Jason Chaser, hover car racer (it is rather tasteless alliteration, is it not?) gets his chance to join the premier hover-car racing school to prove his mettle against a world-wide crop of rising stars. Racing school is where up-and-coming racers, like Jason, get to learn the intricate details of racing. And race hover cars, too. However, we only really get to read the parts where they race eachother in hover-cars.

Matthew Reilly's writing isn't really any different to any other book he's done. Punctuation marks and capitalisation abound, and, like his other books, has a fairly simple and unchallenging vocabulary. And, as with all of Reilly's books, there are plenty of diagrams to depict where the action occurs - this time, on various race tracks. Although the grey colour scheme for these pictures could have been done better, all of the diagrams are re-produced in their original colours (Hover Car Racer was originally an online release), for the middle section of the book, which is quite neat.

As to the plot of the story, it is quite cliched, and you've probably read it in a plethora of young adult stories. Young, smart kid against bigger, tougher, but less intelligent, counterparts. Lessons are learnt about friendship, and teamwork and other such things. The racing part of the story is equally cliched - the rivals who play unfairly, overcoming the odds to win the important races, and other such cliches.

Character development rarely passes beyond broad sketches, either.

I'm sorry if I spoiled it all, but there is really little doubt as to the results of what is going to happen before it does happen. Trom all that I've said, it sounds like I am going to give "Hover Car Racer" quite a low rating.

But I'm not.

There's one thing that I haven't mentioned yet that largely manages to trump all that. I had a lot of fun reading "Hover Car Racer". Although I knew the destination of where the story was going to go, I didn't know what would happen in the journey there (well, I didn't the first time I read it), and it was certainly fun finding out. Preposterous fun, certainly, but fun nonetheless.

Yes, it is cliched, and rather simply written. Yes, it is preposterous. It is also, in spite of this (or perhaps because of this) quite a fun read. ( )

Plot summery

In the world of the near future the most popular sport in the world is hover car racing. The racers are “part fighter pilot, part race car driver, all superstar”, and this is the world that young master Jason Chaser is about to step into.
This story is about a young Australian county boy named Jason chaser. He is selected to participate in the most prestigious race school in the world. At race school, winning is everything and not everyone at the school fights fair…and you never have any friends on the track. This book goes through a series of races before the climax race called “The New York Challenger” in which after insurmountable odds, Jason Chaser achieves the victor’s seat. But the story really is about the races in-between.

Opinions and recommendations

This book is well written and does get the imagination going. I would recommend this book to those people that enjoy reading books that involve racing, jets and very fast racing action. I would rate this book 8/10 because of its enjoy-ability factor. This novel may not appeal to younger readers. This book comes in two cover sets of covers, hard and soft. The book also contains pictures of the designs of hover cars. ( )

"Hover Car Racer sees the heroic Jason Chaser - a boy in a man's world - pitted against the cutthroat future world of near-supersonic racing. Combating with obstacles both on and off the track, both physical and psychological, the 8-part serialised novel chronicled Jason's fight to keep his head above water.
From the International Race School located on the now-privatised island of Tasmania to the coastlines of Italy and then the mean streets of New York City, even the elite of professional racers can buckle under the pressure. The question now is: Will Jason Chaser, Hover Car Racer, live to see his future on the pro circuit?

Targeted towards the sophisticated young adult market, Hover Car Racer contains the trademark Matthew Reilly styled novel in a Saturday-Morning-Cartoon format which is sure to keep everybody - young and old - reading till the very end."

I love all his other books. Fluff. Very entertaining, fast-paced fluff with great heroes. But what was he thinking, when he wrote this? Minimalistic plot, no substance. Just an endless narration of one race after the other. This might work well as a biweekly release on the Internet, targeted at teenagers with no attention span. But it certainly doesn't work as a book. It is just repetitive. Each chapter feels like the previous one. Fast-paced race, hero against the odds, sabotage of his car, him turning that into a win, the crowd going ballistic. And again. And again. And again. What a disappointment. ( )