Tim Waggoner - The Roads Not Taken

I got fed up with being too slow at writing my reviews, which is my own fault because I got busy with work and got distracted too easily, so I decided to read a small book to revitalise my need to read more.

Based on the Supernatural TV series and its primary characters, The Roads Not Taken is a choose-your-own-adventure book by Tim Waggoner where fans of the series and the like can take fate into their own hands and make some of Sam and Dean's decisions for them and see how long they would survive.

Rating: 8

Recommended To: Supernatural fans

Favourite Character: Dean

Favourite Part: Shulman's Model

Good Points: Interesting to have control over the Winchester's fates; multiple endings; the stories were interlinked

Bad Points: Could have been longer; Here Kitty, Kitty was too obvious

The Roads Not Taken begins with Sam and Dean on a normal everyday hunt, searching for who/what it was that killed a number of people, using illegal means to gain access to the bodies so they can investigate, such as fake FBI IDs which seems to get them through to the coroner when the reader joins them as they find out how the victim was killed.  The reader follows the boys through their normal investigation pattern to figure what the monster is and how they go about stopping it and, in turn, makes choices for them during key moments which could lead to life or death, something that the boys do every time in the TV series.  As long as the right choice is made, the Winchesters will survive.

The Roads Not Taken was a fun book because it was interesting to have some control over the fates of the characters from my favourite TV show, something I've never read before, as they fight monsters and the like and try to live another day.  This is probably something other shows should do because it could throw the audience directly into the world of their favourite characters which could draw more people to watch the series.

Though limited, there were multiple endings and it was enjoyable to see what you had to do to get all the endings, what simple choices you made such as going left or right so the boys would survive the story without any injury, there are other results were you can get a Winchester hurt or cause the death of at least one Winchester.  Even though there are multiple bad endings, they're all different as something different occurs.

I loved how the four different stories were interlinked as it made the book feel episodic like the TV shoe and felt as if  as if this could be part of a season for a few episodes so it further implied that feeling of taking control of a TV show.  With this episodic style, the original format was able to translate well into a book format I think because as I said previously, it felt like part of the show with the four stories interlinked with a underlying story arc.

Dean is my absolute favourite character out of the Supernatural TV series and it is no different in this book because they've kept true to character in this book, something that could be difficult to do as normally, the actor plays a large factor on how the character is portayed for obvious reasons.  Dean is the protective older brother with a warrior-like trait to his personality as he hunts monsters like he's been taught and for that, he always fascinates me and they did a good job of translating that to paper.

I personally wanted this to be longer as it was a very short book, especially considering if you chose all the right options and survived the first time all of the way through.  Granted, it took me a while to finish this book as I kept killing the Winchesters through my choices or I got Dean hurt so I had to go back a few times to try again but if it had been longer, I could have spent days on it rather than hours which I think I would have enjoyed because I loved most of the individual stories and it could have allowed the storyline that ran throughout the book to develop more as it was over very quickly once you got to the last story.  Fortunately, I bought this second hand so it was wasn't too bad considering the length of the book but I wouldn't pay full price for it.

I was expecting that I wouldn't like a particular story as much as I like another but not as much as I disliked Here Kitty, Kitty which I found too predictable and therefore boring.  It felt like a waste of my time and I wish they could have used a bit more imagination for this as I nearly lost interest when I read Here Kitty, Kitty but I continued to see if the other stories were better and fortunately they were.

I found the Shulman's Model story a lot more interesting than the other three as the story was more unpredictable and I couldn't guess who or what the monster was and there was more variety in the endings as well, with deaths and injury, as well as continuing into the next story.  This was the level I was expecting each story as the endings were unpredictable and the entire story was imaginative overall.

Supernatural is my favourite show on TV, at least one of my favourite shows, and I enjoyed The Roads Not Taken as it threw me into Sam and Dean's lives and allowed me to choose what they did, controlling their fates in a way.  The way the stories were interlinked making it feel episodic as if part of the TV series which enabled the original format to be translated better.  However, this was a short book so it may not be worth full price if you only read it once.