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Ready Player One: A Novel
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - Now a major motion picture directed by Steven Spielberg. "Enchanting . . . Willy Wonka meets The Matrix."--USA Today - "As one adventure leads expertly to the next, time simply evaporates."--Entertainment Weekly A world at stake. A quest for the ultimate prize. Are you ready? In the year 2045, reality is an ugly place. The only time Wade Watts really feels alive is when he's jacked into the OASIS, a vast virtual world where most of humanity spends their days. When the eccentric creator of the OASIS dies, he leaves behind a series of fiendish puzzles, based on his obsession with the pop culture of decades past. Whoever is first to solve them will inherit his vast fortune--and control of the OASIS itself. Then Wade cracks the first clue. Suddenly he's beset by rivals who'll kill to take this prize. The race is on--and the only way to survive is to win. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Entertainment Weekly - San Francisco Chronicle - Village Voice - Chicago Sun-Times - iO9 - The AV Club "Delightful . . . the grown-up's Harry Potter."--HuffPost "An addictive read . . . part intergalactic scavenger hunt, part romance, and all heart."--CNN "A most excellent ride . . . Cline stuffs his novel with a cornucopia of pop culture, as if to wink to the reader."--Boston Globe "Ridiculously fun and large-hearted . . . Cline is that rare writer who can translate his own dorky enthusiasms into prose that's both hilarious and compassionate."--NPR "[A] fantastic page-turner . . . starts out like a simple bit of fun and winds up feeling like a rich and plausible picture of future friendships in a world not too distant from our own."--iO9
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Community Reviews
I really enjoyed the story! It is set in a futuristic future and most of the book takes place within a video game.
I wanted to read this before the movie came out, and because my husband strongly recommended it. He'd give it 5 stars.
I should be the perfect audience for this book - I lived the 80's, and started computer games back then. Zork and Wizardry were my earliest computer games, and my friends who loved arcades lived on Space Invaders and Centipede. But this book was just over the top. These gamers had more than 24 hours in a day, and more than 365 days in a year if they got the expertise in all these games and watched and rewatched all those movies so many times that they memorized the dialogues of multiple movies.
The social commentary of the book is excellent though, with so much of life done through virtual reality and the extremes of income inequality. The more I play with my Oculus Rift (okay, yep, I'm that much of a grey-haired gamer), the more I see what it will be capable of in the near future, and I predict that a lot of education will be done with it.
It's an enjoyable book, but you do have to be the target audience.
I should be the perfect audience for this book - I lived the 80's, and started computer games back then. Zork and Wizardry were my earliest computer games, and my friends who loved arcades lived on Space Invaders and Centipede. But this book was just over the top. These gamers had more than 24 hours in a day, and more than 365 days in a year if they got the expertise in all these games and watched and rewatched all those movies so many times that they memorized the dialogues of multiple movies.
The social commentary of the book is excellent though, with so much of life done through virtual reality and the extremes of income inequality. The more I play with my Oculus Rift (okay, yep, I'm that much of a grey-haired gamer), the more I see what it will be capable of in the near future, and I predict that a lot of education will be done with it.
It's an enjoyable book, but you do have to be the target audience.
SHUT UP IT WAS SO GOOD. This is one of those books I was not reading because everyone was telling me to and I was being an ass about it. LEARN FROM MY MISTAKES AND READ THIS. I haven't read anything this well written, developed, instantly lovable in a while. The characters are relatable and dynamic, the world of the OASIS is beautifully described and the entire concept of the book was delightfully interesting. 20 out of 10 recommend to anyone who has even looked at this book in passing.
I was pleasantly surprised by this book!
I'm not a gamer, nor am I familiar with 80s pop culture, but that didn't stop me from enjoying the book. I loved the OASIS and Parzival/Wade's adventure in it.
There was quite a bit of info dumping in the beginning, so the book starts out slowly, but the last half was great, action packed and fast paced!
If you read this after watching the movie, or will watch the movie after you read the book, please do yourself a favor and don't expect anything to be the same. I enjoyed both the movie and the book, but they're completely separate things in my opinion. Both good for different reasons.
I was, however, left feeling a little disappointed and with some of questions.
I think the book spent a little too much time developing the OASIS and not enough time on the real world. (Though that might well have been the point considering most spent nearly their entire day in the OASIS.) How did everything fall apart? Are things really so bad or did people just stop caring? Is the entire world so desolate and fallen to neglect? Or just America? I would have liked all of this explored a little bit more.
In the end, I enjoyed the book and it took me long a little over a week to finish it. And Wil Wheaton did a fantastic job with the narration! Was it just me, or does he sound like Zach Appelman, the narrator from All the Light We Cannot See?
I'm not a gamer, nor am I familiar with 80s pop culture, but that didn't stop me from enjoying the book. I loved the OASIS and Parzival/Wade's adventure in it.
There was quite a bit of info dumping in the beginning, so the book starts out slowly, but the last half was great, action packed and fast paced!
If you read this after watching the movie, or will watch the movie after you read the book, please do yourself a favor and don't expect anything to be the same. I enjoyed both the movie and the book, but they're completely separate things in my opinion. Both good for different reasons.
I was, however, left feeling a little disappointed and with some of questions.
I think the book spent a little too much time developing the OASIS and not enough time on the real world. (Though that might well have been the point considering most spent nearly their entire day in the OASIS.) How did everything fall apart? Are things really so bad or did people just stop caring? Is the entire world so desolate and fallen to neglect? Or just America? I would have liked all of this explored a little bit more.
In the end, I enjoyed the book and it took me long a little over a week to finish it. And Wil Wheaton did a fantastic job with the narration! Was it just me, or does he sound like Zach Appelman, the narrator from All the Light We Cannot See?
This book had me telling Alexa to key up the 80's station. I was barely more than a seed in 1980, but I grew up listening to the music on my Dad's ridiculously sized stereo speakers. I'd forgotten what an awesome decade it was.
The author did a good job describing the games, movies, and the virtual world â almost to the point of boredom. Despite the occasional pages of monotonous details, it was still enjoyable.
My only real gripe about the whole book was the occasional bad language. I'm a bit of a Puritan in that area, but I felt like it didn't add anything to the book. (It rarely ever does.) The atheistic views also soured my stomach and added no value to the book whatsoever. Leaving it out would've allowed me to hand it off to a young reader in good conscience.
The reason for 4 rather than 3 stars is because I know this will be one of those books that will poke its head into my sub-conscience for a long time. It also renewed a spark for the culture of that decade. That kind of reaction deserves an extra star.
The author did a good job describing the games, movies, and the virtual world â almost to the point of boredom. Despite the occasional pages of monotonous details, it was still enjoyable.
My only real gripe about the whole book was the occasional bad language. I'm a bit of a Puritan in that area, but I felt like it didn't add anything to the book. (It rarely ever does.) The atheistic views also soured my stomach and added no value to the book whatsoever. Leaving it out would've allowed me to hand it off to a young reader in good conscience.
The reason for 4 rather than 3 stars is because I know this will be one of those books that will poke its head into my sub-conscience for a long time. It also renewed a spark for the culture of that decade. That kind of reaction deserves an extra star.
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