The Only Way Out is Up
A small-time scrapper and his pet robot will fight their way out of the junk-heap in a tournament that will either make them richer than gods or rip them apart in the first book of Django Wexler’s brand-new tower-climbing, robot-fighting progression fantasy adventure for fans of Cradle and Dungeon Crawler Carl!
Taj lives in a junkheap, scavenging scrap to keep his family fed and dodging the monsters who live among the wreckage. His only edge is a smart-ass construct named Star he built himself. Taj dreams of winning big with Star in the construct fighting circuits, but victory always seems just beyond his reach and the debt collectors are at the door.
His world changes forever when someone there makes him an offer that seems too good to be true: a chance to fight in the Ascent, the ultimate fighting tournament, for a prize beyond his wildest fantasies. But things that seem too good to be true usually are, and Taj finds his new benefactor comes with plenty of new enemies. As he ventures beyond the only world he’s ever known, he discovers it’s not just his money on the line in the Ascent — it’s his life.
When you start at the very bottom, the only way out is up…
Praise
“You had me at bad-ass robot pit fights. Django Wexler doesn’t pull punches in this wild tale of heart, courage and twisted metal. Trust me, you’ll like this one. I gobbled that book with a near-constant grin and a whole lot of ‘whoa’s.”
—Sylvain Neuvel, author of The Many
“A fantastic book that manages to combine pit fighting, awkward teen romance, a few murders, literal social climbing, and class warfare by way of gladiatorial robot warfare into a fun, fast, uplifting tale about a young man and his quasi-magical robot best friend.”
—Peter Clines, author of God’s Junk Drawer and The Off Season