Sunday, December 10, 2017
BIG NEWS: MOVING WEBSITES
As of December 10th, 2017, I have moved my reviews & other book-related posts over to my new website. All new reviews and content will be posted there. I am leaving this site up until I transfer all of my old posts over, and at that point it may or may not remain active. Thanks for understanding!
Tuesday, November 21, 2017
Book Review: Renegades
Title: Renegades
Author: Marissa Meyer
Rating: 5/5 Stars
Series: Renegades (Book 1)
Why?: Loved Heartless and The Lunar Chronicles
I went into this book slightly worried, because I had read less-than stellar comments/reviews from other people and this is the first book I have read from Marissa Meyer that wasn't a retelling. So this was slightly outside my comfort zone, and I didn't want any negative feelings I had towards this book to affect how I see her other books.
Luckily, that wasn't a problem.
There is no denying that this book is insanely different from her other ones. Her other books are retellings and more fantasy-ish, while this one is (kinda still a retelling but I'll get there) and definitely falls more on the science-fiction side of the fence. But I didn't have to walk to the "scary side" of the library to get it so that was a plus. Also I almost felt like the writing style was different, although not necessarily bad.
Before I talk about all the stuff that I liked (or maybe didn't like) about the book, I feel the urge to discuss a comment that I saw floating around a lot. YES, a lot of the characters do resemble figures in X-MEN quite heavily. X-MEN is mentioned in the acknowledgments. Did it bother me? Not necessarily a ton, but there were a couple of characters (but one in particular) where I felt like the character was no longer inspired by a character in the X-MEN universe, they WERE that character. I know that it can be really hard to create an original character based off of a different character without retaining some characteristics, but I felt like some more work could have been done to make it so that the characters weren't nearly so similar.
Moving on.
So here's what I loved: there was little to no romance, there was plenty of action, and there was enough of a cliffhanger thingy at the end to keep me interested in the next one.
The whole little to no romance thing was GREAT for me. The novel was all about the action and the conflict, and while there were hints at a potential romance it didn't completely derail the entire story line.
There was a ton of action in this book, and it just moved from one conflict to the next. Generally this bugs me because I like to be walked through every single step, but I actually didn't mind! I was never bored while reading, and it was quite enjoyable.
I was quite confused while reading this book because I didn't remember if it was part of a series or not, and didn't muster up the energy to Google it until halfway through the book. Once I figured out it was a series though, the structure started to make a ton more sense. At the end of the book it was clear that it wasn't a stand-alone, and now I can't wait to read the next one.
Here's what I didn't like: the whole X-MEN thing, the conflicts were slightly confusing, and the backstory wasn't that well explained.
The conflicts were pretty confusing just because the story seemed to slide from one conflict to the next without having a clearly defined resolution to the one before it. A lot of times this left me feeling like I was holding a ton of loose ends, which I hate. There were a bunch of questions that were left unanswered, which bugged me a lot.
The backstory was sporadically mixed in throughout the novel, which made it super difficult because previous battles were always being referenced and I wouldn't figure out what had happened in that battle until chapters later. I wish it would have been more clearly explained, since it would have made reading it a ton easier.
Overall this was a super good book, and I didn't mind the couple of things that bothered me too much. If you liked Meyer's previous books, I would definitely check this one out!
Saturday, November 11, 2017
Book Review: We Were Liars
Title: We Were Liars
Author: E. Lockhart
Rating: 4/5 Stars
Series: N/A
Why: Recommended
I feel like I should start with a disclaimer that I did not include the writing style as a factor when rating this book. I'm not a huge fan of the fragmented writing style just because of how my brain works and what it needs in order to connect the dots, and I didn't feel like it was fair to give this book 2 or 3 stars because I loved everything about it but the writing style. I'm trying to separate my feelings about the writing style and my feelings about the story, since I know that some people love the whole fragments thing.
