World's Worst Time Machine (Volume 1)

We read this book as a family during a family trip and at the end of every single chapter the kids (ages 8 and 10) wanted to keep reading! Previously, our 10 year old read the entire “Trapped in a Video Game” book series (birthday present from his grandparents) and he also found that series very hard to stop reading. (Huge win!) Dustin has the superpower of helping children love to read- even the ones that find reading challenging! I also really appreciate how he genuinely connects with his readers and fans. ( My son was so excited to open the envelope at the end of the Trapped in a Video Game book series! And then it was so exciting for my son and daughter to ask Dustin a question and receive a video reply (thank you so much!)!)Overall, I only have positives about every aspect of this book- it turns imaginations on and I loved how it was an adventure that weaved through time and different life perspectives as present-day kid characters met other characters from “back in time”. It’s neat to be able to connect aspects of different generations in this way and fun to read the different ways the characters from the past and present “react” and “relate” to each other and to present-day!Dustin is catchy with his writing style and the kids really tuned in to all of the details- words such as “recombulator” and relatable, familiar references such as the “morning routine” chasing the bus (oops!) and the “Home Alone” scenes….it was easy to see how Dustin’s writings sparked images of the story in their minds and they kept wanting to read on to see what would happen next! I love that it is an entertaining family read- making both the kids and parents laugh and smile. We all enjoyed the facts about the real-life people behind the characters in the book! Such a great way to give the reader an additional snippet of history!As a parent, I really enjoyed the ending of the story and how it shined twinkling lights on a life well-lived and it conveyed a simple, yet important message about friendship and how our choices matter.Thank you, Dustin, for sharing your gift of inspiring our children to read (and not just read but to love to read!) and also for sparking their imagination in ways that I believe are so important. Keep writing please! My kiddos are hooked (and so are us parents!)! My children are 8 and 10 and these are their thoughts after reading the story:My 8-year-olds opinion: I like it because it keeps your attention and makes you want to know what is going to happen next. I like how it shows pictures and gives little details throughout the story. I liked how it had pictures and real facts at the end of the story. This is a great book for long car rides.Here’s my 10 year old’s opinion: I liked how the person at the hotel didn’t acknowledge the cat guy and how if the chaos meter reached 12 then a giant crack would open and suck everyone into the floor. I liked how they started creating chaos- but not time chaos.I like how Liam put frosting on the Tesla and lied about it being scratched and then said that he needed toothpaste to fix it. I think it’s funny that Mason fell for it.I thought that the time machine was really cool because it was made out of junk and I like to make things too. I thought this book was awesome and I am reading the “Escape From a Video Game” books now!

My son (8-years-old) has been following Dustin Brady as a writer now for the past few years. When he was 6, his older cousins suggested he read the Trapped In A Video Game series. He got the whole series for Christmas and quickly plowed through them, then begging for Escape From A Video Game, the follow-up that was written like a Choose Your Own Adventure story.He admitted that this book what a challenge for him - the puzzles and codebreaking required to advance in the story were hard for him. However, he was still engaged and really happy.Around the time that he was reading the TIAVG series, I started to follow Dustin Brady on Twitter, and then joining his email list. In fact, we actually emailed back and forth a few times talking about writing. I knew early when Dustin announced to his email list that a new book was coming out, and I pre-ordered it immediately.So, when the book arrived, it's safe to say that my son was THRILLED. He read it in just a few days. When I asked him what he thought, this is what he said:WHAT AN 8-YEAR-OLD THINKS ABOUT THIS BOOKI liked hearing about Tesla a lot [Note from dad: The guy, not the car, who my son studied for school]. It took me only a few days to read, I was really into it. It’s a lot like Trapped In A Video Game series which I really like too. My parents made me stop reading so I’d go to bed!---Admittedly, I was hoping to get a bit more out of him regarding his take so I could add to this review, but let's be honest, that's about as good of a review out of the target market as you could hope!WHAT AN ADULT THINKS OF THE BOOKDustin knows his audience. But he doesn’t pander to them. Its clear he respects his readers and he approaches his style in such a way. The style uses simple structure to convey his story clearly, present his characters with realistic conversation, and most uniquely for this book, educate his reader.While he plays with the characters a bit, as one would imagine in a work of fiction, he does so carefully. It helps that he’s a parent (in the About the Author section, it says he has 3 kids), so he understands how certain language dynamics best work for certain audiences.If you’re looking to read this as an adult - you’ll enjoy it! But, it isn’t written for you, it’s for young readers, and it’s written to entertain and educate.Dustin provides a useful appendix to explain a bit more historically about some of the cast of characters from the book, including Alvin Karpis and the Barker Boys.I appreciate books like this a lot as a parent, books that engage my young readers, and inspire them to think, talk about what they read, and be excited. Excitement and desire to read more is the joy I get from reading and writing, so to see that translated to my kids is a real joy.So, credit to Dustin Brady for creating another engaging story that captured my son and kept him so engaged that my wife and I had to tell him to stop reading and go to sleep.Regardless of what any adult would say, I think that’s the biggest win an author for young readers could hope for.

Given that this is a brand new book series, I wanted to preview the book before reading it to my 7-year-old. I won't go into a lot of detail regarding the characters and plot, as I see other reviews have already done that. Suffice it to say, there is nothing in this book that is inappropriate for a 1st grader. My son's reading level is pretty high for 1st grade, but this book is slightly above that level, so we'll be reading it for bedtime story. I would say that the book is probably appropriate for readers age 10 or above (I'm just talking about the reading level, not the content; the content is fine even for younger ones).If you're familiar with the author's other works, I don't think anything here will surprise you. There are some cool characters (the MC reminds me of the lead character in Trapped in a Video game), and you have some cool early-20th century gangster related-lore, handled tastefully enough for you kids, but at the same time, it's a cool way to introduce an Americana subculture to kids that they normally wouldn't hear much about until later in life.To summarize, this book gets my stamp of approval as a parent, and it's next on my list to read for bedtime story.

7 yr old (3rd grade level) loves all Dustin Brady books.