172 Hours on the Moon by Johan Harstad

Three teenagers are going on the trip of a lifetime. Only one is coming back. It's been more than forty years since NASA sent the first men to the moon, and to grab some much-needed funding and attention, they decide to launch an historic international lottery in which three lucky teenagers can win a week-long trip to moon base DARLAH 2.










Rating: 2/5 Stars

Alternative covers:




172 Hours on the Moon is like The Selection but in space, hence the alternative covers.

The premise is simple… well, kind of. NASA has a secret mission, they want to go back to the Moon but because of the lack of support they come up with the idea of starting a contest; they’ll select three random teenagers from all over the world to go to space, making NASA popular again (don’t argue the logic, there’s none). Problem is, when the three lucky kids arrive, they realize that NASA hasn’t been honest to them, because there is something on the moon and they might not get out of it alive.

I love space and mysteries, and if the two are combined even better! Unfortunately, this book just didn’t do it for me.

First, I found the entire premise rather ridiculous; I mean, taking teenagers with no testing or training to an isolated habitat on the moon? And make it a freaking contest to win support while they are sending three teens on a really dangerous mission? I can suspend my disbelief sometimes, but this just didn’t make any sense. Couldn’t they have just done it any other way?

Then there were the characters. I couldn’t really relate to any of them, from Mia who is the America Singer of the book, the lead vocalist of her band and who is inscribed in the contest against her will. The rest didn’t do an impression on me either, they were… kind of there but didn’t add much to the plot.

As for the mystery, I saw some of it coming so I wasn’t very much impressed by it.

To sum up, I think 172 Hours on the Moon had a great concept with the lunar mystery but it just couldn’t decide what it was and what it wanted to accomplish.