Reading: THE PASSENGERS - John Marrs

I had bumped John Marrs's latest toward the top of my TBR list soon as I read its high-profile premise: in a near-future London, where self-driving cars are now the norm, a hacker has taken control of a handful of the vehicles with the intention of killing the passengers each one carries.  And indeed, from the beginning of the novel we are introduced to the individual passengers and given a bare-bones backstory for each as he or she has their car taken over ... as well as meeting the young, idealistic main character, Libby, who has her own bias against driver-less cars and AI when she is thrust front and center into the disaster as a hostile jury member, recruited to hear out cases where an accident involving a driver-less car ended in the death of a civilian. Once taking control of the cars, the hacker slowly unfolds his intentions not only to the jury room but the world - via live streaming online and over TV - even allowing the public to help determine the fate of each passenger and who may die first or not. As the novel unfolds, the reader slowly learns there is way more to both Libby and each passenger than meets the eye, even as the hacker manipulates everything and everyone like pieces on a chessboard. And though the action of the novel is pretty much limited to the jury room and (occasionally) the interior of each individual car, which feels a bit stale and static after awhile, I was still enjoying riding along with the story, tension building as a couple deaths ensue even as the passengers all head toward the head-on collisions planned for them. But then "the twist" occurs, a not wholly-unexpected one by the time you get there, and while even that worked for me to a degree - as it opened up more questions than it answered - there is still a whole lot of book after The Twist. And that's where this one lost me, the plot eventually wearing away what suspension of belief I'd been able to work up until the more pages I turned, the sillier things became.  Sadly, I also had an issue with Marrs's skills as a writer, particularly the last third of the book - although throughout it felt like the subject matter/technical aspects of the story were being laid out by a novice trying to speak on a subject he wasn't knowledgeable about, without much confidence.  Still an okay thriller for the first two-thirds, and I know I am going against the tide of hype this book has gotten, but while I look forward to trying more of Marrs's work this one, unfortunately, fell flat for me.  2.5/5 stars