God's Junk Drawer Group Read

Many of us like Peter Clines's books - 14, The Fold and The Broken Room, to name a few. With God's Junk Drawer having just come out in January of this year, I thought starting a thread about it would be helpful and fun. That's one thing you can always count on with Clines is fun. Maybe not as over-the-top zany as John Scalzi, but in the same pond.



Also like Scalzi, Clines has a go-to narrator for the audio versions - Ray Porter. I think many of the early books were audio only and the guys worked together closely to frame the story so that narration would enhance and create it, not just read it. As an audiobook junkie, I really appreciate that they take it so seriously. Many cite Porter and R.C. Bray, another audiobook powerhouse, as favorites and they work in many of the same genres. Their voices are very similar, too. Oh I wonder if they've ever worked together. Head explodes. 🤯

Anyway...I'm on chapter 7 and much like the other books, it starts slowly with a lot of set up involving the place, the event and the characters. So to paraphrase Margot Channing, buckle up, it's going to be a bumpy ride.

So if you read the description, and are a US resident of a certain age, you'll recognize a Land of the Lost homage at work, and I think that's really true although Clines expands it quite a bit with the introduction of a wormhole. Similar to what he played around with in other books, but this one is connected to Earth in a particular place and only once per year is it open. As a result, all kinds of stuff gets sucked in from the past, present and future. Everything exists in sort of a strange jumble, and one character likens it to a theme park with pockets of contrasting artifacts and ecosystems laid next to each other. There's even a resident alien who is a cast away and we can only experience it in a way similar to shadow puppets because it is 6 dimensional in a 3 dimensional world. So far it's only been referenced, but not encountered. And I should really say they.

The idea of the wormhole and washed up objects is one he can really sink his teeth into, but the plausibility grounds it. Really looking forward to the next 13+ hours!

Oh and the 'not a real guide' guy, Josh, reminds me a lot of Tim in 14. In that book, Tim says he's a publisher, but has all kinds of knowledge of government stuff and after a while it becomes a running joke that he learned it because of a book he published. I have a feeling it's going to be the same for our 'sales and marketing' guy. What is he really?

Darn, seems like it's not so shadowy, just a drug dealer on the run

It also has a really strong Lost World or Jurassic Park vibe, which of course riff on Journey to the Center of the Earth. Right now something big is coming and all I can think of is 'impact tremors'. Whee!

And our first death is eerily like the lawyer in J.P. minus the outhouse.

Ooh, I’ll make this my next read. I’m halfway done with my current book so maybe by the end of the weekend.

Through Ch 17 and I'm getting strong Doctor Who vibes. Especially with the timey wimey explanations on how the wormhole or whatever it is just picks up stuff all across time and dumps it here. The whole reshaping of reality to make room for new stuff is a really neat idea.

I'm glad Noah found the old robot and it validated who he is. It's nice having some puzzle pieces filled in even if it just brings up more questions. Like is this the real Roanoke that was lost or did the people just name it that? And who are all these people? Still so much we don't know. This is awesome :)

I'm not convinced his sister is dead yet. She could've gotten out and sent who knows where across time. I hope we go meet those multidimensional aliens. They sound fascinating too.

Ok, I just finished chapter 18 and agree with you about the Roanoke thing and whether people just adopted the name, or whether that's where the colony went. Yeah, I love the curling tendrils of mystery that remain even when we get tidbits of explanation. I don't know that I caught all of the reshaping reality to make room for new stuff thing, but now you clarify it some of the strange reconfigurations make more sense.

Oh and talking with the alien is so odd given their relationship to time. I think of it as our relationship with water bodies - we can move through any and all parts of it in three dimensions. Maybe that's how the other beings move through time.

Another thing that's interesting is how all the people have come together despite their complete estrangement from each other to begin with. Different times, planets, technologies and possibly species are actually functioning. At least they are right now, maybe there have been fights in the past, or possibly some unease right now, but no one is saying to make the new people more at ease. I'd be interested to know how that society formed because heck, we're all one species in one time and we can't get along at all.

So much fun. I'm so glad I ditched my awful library loan for this!

Oh and a Hitchhiker's Guide vibe withRoss the robot with the walking stick must be related to Marvin. At least Ross doesn't complain that much.

Am on Chapter 23 and Noah has set out to find the cave he and his family lived in, but the situation is making me wonder a lot about the lack of population. War? Disease? Predation? Or is there something about the world that prevents people breeding? Even the Neaderthal numbers seem low. I mean, it's what we do best so it's very strange to have no kids. Are there kids, but kept away from this compound? Is it an outpost or the main living area? Why the tall gates and the ever-present wardens. Lookouts for what? Allosaurus? King Kong? Surely the Neanderthals, or whatever they are, are too few and too primitive to launch a large-scale attack. It's odd and unsettling, which is probably what Clines is going for.