Review disclaimed. (Not even sure that's how you use that word but whatever I'm going with it)
So this book required me to go out of my comfort zone a little bit. I mean first of all I had to walk to the OTHER SIDE of the library (Fun fact: I walked to the science fiction/fantasy side out of habit and had to be pointed in the other direction. That's how frequently I venture away from "my side" of the library) And secondly I read a book that was NOT science fiction or fantasy. Putting sci-fi/fantasy aside, my next favorite genres are mystery, crime, and horror (can't watch scary movies by Stephen King books are okay for some reason?) so it wasn't like I was reading romance or anything, but it was still abnormal for me. Also it was like 200 pages shorter than my normal read. My books are normally 400-1000 pages, and this was a whopping like 220 pages. That said... I really liked it!
The first part of the book is confusing as heck. I had no idea where I was, who was speaking, what was going on, any of that. And what I didn't know when reading this part (it makes sense in the middle/end of the book but it's not a spoiler so... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ) is that there is an actual purpose behind how the beginning of this book is structured. The fragments have a purpose, it's just really hard to know/understand that until later in the book. Once you get past the first part of the book the writing becomes more "normal" and it was a lot easier to understand. And then the end gets all fragmenty again but, like I said before, there's a purpose to it and by that point in the book I realized what was going on and why the writing style was like that.
Basically this book is about this huge mystery surrounding Cadence's (the narrator) accident, but it also touches on some really important issues surrounding family dynamics and how the families on the island treat other people (and their own children). There were two things that I really liked about this book, but they are so different from each other that it's almost hard to imagine that they come from the same book.
So I made a list-ish thing because lists.
1. The plot. Specifically the ending. I pride myself in being able to tell when plot twists are coming pretty easily (except in A Song of Ice and Fire because the plot twists are insane in that thing) but when the ending came I just sat there in shock for a good minute or so. The book was like "turn left here" and I was like nope I'm gonna turn right because I'm SO SMART but the book predicted that ahead of time and I'm having a meltdown as I type this because I still feel so betrayed/shocked. Basically if you think you know what's going on in the book YOU DON'T.
2. The issues it talked about. The whole thing about Gat, the double speak that everyone on that entire island used, how the parents treated the Liars (which was just so messed up)... during some of these scenes I was honestly disgusted at the behavior of the adults. I really don't want to say anything more than I already have because it would get really spoiler-y but it was messed up.
This book was a really quick read, and I would definitely recommend it! The fragment writing wasn't my favorite thing, but it was a price I was willing to pay for the story.
See this review on Goodreads.
Author: E. Lockhart
Rating: 4/5 Stars
Series: N/A
Why: Recommended
I feel like I should start with a disclaimer that I did not include the writing style as a factor when rating this book. I'm not a huge fan of the fragmented writing style just because of how my brain works and what it needs in order to connect the dots, and I didn't feel like it was fair to give this book 2 or 3 stars because I loved everything about it but the writing style. I'm trying to separate my feelings about the writing style and my feelings about the story, since I know that some people love the whole fragments thing.
Review disclaimed. (Not even sure that's how you use that word but whatever I'm going with it)
So this book required me to go out of my comfort zone a little bit. I mean first of all I had to walk to the OTHER SIDE of the library (Fun fact: I walked to the science fiction/fantasy side out of habit and had to be pointed in the other direction. That's how frequently I venture away from "my side" of the library) And secondly I read a book that was NOT science fiction or fantasy. Putting sci-fi/fantasy aside, my next favorite genres are mystery, crime, and horror (can't watch scary movies by Stephen King books are okay for some reason?) so it wasn't like I was reading romance or anything, but it was still abnormal for me. Also it was like 200 pages shorter than my normal read. My books are normally 400-1000 pages, and this was a whopping like 220 pages. That said... I really liked it!
The first part of the book is confusing as heck. I had no idea where I was, who was speaking, what was going on, any of that. And what I didn't know when reading this part (it makes sense in the middle/end of the book but it's not a spoiler so... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ) is that there is an actual purpose behind how the beginning of this book is structured. The fragments have a purpose, it's just really hard to know/understand that until later in the book. Once you get past the first part of the book the writing becomes more "normal" and it was a lot easier to understand. And then the end gets all fragmenty again but, like I said before, there's a purpose to it and by that point in the book I realized what was going on and why the writing style was like that.
