I came to One Word Kill immediately after giving up on two different, terrible (self-pubbed) scifi titles, and I was beginning to question whether I even still like science fiction any more. But this story of friendship, time-travel, math, destiny, and D&D sessions pulled me right back.

Teenage Nick mostly wants to avoid bullies, play tabletop games with his friends, and maybe get a girlfriend, but he’s got to deal with an aggressive cancer and cryptic messages from his future self. Future!Nick, called Demos, needs Nick’s help on a dangerous, probably deadly mission, and also he needs Nick to hurry up and invent time travel so Demos can travel back in time and remind Nick to invent time travel. It’s a lovely big ball of wibbly-wobbly temporal paradox avoidance.

There’s a bit of retro media to establish the 1980s setting, without the intense hipster nostalgia of Ready Player One.  I really enjoyed the friendships between the boys, especially awkward, focused Simon, and they way the others relate to him. The scenes of D&D felt very realistic and everyday, and made a nice counterpoint to the wild time travel adventures. (Their gamer group does suffer from the Smurfette problem, but at least Mia is developed and complex.)

Nick’s at a British boys’ school, so the normal school bullies are about 10 minutes away from going all Lord of the Flies on a typical Tuesday. Even so, there’s a distinction between the usual nerd-bothering bullies, and a psychopath who happens to attend their school, and happens to be connected with Demos’ mission.

I realized, as the A-plot wrapped up, leaving a dozen sub-plots unfinished (Math[s]! True love and destiny! Elton! Are there any other girls in England?), that this is part one of a trilogy, and am now anxiously awaiting Limited Wish to see what happens with Nick, time travel, and his friends.