RELEASE DATE: April 05th, 2012
AUTHOR: Ernest Cline
GENRE: Young-Adult, Sci-fi, Adventure, fantasy.
PUBLISHER: Arrow Books
SUMMARY:
It’s the year 2044, and the real world has become an ugly place. We’re out of oil. We’ve wrecked the climate. Famine, poverty, and disease are widespread.
Like most of humanity, Wade Watts escapes this depressing reality by spending his waking hours jacked into the OASIS, a sprawling virtual utopia where you can be anything you want to be, where you can live and play and fall in love on any of ten thousand planets. And like most of humanity, Wade is obsessed by the ultimate lottery ticket that lies concealed within this alternate reality: OASIS founder James Halliday, who dies with no heir, has promised that control of the OASIS – and his massive fortune – will go to the person who can solve the riddles he has left scattered throughout his creation.
For years, millions have struggled fruitlessly to attain this prize, knowing only that the riddles are based in the culture of the late twentieth century. And then Wade stumbles onto the key to the first puzzle. Suddenly, he finds himself pitted against thousands of competitors in a desperate race to claim the ultimate prize, a chase that soon takes on terrifying real-world dimensions – and that will leave both Wade and his world profoundly changed.
This book has been sitting on my shelf for a very long time but the huge hype surrounding the movie piqued my interest so I finally gave it a shot and I really liked it. This is such a nostalgic read for all the classic video game lovers. It has a heavy dose of 80’s pop culture references and I really wasn’t familiar with all of them because I’m a 90’s kid but I still enjoyed it. I grew up playing classic video games like galaga, pac-man etc., and this book brought back some memories. The idea of virtual universe is always a fascinating aspect in sci-fi books and the author did an amazing job of portraying it in Ready Player One. It was the major highlight of this whole book. The characters were good but I liked Artemis and Aech more than Wade Watts, our main protagonist.
The story is set in a dystopian future 2044 where earth has become an ugly place to live. Climate has changed to a dangerous degree, there is food and fuel crisis, disease, famine and poverty spread everywhere. Like everyone else, to escape this ugly reality, Wade Watts spends his waking hours in Oasis, a virtual reality world created by James Halliday. In this world besides playing games, you can transform your looks and live as you want, and wherever you want in any of the planets. Before James Halliday’s death he hid a lottery ticket i.e. an easter egg somewhere in this alternate reality and the person who can find this egg after solving all his puzzles will gain his entire fortune. For five years, millions have tried to find this prize but everyone failed. Wade has spent years to learn everything about James Halliday and the 80’s pop culture. When he solves the first puzzle and gains his first key, everything becomes chaos. Hence the ultimate chase for the prize begins where he is hunted by dangerous people who want the prize for themselves. With such heavy competition, Wade needs to be anonymous and find the remaining two keys that will lead him to the ultimate prize.
Wade aka Parzival is a good character but honestly, he isn’t really my favorite protagonist. I don’t hate him but I don’t love him either. He’s a smart guy but sometimes his actions really annoyed me. Artemis and Aech are pretty good characters and it’s too bad that this book didn’t have their own POV’s. I loved both of them. It’s one of those cases where you liked secondary characters more than the protagonist. I loved Artemis’s spunky cool attitude and Aech’s fun personality. Both of their real identities is a mystery till the end. The little romance between Parzival and Artemis is kinda cute and it’s the perfect amount without distracting us from the story. I also enjoyed the friendship between Aech and Parzival. It’s one of the aspects I loved. The two Japanese kids Sho and Daito are nice additions to the plot although they didn’t played much part in it. The villain in this book isn’t that impressive but he isn’t bad either. I was really expecting a strong intimidating villain.
The plot was great and very unique. I expected it to be fully action packed but it’s really not. The whole book is all about solving puzzles by playing video games while escaping the enemies on your tail. The only real action you’ll get is at the end of the book, the ultimate battle which is my favorite part in this entire book. Also this book has a lot of 80’s pop culture references and people who aren’t familiar with them will definitely have a hard time connecting to them cause you don’t know what he’s talking about. You can say it’s one of the minor issues I had with this book. To be honest, I did liked them but I wish it didn’t have too much of them. The other issues I had was that the pacing felt uneven to me sometimes it was fast and sometimes it was very slow, and there are some info dumps which felt unnecessary to me. The plot twists were really good. when Aech’s real identity was revealed, I was totally surprised. The writing was okay-ish. The story was told in Wade’s POV but I wish it was told in multiple POV’s. The world building was fantastic. As I already said It’s the best part of this whole book. Oasis is a virtual paradise for all the geeks and the nerds.