Basically this book is about this huge mystery surrounding Cadence's (the narrator) accident, but it also touches on some really important issues surrounding family dynamics and how the families on the island treat other people (and their own children). There were two things that I really liked about this book, but they are so different from each other that it's almost hard to imagine that they come from the same book.
So I made a list-ish thing because lists.
1. The plot. Specifically the ending. I pride myself in being able to tell when plot twists are coming pretty easily (except in A Song of Ice and Fire because the plot twists are insane in that thing) but when the ending came I just sat there in shock for a good minute or so. The book was like "turn left here" and I was like nope I'm gonna turn right because I'm SO SMART but the book predicted that ahead of time and I'm having a meltdown as I type this because I still feel so betrayed/shocked. Basically if you think you know what's going on in the book YOU DON'T.
2. The issues it talked about. The whole thing about Gat, the double speak that everyone on that entire island used, how the parents treated the Liars (which was just so messed up)... during some of these scenes I was honestly disgusted at the behavior of the adults. I really don't want to say anything more than I already have because it would get really spoiler-y but it was messed up.
This book was a really quick read, and I would definitely recommend it! The fragment writing wasn't my favorite thing, but it was a price I was willing to pay for the story.
See this review on Goodreads.
Saturday, October 21, 2017
Book Review: Tower of Dawn
Title: Tower of Dawn
Author: Sarah J. Maas
Rating: 2.5/5 Stars
Series: Throne of Glass (Book 6)
Why?: Series
My expectations for this book were a bit of a roller-coaster. At when after reading the first four books, my expectations were pretty high. After reading the fifth book, they went down a little. And after the first 20 pages of this book, they went down a lot. Until about halfway through the book, I wasn't sure I was going to finish and was basically dragging myself through.
Here was my main problem: the plot twists were not twisty in the least. Within the first 30 pages I had successfully predicted 2 out of the 4 main plot twists. That's not a good thing. The characters were pretty predicable too, considering they followed the same track that a lot of this series has followed... Introduce pretty girl to handsome guy whom she originally hates, then make him take off his shirt and boom, they are in love. There isn't even a question if that will happen or not, it's basically a given.
So, main grievances: plot twists were not twisty, and characters were kinda generic/flat. Also, really slow beginning.
But the ending. This deserves a special little moment of pause because I actually kinda liked it. Like somewhere in my cold, stone heart there was a little bit of this weird happy feeling before I found something else to angrily fixate on. Basically because it seemed like a compromise so that the stone-hearted people such as myself would grudgingly admit that yes, that was a good ending. It is SO hard to talk about this without spoiling anything... But I liked it and I don't normally like the endings of these types of books so A+ for effort.
Am I glad that I finished this book? Definitely. And not only because it would have driven me nuts for days if I hadn't (giving up on books is SO hard for me). I feel like the ending was worth the first half of this book, just because it was so shocking for me that that is how it would end. Again, so hard to talk about it without spoiling anything but it was so atypical for this type of book that I couldn't help but applaud the deviation from the track.
The reason why my rating is so low is because while it was a quick read and besides the grievances listed above I didn't really have too many other problems, there was nothing (besides the ending) that jumped out at me and was like WHOA. It was just like... okay, I guess.
This book was supposed to help me determine if I was done following the series or not, but now I have no clue. Because it wasn't my favorite, but it wasn't completely awful.
See this review on Goodreads.
Author: Sarah J. Maas
Rating: 2.5/5 Stars
Series: Throne of Glass (Book 6)
Why?: Series
My expectations for this book were a bit of a roller-coaster. At when after reading the first four books, my expectations were pretty high. After reading the fifth book, they went down a little. And after the first 20 pages of this book, they went down a lot. Until about halfway through the book, I wasn't sure I was going to finish and was basically dragging myself through.
Here was my main problem: the plot twists were not twisty in the least. Within the first 30 pages I had successfully predicted 2 out of the 4 main plot twists. That's not a good thing. The characters were pretty predicable too, considering they followed the same track that a lot of this series has followed... Introduce pretty girl to handsome guy whom she originally hates, then make him take off his shirt and boom, they are in love. There isn't even a question if that will happen or not, it's basically a given.
