If you like your stories dark, then The Beautiful Land would be a fine place to start reading. Averill has a sure hand and creates very powerful images—disturbing ones—from the opening scene, in which we first meet the fascinating Takahiro (Tak) O’Leary, who is about to hang himself in his "suicide studio" to the background accompaniment of a Miles Davis song. When that plan is interrupted and Tak accepts a dangerous job to become an "explorer" for a mysterious consortium of international businessmen and scientists, the action takes off in completely unexpected directions. There were times I was so confused that I had to reread several paragraphs to make sure I hadn’t missed a phrase or misunderstood the context. And while the writing is mature and creative, I was bothered by silly, common phrases like "aw, shit on a shingle" and "Christ on a crutch." There is an element to the book that is almost sci-fi-like, which should please lots of crossover crime fans; for example, Tak wants to take his friend Samira to the timeline he’s found where "snow is different colors." Averill has a very original style, which will appeal to many readers, and his bold storytelling vision makes this a page-turner from start to finish.

Averill’s literary-flavored time-travel tale revolves around Takahiro (Tak) O’Leary, the ex-host of Japanese TV adventure shows, who is pulled back from the brink of suicide by a mysterious phone call. Four years later he contacts his best friend from high school, a PTSD- and dream-plagued Army veteran named Samira (Sam) Moheb, to whom he relates wild tales of alternate timelines and an evil consortium who seek to shift reality to one in which they rule. Worse, the inventor of a device called The Machine plans to retreat to a pastoral timeline called The Beautiful Land and destroy all others. Racing against time even while they hop around it, Tak and Sam search for a fail-safe backup of the "solid timeline" (ours) which will save the sorry reality that we know. Averill’s story reads smoothly but passionlessly. Cardboard baddies, unimaginative time paradoxes, and unexplored character arcs result in an adventure that deserves more than the dry literary treatment it gets here.

Tak O’Leary, down on his luck and unemployed, is contemplating ending it all. Then a phone call changes everything. A mysterious consortium, the Axon Corporation, wants to hire him to lead an exploration into a true undiscovered country: alternate realities. Tak is dubious, but feels he has nothing to lose and takes them up on it—and vanishes for the next four years.

Meanwhile, Samira Moheb, a reservist suffering from PTSD, is struggling to put herself back together before she’s called up for another tour in the Middle East. As an Arabic translator, she’s in high demand—but her experiences over there have broken her, perhaps beyond repair. Then Tak, her best friend from high school, whom she thought dead, calls her with a wild and crazy story: if they don’t stop the Axon Corporation in thirty-six hours, she’s going to die.

With breakneck pacing, The Beautiful Land started with a bang and didn’t let up. The characters are immediately compelling and their adventure gripping, with an entertaining twisty plot that mashes up elements of "Fringe," "Lost," and The Time Traveler’s Wife. While the world-building could be strengthened, the characterizations of Tak and Samira, two damaged, amusingly self-aware, and heartbreakingly real people, are so good that it’s easy to overlook the weaker aspects and just sit back and enjoy the ride. By turns funny and wrenching, this is the best kind of page-turner—a can’t-put-it-down book with heart— and it’s my pick for the winner of the ABNA contest.

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