I will try to catch up!

>10 Karlstar: Terrific. Glad your daughter is out of the hospital and you can peel off some time to join in. It's an addictive book.

Chapter 36 and SO MUCH NEW STUFF!

Ok, so no kids at all. For anyone. Including dinosaurs. How weird. And the whole sun disappearing thing is also weird. As is the sky not moving at all...well the things in it at any rate. So fun how Parker chips away at it until she finds a possible explanation. Noah is in denial, but as we say in crime novels...until you see the body, suspend conclusions. That's why as SOON as I heard about the Empress, I thought of his sister. Especially when someone reported that she spoke English and a bunch of other languages. How though? She was what, 15 when they wormholed (that's a verb now). And she'd have to be 400 years old, so maybe some Rosetta Stone CDs got wormholed, too. And electricity and a player. Ha. But I digress. Tribute days. As soon as someone said that, I knew it was to the Neaderthals before that was revealed, but it seemed to sophisticated for them to dream up a protection racket. And there didn't seem to be than many of them to be able to do it anyway. Then we see the animal taming and that's not anything remotely like what Neaderthals did. Cro Magnon, mabye, but not them.

Ok sorry for the stream of consciousness post here, but it's such a runaway train of a book that it's hard to stop to get my thoughts down.

Wait, is he tying in some kind of time travel deal like in Paradox Bound? Is that how she is so long lived and knows all those languages? And why the descent into savagery. Ok more listening.

And the crazy continues, but in such a good way! Olivia has woken, but has a speech issue (aphasia?) so that her communication is severely limited, but Josh cracks the code to a certain extent and it's her info, plus the others' observations that lead them to believe they are on a spaceship. Not just any spaceship, but the Castaway's lifeboat or eject pod or whatever. And that they got rescued ages ago and now Bo has taken over the Ice Castle in its absence.

Woah. Now Noah has just walked into her throne room. Must get back to listening.

Through Ch 29 So.... the constellations are from our modern day. Where does that leave us? Is this a pocket dimension?

I feel bad for Noah. It's too bad it took him visiting the old cave and learning of his sister's disappearance to get him to accept that the valley has indeed changed. As if the evidence wasn't in his face to begin with.

It would be interesting if the person calling herself Empress of the neanderthals ended up being his sister.

I wonder why no one gets pregnant in this place. That's just weird. Unless this is a pocket dimension and they are outside of linear time so normal biology doesn't quite work. It could let someone live a really long time too though I don't think most people die of old age here. Or perhaps this is a whole alien experiment lol

I hope some of this is answered :D

Finished it and I want more!

The revelation of the true identity of the Empress, was a bit of a shock. I didn't expect a neanderthal, much less the original matriarch who nearly killed Billy. The idea that she killed the Castaway and took over the powers and "ownership" of the valley was right, and it was wrong. What I didn't follow as well was why the Castaway felt that he had to sacrifice himself to keep the life forms within his lifeboat alive. There were a couple of hints, but nothing that really convinced me it would happen. But it worked to make the final pitched battle work by adding another layer of suspense. Would Noah make it to the others before they threw the first stone? Nope. A lucky strike hit the Empress, but when he tells them that if she dies, they all do, things got pretty desperate. The whole thing with Noah having his "dream" about the Castaway was a nice ploy and helped write the ending where he makes the Ice Castle home. What was less clear is how he can send people back accurately and at will. That seemed more of a stretch, but hell, if I could swallow the rest of it, why the heck not.

Once again, the body count is high and I didn't expect the casualties we got. I did like the epilogue explaining what happened to the survivors. Is it me, or did he include Josh's job just for the kickstart to Olivia's brain? He couldn't have found another way to do that, or make the condition not so severe? Eh. Authorial decisions.

I finished yesterday. I was so disappointed that the Empress wasn't Noah's sister and then we got that ending! Perfect ending. Talk about a great use of a red herring AND still making it satisfying.

I admit, I had a hard time keeping track of names in this one, especially the people of Roanoake. One day later and I can't remember the name of the robot butler lol Since a lot of them die, doesn't seem too terribly important. At least some of the college students stuck with me.

I like that Noah got to rescue Beau. Can you just imagine the conversations they had afterwards. The wrap up on the students going home was nice too.

The Castaway has to be one of the most unique characters I've read in a while. Clines made the alien very alien! I also agree that Olivia, who got zapped and had her talking patterns scrambled, was super creative too. Plus all her dialog actually made sense. I have no idea where Clines gets his ideas from but I hope they keep coming!