So, main grievances: plot twists were not twisty, and characters were kinda generic/flat. Also, really slow beginning.
But the ending. This deserves a special little moment of pause because I actually kinda liked it. Like somewhere in my cold, stone heart there was a little bit of this weird happy feeling before I found something else to angrily fixate on. Basically because it seemed like a compromise so that the stone-hearted people such as myself would grudgingly admit that yes, that was a good ending. It is SO hard to talk about this without spoiling anything... But I liked it and I don't normally like the endings of these types of books so A+ for effort.
Am I glad that I finished this book? Definitely. And not only because it would have driven me nuts for days if I hadn't (giving up on books is SO hard for me). I feel like the ending was worth the first half of this book, just because it was so shocking for me that that is how it would end. Again, so hard to talk about it without spoiling anything but it was so atypical for this type of book that I couldn't help but applaud the deviation from the track.
The reason why my rating is so low is because while it was a quick read and besides the grievances listed above I didn't really have too many other problems, there was nothing (besides the ending) that jumped out at me and was like WHOA. It was just like... okay, I guess.
This book was supposed to help me determine if I was done following the series or not, but now I have no clue. Because it wasn't my favorite, but it wasn't completely awful.
See this review on Goodreads.
Book Review: Song of the Current
Title: Song of the Current
Author: Sarah Tolcser
Rating: 3/5 Stars
Series: Song of the Current (Book 1)
Why?: On TBR
I would like to apologize in advance for any sentences or paragraphs that do not make sense. I tried to give myself a pep talk before writing this review because I've been having trouble with words lately and all my brain could come up with was "I can has words." So it's been a rough couple of weeks.
Okay so I went into this book knowing that it was highly rated on Goodreads and that was about it. I didn't read the little summary on Goodreads or even the front cover flap because the cover was just so pretty and I am a hard-core cover judger. Not gonna lie. Over 75% of the books I read it's because I thought the cover looked interesting (and I should qualify this statement by saying that I'm standing in the science fiction/fantasy section when I do this cover-judging because... reasons). So just know that my expectations for this book were only based on it's rating on Goodreads when I added it to my TBR.
So I guess I'll start off with the negatives and then go into the positives, just to switch it up a bit.
What did I not like? The plot twist predictability. Granted, it's become a lot easier in recent years for me to figure out plot twists just because once you read a certain number of books you can start seeing these patterns in the storylines. However, with this book I felt like it was grabbing you by the hand and dragging you to the "big reveal," which wound up not being that big of a reveal because it was so dang obvious. I felt like you were supposed to be shocked when you discover *things* but for me it was kind of a "well DUH" moment. So, plot twists were not twisty.
Except the one at the end.
That one was cool.
My other main complaint was that there were romance teasings throughout the entire novel (which was okay, I mean romance isn't my things but as long as it's small I'll just pretend it doesn't exist) but then at the very end it was like romance to the MAX. There was all the romance was going on, and it felt like the last 50-100 pages belonged to a completely different book. I felt like it was just romance overload at the end... I know that in the blurb it's called a "romantic fantasy" (see I read it now...) but I felt like that only described the first 3/4ths of the book. The last 25% was just like pure romance. REALLY not my thing.
What did I like?
[Teeny tiny spoiler ahead. Like teeny tiny.]
I loved the setting. I think it's fairly obvious by now that my favorite time period to read about is when they have swords and minimal to no guns, and that the modern time period just isn't my thing. And this book had PIRATES. Caro wasn't Lila Bard, but she was still awesome! (Side note: super awesome to have a protagonist that isn't a fan of blood. Most protagonists are all cool and chill about it and Caro and I will be over there trying not to look at it.) And water gods... water is by far my favorite element to read about, and this just made me a little puddle of happiness (get it, puddle? because water? I'm so funny.)
Also the whole not-fitting-in motif/theme/thingy was so prevalent throughout this story and it made me so happy. Sometimes it can be so hard to feel like you belong somewhere, especially when certain things come naturally to everybody else, but not you. So the fact that Caro was in that situation and was able to work through it like a normal person would, she didn't just like wake up one day and all of her problems were solved. So the fact that this was a fun, action-packed story yet it was still so relatable (as relatable as a story can be with pirates, river gods, and shadow people) just made it so much easier to read and enjoy.
