Major Detours by Zachary Sergi

It's the summer before college and four best friends—Amelia, Chase, Cleo, and Logan—are on the first leg of their road trip inspired by the unique tarot deck that Amelia inherited from her grandmother. However, their trip full of visiting occult shops, bonding and sightseeing, takes a major detour as the friends discover that their tarot deck is more valuable—and coveted—than they could've ever imagined. As the friends race to finish this mystical scavenger-hunt across the West coast and uncover the mysteries of their tarot deck, it is you who will decide where to go next and how the story will end. With four possible final and romantic endings, you will get to make actual choices to further the friends’ road trip adventure in this unique interactive novel.

​Will you uncover the mysteries of the tarot deck and the legacy left behind? Will you help Amelia and Chase learn and grow? And will you unravel the secrets these friends keep from each other—and from themselves?

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I used to love Choose your own Adventure. I had loads. I was usually very disciplined until about halfway through my first read, when I'd give up and read all the endings, and then start again and try and make the choices that led to my desired ending. I had hours of fun.

I did not have hours of fun with this.

Part of that, let's be honest, is the format. Ebook just isn't a good format for a Choose your own Adventure; the pages aren't numbered, so when it told me to turn to page 17, I had to make my best guess. That's an artifact of the ebook process and won't be a problem in the physical book. As it turned out, though, it didn't matter too much, because all the choices led to basically the same place; the main part of the book wasn't affected at all by the choices made along the way.

I liked the characters well enough, and I enjoyed the tarot bits (although really, they've been friends for how long and Amelia just realises on this trip that they happen to match specific cards very well?) The deck sounds really interesting and I'd have loved to have seen images from it. I'm not sure how accessible the story would be to someone who knows nothing about tarot, though.

Fun but slightly flawed and annoying. Would be much less so in a physical book, though.

Major Detours publishes on the 30th September, 2021. I received a free copy and am giving an honest review.