Overall, it was a solid four star read for me. Despite issues, I really enjoyed this book. I wish I could give it a five star but I can’t ignore the issues. Nonetheless, It was a good read and I would love to check out Ernest’s other book Armada.
Recommend it?
I highly recommend this book to all the YA sci-fi book lovers!
MY RATING:[4/5 Stars]
I listened to this one, and I don’t think I would have loved it as much as I did if I had read it. There’s so much info dumping going on.
Great review!
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I’m glad you loved it and I agree with you on info dumping thing. Thank you! 😊
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I really enjoyed this book. It definitely wasn’t a perfect novel or anything, but it was just a lot of fun. It’ll be interesting to see what Cline comes up with in regards to the sequel that he’s writing.
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I’m glad you enjoyed it! Yeah, it was a fun book to read. I didn’t know there’s going to be a sequel to it. Thanks for the info! ☺️
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You’re welcome! 😁
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Wonderful review Raven and your pics on IG were brilliant by the way 😉
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Aww Thank you so much Sophie! 😊❤️
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Amazing review, Raven love! I still can’t believe I haven’t picked this one up! 💗xx
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Thank you, Melanie! I hope you pick this up soon! 😊❤️
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Multiple POVs would have been amazing in this story. There was a lot of 80’s culture in this book and I found that it was interesting despite not knowing all of the things he talked about. I hope that you enjoy his other novels if you give them a try. 🙂
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Yeah, I think I would’ve loved it more if there was more POVs in the book. I’m glad you enjoyed the 80s references. I liked them too but some times they seemed a bit too much to me. I would definitely give his other books a try. I’m hoping to pick up Armada next.
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I feel like I’m the only one who hasn’t read this yet. I need to get it together. Great review!
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Thank you! I hope you get to it soon! ☺️
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Thank you for the honest review Raven. I still haven’t read this, but I want to before I see the movie.
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You’re welcome! I hope you enjoy the book when you get to it! 🙂
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I have it on hold on Overdrive. BTW, Kara shared some more info about Stephanie on her last post and I just posted a tribute to her.
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Yeah, I’ve read it, It’s so sad. I will check out your post!
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Great review! I read this one recently and enjoyed it … I think you’re right, multiple perspectives would have been so interesting! Aech was my favorite; I would have loved to see his POV!
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Thank you, Kaila! I’m glad you agree with me! This book should’ve been written in multiple POV.
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The movie has me interested in this book too! I have it on Overdrive at my library so I definitely need to check it out before seeing the movie! And I love unique plots, I’m so excited to pick it up now! 🙂
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I hope you enjoy it Jen! 🙂
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Yeah I was born in the 90s too, so I didn’t get a lot of the references either. And I agree with you about a lot of the characters- I liked a lot of the side characters more than the protagonist too and was meh about the villain too. I did enjoy the plot as well (though yeah, I think I could’ve done with fewer references too) Great review!
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Thank you! I’m glad you agree with my review! I enjoyed the references, but soon they became a bit info dumpy for me when I didn’t get them. Yeah, I was hoping for a strong villain and this book needs a strong one so it was a bit disappointing. I loved Aech and Artemis!
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You’re welcome! Ah fair enough! And yes totally agree. Me too!
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My brother and I talked about this book when he read it and we wished it had multiple POVs too! It would have upped the tension and allowed readers to root for whichever character they wanted! He didn’t mind the references (he’s super smart though he was born in the 90s too!) but we agreed not for everyone!
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I totally agree! It would definitely upped the tension in the plot if it was written in multiple POV. Things slowed down in the middle with Wade’s daily routine, it felt unnecessary to me. I’m glad your brother enjoyed the references.
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Yaaayie!! I am glaaad you liked it!! It was sooo freaking enjoyable, I’ve already written my review but haven’t got the chance to post it yet. The movie was also sooooooooo good!! Great review Raven!
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Thank you, Poulami! 😊❤️
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You’re welcome! ❤
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