This is a really quick read. I read the last 200ish+ pages in like 50ish minutes? My math is bad so that could be wrong but anyway the book didn't drag at all (excluding that annoying romance part) and I didn't feel like I was dragging myself through the entire thing. Even all of the sailing stuff couldn't slow me down mostly because I just skipped over it and figured out what had happened from context clues (one of the most useful things I've ever learned from English classes in school).
I would definitely recommend this book to other people. It's fun, it's quick, and there are PIRATES.
Just maybe read the blurb first. It might help.
See this review on Goodreads.
Author: Sarah Tolcser
Rating: 3/5 Stars
Series: Song of the Current (Book 1)
Why?: On TBR
I would like to apologize in advance for any sentences or paragraphs that do not make sense. I tried to give myself a pep talk before writing this review because I've been having trouble with words lately and all my brain could come up with was "I can has words." So it's been a rough couple of weeks.
Okay so I went into this book knowing that it was highly rated on Goodreads and that was about it. I didn't read the little summary on Goodreads or even the front cover flap because the cover was just so pretty and I am a hard-core cover judger. Not gonna lie. Over 75% of the books I read it's because I thought the cover looked interesting (and I should qualify this statement by saying that I'm standing in the science fiction/fantasy section when I do this cover-judging because... reasons). So just know that my expectations for this book were only based on it's rating on Goodreads when I added it to my TBR.
So I guess I'll start off with the negatives and then go into the positives, just to switch it up a bit.
What did I not like? The plot twist predictability. Granted, it's become a lot easier in recent years for me to figure out plot twists just because once you read a certain number of books you can start seeing these patterns in the storylines. However, with this book I felt like it was grabbing you by the hand and dragging you to the "big reveal," which wound up not being that big of a reveal because it was so dang obvious. I felt like you were supposed to be shocked when you discover *things* but for me it was kind of a "well DUH" moment. So, plot twists were not twisty.
Except the one at the end.
That one was cool.
My other main complaint was that there were romance teasings throughout the entire novel (which was okay, I mean romance isn't my things but as long as it's small I'll just pretend it doesn't exist) but then at the very end it was like romance to the MAX. There was all the romance was going on, and it felt like the last 50-100 pages belonged to a completely different book. I felt like it was just romance overload at the end... I know that in the blurb it's called a "romantic fantasy" (see I read it now...) but I felt like that only described the first 3/4ths of the book. The last 25% was just like pure romance. REALLY not my thing.
What did I like?
[Teeny tiny spoiler ahead. Like teeny tiny.]
I loved the setting. I think it's fairly obvious by now that my favorite time period to read about is when they have swords and minimal to no guns, and that the modern time period just isn't my thing. And this book had PIRATES. Caro wasn't Lila Bard, but she was still awesome! (Side note: super awesome to have a protagonist that isn't a fan of blood. Most protagonists are all cool and chill about it and Caro and I will be over there trying not to look at it.) And water gods... water is by far my favorite element to read about, and this just made me a little puddle of happiness (get it, puddle? because water? I'm so funny.)
Also the whole not-fitting-in motif/theme/thingy was so prevalent throughout this story and it made me so happy. Sometimes it can be so hard to feel like you belong somewhere, especially when certain things come naturally to everybody else, but not you. So the fact that Caro was in that situation and was able to work through it like a normal person would, she didn't just like wake up one day and all of her problems were solved. So the fact that this was a fun, action-packed story yet it was still so relatable (as relatable as a story can be with pirates, river gods, and shadow people) just made it so much easier to read and enjoy.
This is a really quick read. I read the last 200ish+ pages in like 50ish minutes? My math is bad so that could be wrong but anyway the book didn't drag at all (excluding that annoying romance part) and I didn't feel like I was dragging myself through the entire thing. Even all of the sailing stuff couldn't slow me down mostly because I just skipped over it and figured out what had happened from context clues (one of the most useful things I've ever learned from English classes in school).
