X-Men: Prisoner X
By
Ann Nocenti

Nocenti is known for her cereberal storylines. We comic readers witnessed this in her Daredevil comic run and other short stories she has written in the Marvel short story anotholigies,but none were as good as this novel was. This was a prison novel disquised as a X-novel. That however doesn't mean the book wasn't eXcelent.
For everyone who reads novels, there are two types. The first is the novel that drags along. The story is contrived and the characters you could care less about. But you've already spent $6 or more dollars, and have read 100 pages and feel obligated to finish the darn thing. The second type of novel is one where you can't put down. You are immediatly drawn into the storyline and care about where they are going on this journey for 200 or more pages. The opening bar scene with Wolverine showed me immediatly that this book was the latter.
The novel plot involved Mojo taking over a new prision in space named UltraMax. Mojo then broadcasted the exploits on television on his new prison channel. Rogue and the rest of the X-Men stumble across the channel and see their teammate Longshot is one of the inmates and decide to rescue him. The inmates are brought to this prison through a new tranporting video game system. Let's see how Nintendo beats that new trick.
Nocenti has a great ability of getting into the characters heads. In some cases quite literally,for instance when Longshot put a metal object in his head to catch radio transmission from prison. Nocenti nailed the characterization of all the X-Men very well. I especially loved her take on Wolverine. It would be great to see her write a solo Wolverine novel.
This novel gets three web heads out of four. Good solid reading to put next to your "to read" spot on your nightstnad.