Hi, folks! Today’s splendiferous video review doesn’t have a script as such, but I’ll attempt to summarize the five point I bring up in the review above, in case you’d rather not watch through the video (but please do, it’s fun!):

1. The Far Wild is a fantasy thriller, meaning that it borrows from the conventions of both genres. The worldbuilding, with its empires and kingdoms and airships, brings a number of delightfully fantastic elements to the table–a secondary world it was a joy to get lost in! The generic thriller elements, meanwhile, are evident in the struggle the novel’s characters face–first against the Far Wild itself, a world fill with dangers that make the very prospect of survival unlikely; and then against the agents of an enemy government, intent on exploiting the resources of this unknowable continent for their gain and the loss of the Empire–of which our protagonists are subjects of.
2. It’s an Audible Original, performed by a trio of flawless narrators: Peter Kenny, Stephanioe Lane, and Carlys Peer. They are, every one of them, a joy to listen to.
3. Its characters are a delight, and also bring to the fore a discussion of flat and round characters. The tendency nowadays is to think of flat characters as badly written, but Alex’s novel serves as an excellent counterpoint to that. Let’s take a quick look at the two main protagonists in The Far Wild: Senesio Suleiman Nikolau doesn’t go through a character arc the same way as the naturalist Suni does; his character does not really change or develop; yet he is a fantastic character, a heroic braggart through and through.
4. The monsters in this novel are a blast. Some of them, such as the giant komodo dragon and the terror birds, are inspired by Jurassic Park‘s T-rex and Velociraptors, respectively. Others are more original, and equally prone to eating your face off.
5. The humour is on point: though The Far Wild is a love letter to Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park, it forges its own identity through the deployment of humour and a somewhat more lighthearted overall tone. Hats off to Alex for striking a balance between the tension and humour that both pervade The Far Wild.

Should you get it? That’s a resounding yes from me!