I would definitely recommend this book to other people. It's fun, it's quick, and there are PIRATES.
Just maybe read the blurb first. It might help.
See this review on Goodreads.
Sunday, October 15, 2017
Book Review: The Dazzling Heights
Title: The Dazzling Heights
Author: Katharine McGee
Rating: 4/5 Stars
Series: The Thousandth Floor (Book 2)
Reason: On TBR
So, in my Instagram post I compared this book to Thor: The Dark World. I feel like I should explain that a little. Basically a ton of people hated the 2nd Thor movie because its plot resembled the first one quite closely. Personally, I didn't mind. The same goes for this book. The structure is the same as the first one (introduce dead person in the first chapter, now try and figure it out throughout the rest of the book), and normally that would bother the heck out of me. We all know my patience is about the size of a shot glass, maybe even smaller. But I was too wrapped up in all of the drama and the twists and the turns to give it a second thought. Like I thought about it at the very beginning, and then forgot about it until the very end. Basically what I'm saying is that while normally that type of structure would bother me, it didn't in this book because the story was so good.
So this basically takes up the story where the first book left off, and one of the things that made me really happy was the fact that what the characters had experienced wasn't trivialized. A lot of times in books the characters will wake up the day after the big crashing event only to realize that life is perfect and the sun is shining with happy flowers and all that jazz. Not here. The characters are (rightfully) struggling to come to terms with what happened on the roof, and how it will affect the rest of their lives (along with all of the dirt Leda has on them). There are still all of these misconceptions that the main characters have about that night on the roof, and the events leading up to it. Man and the dramatic irony... sometimes I just wanted to scream at the characters that they were wrong but I couldn't because... you know... it wouldn't do anything.
Calliope became my official new favorite character in this series. I can't really talk about why without spoiling it (dang it) but let's just say her character development was wonderful, and I really liked it at the end when [can't say what happens because it's a spoiler!]. It took me a second to remember who the old characters were from the first book, but they were so distinctive that eventually my brain decided to actually, you know, be useful, and it was a lot easier to follow the story after that. I loved learning how the characters were living their lives after everything that had happened, and watching them figure out new power dynamics and all of that.
This book had a great plot, great characters, and a great story. My only minor complaint is that I predicted basically all of the twists ahead of time, but it was so twisty that I began doubting myself anyway so I'm not sure that I can really complain. And the DRAMA. So. Much. DRAMA.
I would like the next one now. Please.
See this review on Goodreads.
Author: Katharine McGee
Rating: 4/5 Stars
Series: The Thousandth Floor (Book 2)
Reason: On TBR
So, in my Instagram post I compared this book to Thor: The Dark World. I feel like I should explain that a little. Basically a ton of people hated the 2nd Thor movie because its plot resembled the first one quite closely. Personally, I didn't mind. The same goes for this book. The structure is the same as the first one (introduce dead person in the first chapter, now try and figure it out throughout the rest of the book), and normally that would bother the heck out of me. We all know my patience is about the size of a shot glass, maybe even smaller. But I was too wrapped up in all of the drama and the twists and the turns to give it a second thought. Like I thought about it at the very beginning, and then forgot about it until the very end. Basically what I'm saying is that while normally that type of structure would bother me, it didn't in this book because the story was so good.
So this basically takes up the story where the first book left off, and one of the things that made me really happy was the fact that what the characters had experienced wasn't trivialized. A lot of times in books the characters will wake up the day after the big crashing event only to realize that life is perfect and the sun is shining with happy flowers and all that jazz. Not here. The characters are (rightfully) struggling to come to terms with what happened on the roof, and how it will affect the rest of their lives (along with all of the dirt Leda has on them). There are still all of these misconceptions that the main characters have about that night on the roof, and the events leading up to it. Man and the dramatic irony... sometimes I just wanted to scream at the characters that they were wrong but I couldn't because... you know... it wouldn't do anything.
