When I first heard that F. Paul Wilson was going to write three YA novels about Repairman Jack, his popular fixer of the unusual, my initial reaction was a cross between “Huh?” And “What the—?”

If Paul was up for sharing Jack’s back story, I knew that I’d show up to read about it, for I’ve long enjoyed the character, but I always figured that when the time came, he’d interpolate that information into one of his novels for grownups, and let us look back at the early days from the perspective of adulthood. It didn’t seem to me that just because a book was going to be about Jack as a kid that it should necessarily be marketed as a book for kids, in a YA format. After all, if the age of a protagonist determined a book’s format and marketing, would that mean that a book about Jack as an old man (though he’s unlikely to survive that long) should be written for and targeted at the elderly, and only be made available in large-print editions?

So as you can see, I was wary. I knew that once this YA incarnation was published, I would read it, but I assumed I’d be … let’s just say … confused by it. I’d grown used to the tone used in the dozen or so Repairman Jack novels I’d already read. I was unsure how I’d feel about that voice being, for lack of a better word, simplified. (more…)