About the only thing I didn't understand is how Noah really ended up running the space ship. Yeah, he got rid of Scarnose's things and stood in place like the Castaway and it just worked? That was my main quibble. I could hand wave pretty much everything else.

Solid 4 stars. Ray Porter's narration is fantastic.

I just snagged this book via Libby, so I will start it tonight. Didn't realize it was so long!

>17 clamairy: Yeah it is, but it doesn't seem that way once you get into it. it's great. I'm thinking of listening over again soon.

Ok, just picked up the audiobook version. Will start it on my dog walk this evening.

>17 clamairy: Good point, let me check Hoopla.

>20 Karlstar: Hope you managed to snag it. It's good so far. Reminds me of the Quantum Earth series by Dennis E. Taylor, except there is very little humor so far.

I finished this this morning. I liked it quite a bit, but I can't say that I loved it. I strongly suspect that if I had chosen to listen to the audio version narrated by Ray Porter I probably would have given it at least another half star. I will give it this, I was very interested in what was going on, even if I was shaking my head in disbelief much of the time.

I'm not sure how Noah/Billy could have mistaken a Neanderthal for his sister. I guess he didn't see her up close until right before he realized it wasn't her.

I did love the ending. What timeline do you think he sent his sister to? It couldn't have been the same one he was in, unless she chose not to reveal who she was.

All in all a very fun romp. (With a high body count.)

Yeah, I felt the same way about the sister/neanderthal mix up, but I let it go to keep with the momentum. Ray Porter did his usual job with the voices - they are all kind of the same from book to book, but it's sort of comforting. I quite liked it and am thinking about listening again soon. I hope there is a sequel...it doesn't set up for one with all the epilogue info about the survivors, but he could do it.

>22 clamairy: & >23 Bookmarque: I think it was because the neanderthal had been healed and he didn't know it. Scar Nose had part of her nose missing and a messed up face when he saw her as a kid. It's easy to think it's NOT the neanderthal because she looked more like a modern human. Noah spent a long time thinking he knew everything in the valley even though he hadn't been there in a few decades, even with obvious proof of changes in his face.

>24 Narilka: Ah, that sounds plausible. I wish we knew more about how the 'transference' worked in that case and in Billy's. It was sketched over and, ok it's fiction, but maybe I missed more info. I guess listening again would be a good idea. Such an engaging story despite that body count.

>25 Bookmarque: The body count was impressive!

Ok, I've finished and I have (non-spoilery) thoughts:

1. I very much enjoyed Ray Porter's reading of this - I think I would've enjoyed it less if I were reading it myself.
2. I thought the setting was great. The whole premise was fun. Reminded me of John Scalzi - the Kaiju Preservation Society came to mind, at the start of the story at least. A few notes of Saturation Point by Adrian Tchaikovsky too (though it's been a while since I read that one, so my comparison may be off).
3. The characters were... functional. Fine. I didn't feel overly drawn to any of them. They served their purpose, but didn't really have me routing for any of them strongly (that body count was higher than I was expecting, though). But then, for me, the setting was the real star of the show.
4. Talking of show - it would be great to see a TV series of this story. There could be some really compelling visuals in it.
5. Some very clever ideas in here, just the right blend of originality and homage to previous works that tread a (somewhat) similar path.
6. This is my second Peter Clines book. I've read Dead Men Can't Complain previously. I will definitely be on the hunt for more.

>27 Tane: Yay! Glad you liked it. I started with 14 years ago and have been a fan ever since. That one is the start of a very loose series that continues with The Fold and then Terminus.

I echo a lot of your thoughts about GJD, especially the characters - I actually got some of them mixed up a bit now and then, that's now generic they felt. I hadn't made the connection to Kaiju Preservation Society, but now you mention it, it tracks.

I just finished God's Junk Drawer. It was my first Peter Cline book.

I thought it was "Okay." There was not much "meat and potatoes" to the story, and the characters were flat and, to me, seemed very cliche. The story idea was promising, but I am not crazy about what Cline did with the original plot thread. I found the story and characters somewhat contrived.

The story would make a very entertaining mini-series on Netflix or Amazon - and reading the afterward, it appears that at one point Cline's original idea for a movie/series that he turned into a book.

At any rate, I am glad I read this book. I would recommend it as a good book to read on vacation, at the beach or on the train traveling to and from work.

>29 Gatoruss: I agree with everything you said. If this hasn't been a group read I probably wouldn't have picked it up.

I didn't realize there was a group read/listen of this! I'm DNFing it just as Noah is leaving to go look for his cave--the flatness of the characters has just gotten too far up my nose, and I. don't. care. Ah well.

>31 Marissa_Doyle: I don't think I would have kept going if it wasn't a group read.