Calliope became my official new favorite character in this series. I can't really talk about why without spoiling it (dang it) but let's just say her character development was wonderful, and I really liked it at the end when [can't say what happens because it's a spoiler!]. It took me a second to remember who the old characters were from the first book, but they were so distinctive that eventually my brain decided to actually, you know, be useful, and it was a lot easier to follow the story after that. I loved learning how the characters were living their lives after everything that had happened, and watching them figure out new power dynamics and all of that.
This book had a great plot, great characters, and a great story. My only minor complaint is that I predicted basically all of the twists ahead of time, but it was so twisty that I began doubting myself anyway so I'm not sure that I can really complain. And the DRAMA. So. Much. DRAMA.
I would like the next one now. Please.
See this review on Goodreads.
Monday, October 2, 2017
Book Review: Ready Player One
Title: Ready Player One
Author: Ernest Cline
Rating: 3/5 Stars
Series: N/A
Reason for Reading: On TBR
Before I begin with the review, I want to add a disclaimer to my 3 star rating. It's more of a grudging 3-star rating. Based on the content of the novel alone (i.e. story, plot, premise, characters, writing, etc.) I would have given it more of a 2-2.5 for reasons I will explain later. But I was just so drawn into this book that I didn't even like that much that I had to up the rating. I wasn't a huge fan of the characters, or of the story. But it was just so addictive that once I picked it up I HAD to keep reading.
This reminds me kinda of the Eye of Minds series, but better. Basically it's set in a futuristic world, where everyone has gotten sucked into this virtual reality called OASIS (btw I love the name, for reasons I will also explain down there VVVV) because real life is kinda awful since the entire planet has really deteriorated. OASIS reminded me of the Wizards 101 game that used to have ads everywhere probably like 8ish years ago? I had to Google to confirm that this game was actually a thing but whenever wizards were mentioned in Ready Player One I thought of the wizard from the Wizards 101 ad and yeah it was weird. Our main character is Wade Watts, who spends most of his time in OASIS looking for the key to the fortune of OASIS' creator. There's also your standard evil company, IOI, which is trying to charge everyone huge amounts of money to use the (mostly) free game.
Ready Player One is full of video game references that, if you are not a gamer, you probably won't get. Just putting that out there. I got the Oingo Boingo "Dead Man's Party" reference, since I grew up listening to it, but half of the games listed my brother probably knows, but I don't. He's the gamer, I've had my nose stuck up a book for years and have decided to never take it out. While other reviews have said that you can still enjoy the book without understanding the references, I feel like it would have been a lot more enjoyable had I actually known what he was talking about half of the time. Also tying into the fact that I'm not a gamer: I could never spend as much time was Wade does in this virtual world. I just really dislike video games, they have never really been my thing. So it was hard to connect to this desire to escape from the world by playing a video game, because when I want to escape I decide to read about King Henry VIII's 6 wives. Which is totally more relatable than video games.
So for my next little "this is what irritated me" segment, I feel like I need to explain how friggin GENIUS the name OASIS is for this simulation. So, normally when you are in the desert and you are dehydrated and struggling, you will see an oasis--you know, the palm trees and pond of water and all that jazz. You know it's a mirage, but you are still drawn to it because what if this time it's real? Now this is how OASIS fits so well. Real life stinks in this book. Wade lives in what is basically a city made out of trailers stacked on top of each other, pollution is a thing, there's a global energy crisis, it's awful. AKA it's our metaphorical desert. What is OASIS? An escape from the real world, where everything is awesome and you have the ability to become anyone that you wish to be. It's not real, but you wish that it was. AKA OASIS is our mirage.
Mini analytical freakout over.
Here is what bugs me about the characters though. I can't go too into detail without giving a bunch of stuff a way, so I am going to try and keep it as generic as possible. Basically all of the main characters in this novel, Wade included, have parts of themselves that either they are uncomfortable with, or they feel like society would be more accepting of them without said part/attribute. And they use OASIS to hide this. Yet throughout the entire book, despite the touted "self-acceptance" parts, these characters either a) get rid of said attributes, b) fail to be more comfortable with their attributes, or c) forget about their insecurities because INSTALOVE. Cline brings up these issues, some of which are actually really big in today's society, and then instead of addressing them either glosses over them, ignores them, or casually "fixes" the character. I feel like he should have used character development to address the issue, not just gloss over it.
