Tuesday, May 8, 2018

Recently Read

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

Cline gives us a dystopian future where the economy has tanked because we ran out of fossil fuels and climate change. Also you can by smart guns in blister packs after an online background check but the gun won't work until a mandatory waiting period has lapsed. The people who live in this fucked up future work and play mostly in a virtual reality called the OASIS. The plot is basically an EVIL corporation tries to prevent our heroes from winning a game that will give them control of the OASIS. Mostly this is a story rapped around tons of 80's pop culture. It was apparently popular enough when it came out for Spielberg to make it into a movie. I read it. It was okay but nothing special. Definitely not worth the ten bucks for the ebook. Read it or don't.

Live Free or Die by John Ringo

It's a re-read for me. Ringo has written a first contact novel place, with permission, in Howard Taylor's Schlock Mercenary world but way before the events of the comic. A gate is placed in out solar system. An alien race shows up and gives us the old, "Nice place you got here. Be a shame if something happened to it." Earth has no choice but to pay Danegeld but a one guy starts looking for a way out. It's typical Ringo and the first in a trilogy. Very funny. Very well done. Also first in a trilogy.

2 comments:

Zendo Deb said...

The wait list at my library for "Ready Player 1" was about a year, so I read "Armada." also by Cline. Also OK - Also not great. Parts felt like a ripoff of "Ender's Game." With video games standing in for athletic games.

kahr40 said...

I looked at the synopsis for Armada. Looks like more of the same. At the price they want, I'll pass.