die-hard Yankee fan, and I was in the stadium for the Aaron Boone game in 2003. I actually got tickets for two Red Sox fans that night, and I remain convinced that the good karma I gained from that act helped the Yankees win that series.

Before I quit to write full time, I worked at MTV for almost ten years. I helped launch mtvU and managed MTV Spring Break three different times. My title was Director of Ancillary Business. I still don’t know what that means, but it was a great job.

My favorite book of all time is The Count of Monte Cristo.

Okay and now to the Giveaway part: We're going to keep this one simple, just fill out the form:

The Accidental Hero

I bought this book after receiving a email from author, Matt Myklusch, and after reading the Goodreads summary it looked really good!

Summary: All Jack Blank knows is his bleak, dreary life at St. Barnaby’s Home for the Hopeless, Abandoned, Forgotten, and Lost, an orphanage that sinks further into the swampland of New Jersey with each passing year. His aptitude tests predict that he will spend a long, unhappy career as a toilet brush cleaner. His only chance at escape comes through the comic books donated years ago to the orphanage that he secretly reads in the dark corners of the library. Everything changes one icy gray morning when Jack receives two visitors that alter his life forever. The first is a deadly robot straight out of one of his comic books that tries its best to blow him up. The second is an emissary from a secret country called the Imagine Nation, an astonishing place where all the fantastic and unbelievable things in our world originate - including Jack. Jack soon discovers that he has an amazing ability--one that could make him the savior of the Imagine Nation and the world beyond, or the biggest threat they've ever faced.

This book was amazing... the characters were all had lots of depth, each of them was perfectly depicted. The plot was excellent and you never knew what was going to happen next, just the way I like a book! I think that this book was one of the few books that truly made you care a lot about the hero, something many authors can't pull off. I thought that the description of every moment was it's own small masterpiece. I can't believe that this was Matt Myklusch's first book. I will definitely be reading anything else he writes. This book book was perfect or the closest any book can be to perfect. Possibly the best sci-fi book I've ever read.

5/5

p.s.: I will be doing a interview with Matt Myklusch, soon!