So basically this was a really fast read that I couldn't put down, even though I really didn't love it and felt like it could have used some work on addressing some of the issues it brought up. I think a gamer would appreciate this book 100x more than I did, but it wasn't necessarily a bad book. It just wasn't really for me.
See this review on Goodreads.
Author: Ernest Cline
Rating: 3/5 Stars
Series: N/A
Reason for Reading: On TBR
Before I begin with the review, I want to add a disclaimer to my 3 star rating. It's more of a grudging 3-star rating. Based on the content of the novel alone (i.e. story, plot, premise, characters, writing, etc.) I would have given it more of a 2-2.5 for reasons I will explain later. But I was just so drawn into this book that I didn't even like that much that I had to up the rating. I wasn't a huge fan of the characters, or of the story. But it was just so addictive that once I picked it up I HAD to keep reading.
This reminds me kinda of the Eye of Minds series, but better. Basically it's set in a futuristic world, where everyone has gotten sucked into this virtual reality called OASIS (btw I love the name, for reasons I will also explain down there VVVV) because real life is kinda awful since the entire planet has really deteriorated. OASIS reminded me of the Wizards 101 game that used to have ads everywhere probably like 8ish years ago? I had to Google to confirm that this game was actually a thing but whenever wizards were mentioned in Ready Player One I thought of the wizard from the Wizards 101 ad and yeah it was weird. Our main character is Wade Watts, who spends most of his time in OASIS looking for the key to the fortune of OASIS' creator. There's also your standard evil company, IOI, which is trying to charge everyone huge amounts of money to use the (mostly) free game.
Ready Player One is full of video game references that, if you are not a gamer, you probably won't get. Just putting that out there. I got the Oingo Boingo "Dead Man's Party" reference, since I grew up listening to it, but half of the games listed my brother probably knows, but I don't. He's the gamer, I've had my nose stuck up a book for years and have decided to never take it out. While other reviews have said that you can still enjoy the book without understanding the references, I feel like it would have been a lot more enjoyable had I actually known what he was talking about half of the time. Also tying into the fact that I'm not a gamer: I could never spend as much time was Wade does in this virtual world. I just really dislike video games, they have never really been my thing. So it was hard to connect to this desire to escape from the world by playing a video game, because when I want to escape I decide to read about King Henry VIII's 6 wives. Which is totally more relatable than video games.
So for my next little "this is what irritated me" segment, I feel like I need to explain how friggin GENIUS the name OASIS is for this simulation. So, normally when you are in the desert and you are dehydrated and struggling, you will see an oasis--you know, the palm trees and pond of water and all that jazz. You know it's a mirage, but you are still drawn to it because what if this time it's real? Now this is how OASIS fits so well. Real life stinks in this book. Wade lives in what is basically a city made out of trailers stacked on top of each other, pollution is a thing, there's a global energy crisis, it's awful. AKA it's our metaphorical desert. What is OASIS? An escape from the real world, where everything is awesome and you have the ability to become anyone that you wish to be. It's not real, but you wish that it was. AKA OASIS is our mirage.
Mini analytical freakout over.
Here is what bugs me about the characters though. I can't go too into detail without giving a bunch of stuff a way, so I am going to try and keep it as generic as possible. Basically all of the main characters in this novel, Wade included, have parts of themselves that either they are uncomfortable with, or they feel like society would be more accepting of them without said part/attribute. And they use OASIS to hide this. Yet throughout the entire book, despite the touted "self-acceptance" parts, these characters either a) get rid of said attributes, b) fail to be more comfortable with their attributes, or c) forget about their insecurities because INSTALOVE. Cline brings up these issues, some of which are actually really big in today's society, and then instead of addressing them either glosses over them, ignores them, or casually "fixes" the character. I feel like he should have used character development to address the issue, not just gloss over it.
So basically this was a really fast read that I couldn't put down, even though I really didn't love it and felt like it could have used some work on addressing some of the issues it brought up. I think a gamer would appreciate this book 100x more than I did, but it wasn't necessarily a bad book. It just wasn't really for me.
See this review on Goodreads.
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