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bookergirl90 's review for:

The Memory Agent by Matthew B. J. Delaney
2.0

I received this e-ARC via NetGalley for review, but all opinions are my own.

This book follows our main character Roger Parker who is a professional prison breaker. He navigates strange dream worlds and extracts those imprisoned there, for a fee. He is convinced to complete one last job by a powerful senator. By accepting to do this job Parker can find his wife, who is lost in a treacherous, time-shifting Manhattan cyberscape.

The description of this book sounded like it was going to read like The Twilight Zone meets The Matrix, but I felt the book was very difficult to get involved in. I found it very confusing and was having to revisit back scenes to determine where we are in time. The story starts in Cairo, 1933, with the main character and his group discovering something that leads them to believe in time travel and hints that this time is 2017. There was talk from the characters about a Prohibition era when they get attacked by the "Brotherhood of Anubis" and stumble upon a subway that they take to an underground "Manhattan" that is deserted. From here is where our story takes a turn that felt clunky. The story continues to grow more confusing from there when our main character meets with a doctor that tells him he is in a VR prison and that his job, Parker's, is to break out the prison.

Overall the story is a good idea, but I do not think there was a good follow through, but would be willing to give the author another try in the future.