Mayday Kaiju Thriller - Epic Monster Action & Adventure

When I read the description for this book I thought that there was no way a blending of detective murder mysteries and giant monsters. I was completely wrong. This premise sounds ridiculous, but Chris Strange pulls it together masterfully. The plot (without any spoilers) begins after the humans have won the war against the five invincible giant monsters. The monsters couldn’t be killed, so their minds were enslaved instead. The Earth was devastated, the population was decimated, and the monsters have been turned into corporate tools by being controlled in mock monster fights (think WWF with 50 story monsters). One day one of the seemingly invincible monsters is killed. How could this be? Enter Jay Escobar, hardboiled detective on the case.The story is masterfully written as a suspenseful thriller. Things never go the way you are expecting them to and it is a thrilling ride. Strange somehow manages to blend the genres seamlessly to create a gripping story. However, the murder mystery side of the story was decidedly the weaker of the two genres. But this is almost to be expected when you have enormous monsters to contend with. Strange does manage to keep the mystery going though and reaches a satisfying conclusion as to the mystery, if a bit contrived. It still works well enough though.The only thing that falls somewhat flat is the main character really. Escobar himself is as generic as they come: gritty, fedora wearing, mean, and violent detective. Frankly, Escobar is boring and no different from the trope of detectives that have been around since the 1920s. But I can’t really blame Strange for this. When mashing genres, especially ones as wildly opposite as these, sometimes you have to play on the archetypes to make the reader identify with the story more. Still, it would have been nice to have Escobar be a little bit more than skin deep.From the world building, to the tightly written prose, to the amazing conclusion, this book is a marvelously written piece of genre blending fiction that I cannot recommend enough.