Space Runners: The Moon Platoon, by Jeramey Kraatz

Though I do my darndest to read All the Books (specifically, all the middle grade science and fantasy books), sometimes I miss them when they come out, and then the sequel appears and I must play catch-up.  That's the case with Space Runners: The Moon Platoon, by Jeramey Kraatz, that came out in May 2017 (HarperCollins) whose sequel, Dark Side of the Moon, came out last month...and since I enjoyed Kraatz's earlier Cloak Society series, and since there's so little exoplanetary mg sci fi that each new series is exciting, I pushed Moon Platoon up on my reading list....and had a nice afternoon of excitement on the moon as my reward!

Benny Love has spent his twelve years in the drylands that cover most of western North America fifty years or so in the future, years he's spent help his dad find food and water for their caravan, helping look after his little brothers, and always dreaming of a way out.  Now the way out has come--Benny has been chosen to go to the moon.  Elijah West, genius inventor and eccentric, has chosen him to be one of 100 scholarship kids who will go spend two weeks at the Lunar Taj, his  luxury resort playground on the moon.  Benny and the other kids, who come from all around the globe, are thrilled at the chance to pilot Space Runners, tinker with cool technology, and compete to earn West's favor (and maybe get to stay on the moon and work for him).

But almost immediately there are signs (not very subtle ones; mechanical exploding asteroids are not subtle) that something is very wrong on the moon.  Benny and the kids in his new cohort soon find themselves breaking rule after rule to find out what's really happening. And then, once they do, it's up to them to do something about it, because there's no-one on earth who can save the day.

If you are a reader who thinks drag-racing in space sounds awesome, you are the perfect reader for this book.  If you are a reader who enjoys cool technology and a mystery plot, with kids saving the day in the end, you are an excellent reader for it.  If you enjoy sci fi mysteries with a lot of page time spent on kids in a boarding school-like situation, where friendship formation is as important as the technology to both saving the world and moving the plot along, you are a very good reader for it.  This would be me.

Except....

Though I enjoyed it as light entertainment, and very much wanted to see what was going to happen, it wasn't as emotionally powerful as I like my fraught adventures to be.  Benny is just too darn good to be true.  In fairness, his nobility is what got him the scholarship, but still.  He is an angel teen, very likeable and sympathetic, but a bit much, and so the reader is being more told to feel certain emotions in response to him rather than be overcome from behind by them (as it were).  The supporting kids were less angelic, but not desperately nuanced either. So if you demand fully-three dimensional characters who are more than their primary attribute (coder girl, jock girl, bratty rich boy sort of thing), you won't love this one.  The author adds some character depth with backstory, but backstory can only take you so far.  

So it is best to simply power up your space runner and go along for the ride....and since I still want to know what happens next (and since the second book has gotten more favorable reviews ) the best part of having taken a while to get to this one is that I can add the sequel to my library holds list right away!