Review: a good story once it was told
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 05 3, 2012
What a way to experience first contact.  The classroom scene is clever and had me primed for a fast moving tale.  Unfortunately, too many characters with too many introduction and too many paths to get them to their final destination, took too much time.  Another reviewer suggested the 60% mark until the action picked up. I think it was closer to 65%.  The story was ambitious, which may have made it seem necessary to tell the tale of everyone who saved the day, in such detail.  In addition, the near future setting (2016) made it too easy to use current spin, a recalcitrant Republican house that had to be coerced to do the right thing, a violent,lunatic Libertarian certain the government was lying  and gratuitous Christian angst over the existence of aliens. I know it's fiction but I don't see an established mining facility on mars by 2016.  One other issue:.......spoiler alert......If the US gives the UN the power in the beginning of the story why would the same characters who instigated UN involvement, fear the UN having the power in the end. (I hope it wasn't foreshadowing of another story plot.)The last third of the book was a great read but it took too much work to get there.