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42 of 44 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Major improvement over the first book, January 14, 2006
This book is actually less than 170 pages long, so calling it a "novel" is a bit of a stretch. It's even shorter than "Endangered Species", the first "Lost" novelization published a few months ago. I bought this, as with the first book, solely because I am an unreformed "Lost" freak and wanted to give the book series every chance to be as interesting as "Lost" the TV show before I gave up on it.
As with "Endangered Species", the lead character here is not a character from the TV show, in spite of the huge blurry close-up photo of Matthew Fox on the cover. The protagonist is Dexter Cross, an Ivy League student from a rich family who awakes from the Oceanic 815 crash with strange gaps in his memory, a missing girlfriend, and a doppelganger stalking other survivors on the island. Although his story is predictable, Dexter is at least more sympathetic than Faith from the first book.
Where "Endangered Species" utterly lacked any sense of "Lost"'s inventiveness, "Secret Identity" successfully borrows many of "Lost"'s core mysteries. Indeed, the book even ends with a couple of unanswered questions. The action takes place primarily between scenes from episodes 2 and 3, as Dexter interacts with most of the TV characters, primarily Shannon and Boone. This book also takes advantage of the extended TV cast; Arzt particularly has a lot to do. Odd-numbered chapters take place in the present, and even-numbered chapters flash back to Dexter's past. Amusingly, there are 23 chapters; I'd like to think that is not a coincidence. There's a joke about Hurley looking as if he just won the lottery, and Kate even obliquely references the title to episode 3 ("Tabula Rasa").
"Secret Identity" is never going to be mistaken for a novel by E.L. Doctorow, or even by Michael Chabon. It is a modestly successful time-waster that you can read in precisely 60 minutes on Wednesday night when "Lost" is in reruns... although you'll still learn more from the rerun.
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Not really worth the read, January 20, 2006
I picked up this book because I didn't think the LOST novels were anything more than a rumor, and didn't realize "Endangered Species" was the first one. At any rate, "Secret Identity" is a big time waster if you're a rabid LOST fan looking for an interesting show based book. Dexter Cross essentially is nothing short of an annoying character that has no interesting back story, and most of the time on the island is devoted to him obsessively mulling over whether he should take a look in the fuselage for Daisy or not or passing out from dehydration, while his backstory is nothing more than a drawn out story of how he lied to his girlfriend of what he really was. Big deal. You have no emotional attachment to the character, and worse yet, the writer forgets to actually describe him! I kept picturing a 30 something year old character that was more akin to looking like Artz than the young man who "didn't quite look like Boone and was probably a little younger". Worse yet, the writer was overly descriptive to the point of exhaustion; I don't need to know precisely all the graphical designs on the box for the grills that fell on his cranky aunt. This woman needs to stop writing, because she obviously can't.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Improvement over the first .. good filler, May 31, 2006
Lost: Secret Identity introduces the reader to another of the Lost survivors, Dexter Stubbs, a/k/a Dexter Cross. Dexter is an interesting character indeed and I found that his background story was much more compelling than the story of his existence on the island.
Dexter Stubbs is introduced as a high school student, from a non-affluent family, that does not necessarily fit in with the crowd. When his Aunt wins a large personal injury settlement, Dexter has the chance to go to an Ivy League school. Once there, amidst the affluence and perceived superior attitude of the other students, Dexter begins to reinvent himself. Starting off with minor things at first, he finds it spiraling out of control as he attempts to gain the affections of a girl that he is interested in. We also see Dexter struggling with his independence from his overbearing Aunt. Eventually, Dexter winds up in Australia and the truth catches up with him.
It is interesting to see the struggle within Dexter as he tries to balance his desire to fit in with his desire to tell the truth. Even on the island, Dexter tries to reinvent himself now referring to himself as Dexter Cross. In typical Lost fashion, Dexter is prone to the powers of the island which make him come to some stark realizations.
The typical Lost characters are present though there is only minimal interaction with them. All in all, the story is good and this should be good filler between seasons.
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