“Ready Player One”
by Ernest Cline
Why you’d like it:
I think Ready Player One would be more interesting to someone who’s familiar with the 70s or 80s on some level, so I’d start there. The plot hinges on the references, sure, but the story’s compelling enough on its own. If you’re not sentimental for either of those eras or if it pisses you off to look up terms or titles you don’t understand, then you might not get as much out of it.
It’s the year 2044, and the real world is an ugly place.
Like most of humanity, Wade Watts escapes his grim surroundings by spending his waking hours jacked into the OASIS, a sprawling virtual utopia that lets you be anything you want to be, a place where you can live and play and fall in love on any of ten thousand planets.
And like most of humanity, Wade dreams of being the one to discover the ultimate lottery ticket that lies concealed within this virtual world. For somewhere inside this giant networked playground, OASIS creator James Halliday has hidden a series of fiendish puzzles that will yield massive fortune–and remarkable power–to whoever can unlock them.
For years, millions have struggled fruitlessly to attain this prize, knowing only that Halliday’s riddles are based in the pop culture he loved–that of the late twentieth century. And for years, millions have found in this quest another means of escape, retreating into happy, obsessive study of Halliday’s icons. Like many of his contemporaries, Wade is as comfortable debating the finer points of John Hughes’s oeuvre, playing Pac-Man, or reciting Devo lyrics as he is scrounging power to run his OASIS rig.
And then Wade stumbles upon the first puzzle.
Suddenly the whole world is watching, and thousands of competitors join the hunt–among them certain powerful players who are willing to commit very real murder to beat Wade to this prize. Now the only way for Wade to survive and preserve everything he knows is to win. But to do so, he may have to leave behind his oh-so-perfect virtual existence and face up to life–and love–in the real world he’s always been so desperate to escape.
A world at stake.
A quest for the ultimate prize.
Are you ready?
What I enjoyed:
Everything. Every single word. I’m not kidding. Speaking as a child of the 1980s, Ready Player One appealed to my nostalgic sensibilities in ways I’d forgotten were possible. So many of the movies, video games, TV shows, and even music that I remember came to life from the pages of this book. The Dark Crystal, Monty Python, Back to the Future, Rush, WarGames, Legend, Star Wars, Golden Axe, Indiana Jones, Dungeons and Dragons… If you identify as a geek, then the referential treasures will abound. It also doesn’t hurt that the main character, Wade Watts, is the kind of person every entertainment-obsessed gamer would want to hang out with in a not-so-distant dystopia.
My two cents of constructive criticism:
It’s only 372 pages. For shame! (Just kidding, Mr. Cline. But seriously, please write a sequel someday!)
How it made me feel:
Compelled. Giddy. Inspired. At several points while reading, I had to mark my page and put down the book so I could flail with excitement. Does that sum it up?
What it reminded me of:
Tron meets Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
What I thought after finishing the last line:
“I WANT TO READ IT AGAIN, RIGHT NOW.”
Memorable, spoiler-free quotes:
“No one in the world ever gets what they want and that is beautiful.”
“It was the dawn of a new era, one where most of the human race now spent all of their free time inside a videogame.”
“Chaotic Neutral, sugar.”
Next time, I’ll be reviewing The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. See you then!
I don’t know why but the line, “Chaotic Neutral, sugar” alone makes me want to read it.
That’s one of the lines that caused me to flail. 🙂
You would love it, Nick! Read it. For real.