Budding “mad scientist” and techno-geek Marcus Jameson spends too much time in his IZ – his Introspective Zone – to pay much attention to the world around him. He’s too busy contemplating the relationship between mass and energy, absolutely absorbed with the idea of producing cheap energy. He sees no reason to be dependent on a costly energy grid that’s not always reliable. Marc completely immerses himself in the works and research of all the scientists that came before him. At least, he does until his father and his college counselor give him a reality check – you have to earn a living. Oh, yeah. That.
He can’t give up his dream, though. There is no reason energy can not be directly produced from matter, he thinks, and he won’t stop until he succeeds. His only hesitation is ‘what would happen if this new technology gets into the wrong hands?’ Even in all his nightmare scenarios, though, he never considered who his worst enemy would turn out to be.
Project WIM contains odd phrasing at times. An example is, Recognizing my consciousness, Steve provided an update. Why the author didn’t write, Realizing I was awake, Steve provided an update, I don’t know. It may be that Marc is a nerdy type and the author feels that word choice exemplifies nerdiness. At other times, it’s written as if Marcus is giving a presentation to a Congressional committee, something he unfortunately became all too familiar with. Still, it also draws us into his story and thoughts as he grows up, gets confused by women, acquires social skills, and deals with the continual ups and downs of running a business.
Even knowing this can’t be a true story, I tried to look up author John Rojewski’s biography to see if he, perhaps, really is the protagonist of the book. Fake news, conspiracies, and dangerous advances in science point to this being an almost possibly close-to-true story. To my mind, the evidence is inconclusive.
There is plenty of science concerning matter-to-energy conversion, quantum chromodynamics, containment requirements, a little bit of string theory, and much more. Rojewski explains it all through the device of Marcus ruminating or discussing the issues with others. I make no claims as to the veracity of most of it. Some of it seems far-fetched, but it’s probably not. There are many acronyms throughout the book that are explained at the first occurrence. A glossary is included at the end that readers can use if they forget what one means.
There are no explicit scenes or vulgar language. The worst it got was a risqué encounter with a woman Marcus was attracted to.
At over 500 pages, the book seemed to go on forever! I couldn’t stop reading, though, because I had to find out exactly how Marc’s technology worked, why the enemy decided he was a threat, and if he would finally ‘get the girl’. I’m not sure fewer pages would be an improvement as all were necessary.
There are far too many punctuation errors, awkward or run-on sentences, and words that were misused, extra, or missing altogether. Because the story was written from Marc’s point of view as he’s recounting what happened, some things that look like errors are not, but too many are. I rate Project Wim 3 out of 4 stars. The writing style took some getting used to, but it fit Marc’s personality. I enjoyed it a lot, but certainly will enjoy it more after corrections are made. This is for readers who love formulas, physics, and energy science who are willing to contemplate the impact of disruptive technologies.
** This book has been revised based on this reviewers noted errors since the review was published**
