FantasticLand

Early on in the book, one character named Johnny Fresno colorful exclaims: “fuck you for pissing on my dream.” If Mike Bockoven ever reads this review, I imagine he might mutter these same words. Here we go! Fantasticland was anything but fantastic. Although some chapters, characters, and ideas were compelling, and the audiobook benefitted from outstanding narration by Luke Daniels and Angela Dawe, overall the story was unbelievable and problematic. It wasn't all bad though, let me start with the good. FantasticLand is an amusement park, and the book basically tells the story of how a group of employees trapped in the park for weeks following a really horrible hurricane quickly descended into Lord of the Flies levels of dystopian chaos. The book is formatted as a series of interviews with the players, similar to World War Z by Max Brooks. The format works really well, and I enjoyed listening to the events of the novel told from many different points of view. One chapter about a guy hiding out in an on-property hotel really stood out. The character was interesting, rational, and likable. The chapter has some real tension and fear, probably one of the only sections of the book I'd really call horror. I also thought that Mike Bockoven hit on a couple of really compelling themes. One antagonistic character says something like “I cannot be held responsible for how people interpret events.” That stopped me cold. I actually put a note in the audiobook, which I almost never do. Despite being written in 2016, that statement punched out of its context and rang with a chilling truth and relevance in light of the events of January 2021 and the subsequent trial. That same character went on to ask “would you have stopped me?” I don't agree that the failure of others to stop him mitigates his actions, but I think Bockoven has captured a psychology of evil and asked a really compelling question here. I wish more of the book had been concerned with this question. Unfortunately much of the rest of the book was really beyond belief. Basically as soon as the hurricane hit and the lights went out the employees became violent. Why? This question was asked multiple times in the book, as the afterword reminded us: they had food and water. I think the rapid onset of killing and tribalism was unrealistic. If we were to compare this book to Lord of the Flies, it's important to remember that these characters were adults, in some cases very young adults, but still high school graduates (despite being constantly called kids in the novel). They weren't stranded on a deserted island, they were in a theme park with supplies. There is absolutely no reason for things to have gotten so bad so quickly. Some characters tried to blame the young characters being cut off from technology and social media, but I don't buy that. It was repeatedly stated that employees weren't allowed to have their phones, but I think that's a steaming pile of sht. Has Bockoven ever met a young adult (or a not so young adult)? I'm sure that even with a no phones allowed policy in place, dozens or even hundreds of people would have one anyway. At minimum they would have them in an employee locker (and toward the end of the book or was acknowledged that an employee locker room existed). There's no reason they wouldn't have had phones. A better explanation would have been no data or internet due to the hurricane, but even that seems unlikely for the length of time described in the book. I also don't believe that young adults would go all Mad Max over not being able to post on Facebook, Twitter, IG, or TikTok, but...hey...maybe my knee-jerk millennial reaction to “these kids couldn't survive without their phones” is blinding me to the profound impacts of being cut off from the internet? In any event, I also found it totally unbelievable that survivors wouldn't have been rescued by either the authorities or corporate much more quickly. Think of the liability and worker's comp claims! We know that the corporation knew the power was out, had access to satellite phones, and even had satellite images of the park. What kind of world ending cataclysm was this hurricane that they couldn't get these folks out? It was suggested that the hurricane was really bad due to climate change, but I don't believe how slow the response time was or how little the company did. If something like this happened at Disney or Universal, I bet they'd get people out within a few days at the absolute longest. In addition to the premise being totally unbelievable, the book also discusses women in several ways that made me uncomfortable. At one point a group of characters is described as kidnapping women and then one character has this long discussion about how there wasn't any raping, and if there was raping it was someone acting alone. It was weird and gross. Other terms like “b***” are used by male characters in ways that I didn't like. Another character describes a woman's “huge rack.” Overall, the way women are viewed, treated, or referred to by some of the men in the book is pretty gross. I'm not saying this reflects the author, but I question the need to write these kinds of attitudes? These attitudes may not be totally unrealistic for some young people (or not so young people), but I still didn't love listening to them. Overall, despite its many shortcomings, listening to FantasticLand wasn't a total waste of time. It was entertaining. It's not one of the best books I've read this year, in fact it might be one of the worst, but I'd listen to Luke Daniels read just about anything. This book definitely qualifies as anything. There are some good parts of the story, such as the format and even some of the themes, but these merits could not overcome the premise which stretched suspension of disbelief to the point of snapping. 3 stars overall. 5 for narration, 2.5 for story.