I considered giving this 4 stars because I felt the ending was weak, but I loved the premise and execution (pun intended) too much to not give all 5 stars. I loved the dry humor in this book. John recounting various other jobs he'd been on was interesting, and made the book better than if he'd just focused on the current job. 
 My problems with the ending. 
 I thought it was a bit of a stretch that John's dad was who he turned out to be. 
 I didn't like that the framing device, which let us see various transcripts, ultimately came to nothing. It never came back.