From now, if I need an example of a novel written exclusively for male audiences, this is what I’ll think of.

I suppose you could call it a science-fiction thriller. The problem is it brings up plot questions, but doesn’t answer them.

The story is about a guy with a wonderful satisfying life, just that he chose family over becoming a famous scientist. Then he’s kidnapped in an odd way, taken to a strange building, and knocked out. He wakes up in a hospital/laboratory where he’s being lauded by a bunch of people who seem to know him, but he doesn’t. So instead of sticking around to ask some questions, get reoriented, and learn what’s going on, he takes the idiot ball and breaks out of the lab into a world he doesn’t know with no allies or money.

So pages and pages go on of this guy wondering what happened, where he is, why things have changed. And I’m yelling at the book “it’s an alternate timeline, idiot! Haven’t you seen a single episode of Star Trek? Or The Twilight Zone? Donnie Darko? Sliding Doors? It’s a Wonderful Life?” This isn’t a foreign concept. It’s like people in zombie movies never using the “Z word”. Being genre blind, either as character or author, doesn’t disguise the concept as original.

And that’s the thing–I’ve seen all those movies mentioned above, and so has the discerning science-fiction audience. I already know every concept and plot point in this sort of story. I knew this guy was going to find his wife, freak out that it’s not her, she’d freak out on him, someone from the alt universe would help him for no reason, and so on. There is some cleverness halfway through in regard to where it takes the idea of all the other alt timeline. But it doesn’t make the main character any more likable.

Speaking of which, this book is pretty misogynist. Or at least not forward-thinking. The guy’s wife is a huge factor in what drives the story goal. Except she’s not really a player in the story. She has all positive personality traits and never makes a mistake, like a Manic Pixie Dream Girl. She’s the ball being tossed back and forth, the prize to be won. This is why I say this was clearly written for men.

It’s like Taken combined with Community‘s “Remedial Chaos Theory” episode. The premise is capitalizing on the “defend my family so I can justify violence” power fantasy that is trending, like John Wick or anything involving Gerard Butler or Denzel Washington, although none of them have a science fiction twist like this does. Too bad that playing ignorant of its legacy couldn’t save it.