There was a fairly interesting 100-page novelette hidden here somewhere. But the long string of amazing coincidences, the goofy dialogue and the misplaced descriptions (one of which was so out of place that the author had to interject and explain where in the book it should have occurred) made it tough slogging at times. I had figured out the plot in its entirety very early on and had to slog though pages where something I already knew was slowly unfolded in a manner that was intended to be suspenseful but wasn't.