The Mayas Never Predicted This Disaster

I was going to forego comment on this book when it was still in hardcover but now that it is starting to turn up in paperback, I feel obliged to say something.

Contrary to what one might believe, Apocalypse 2012 is not a novelization of the recent John Cusack movie 2012 but rather an ill-conceived attempt to cash in on the same Mayan prophecies that inspired that movie. The novel combines the story of a modern expedition to Mexico with the story of a pre-Conquest Mexican Indian but can't resist telling both stories without adding the world's largest infodump to its pages. Though the novel is allegedly based on notes left behind by the late Gary Jennings, the novel itself contains little of the wit to be found in actual Gary Jennings novels such as Aztec or Spangle. Worse yet, the novel's conclusion leaves the way open for a sequel. (For what it's worth, I have read that sequel and it was no improvement on this book.)

In short, this book exists only to provide employment for ghostwriters and to con money out of unwary readers. Please don't be such a reader.