Warcross
Ratings182
Average rating3.8
This was a 3-star book for me up until the last 15 pages and just wow.
I'm usually great at predicting endings of books but even I didn't see that coming. I'm shook.
But in other news, for the first time in two months I FINISHED A BOOK!!!!
Also the main character is named Emika Emi and I wanna know who let her have that name? It's mine. She can't have it.
Anyways, Me, Emi, and not the Emi in the book have actually finished a book. I actually remembered how to read!!! I'm just as surprised as you are.
I had my problems with it, obviously. I wanted to give it 3 stars for most of my read. But that might have to do with the fact for the two months I've been in this horrendous slump, I've spent more time then I probably should admit watching a group of dudes who suck at video games play video games. I'm not used to finding enjoyment if people playing video games well. If that makes sense?
Also Ready Player One exists and my brain really latched onto that mentality.
I might write a review. I might not. Who knows? Do people even miss my reviews? It's been two months.
DNF at 32%.
I'm not enjoying this at all, I can barely read a couple of pages without being annoyed. I was not expecting this since I loved her ‘Legend' and ‘The Young Elites' series but ‘Warcross' is not it. This feels like the plot of every gaming C-drama out there, only that the protagonist here sounds even more juvenile. I'll move on to another book, this is not for me.
So good! I imagine that it would be hard for this book to not be compared to Ready Player One. And while the similarities of a virtual are evident, the story line themselves are vastly different. Marie Lu paints such a glorious world in Warcrossed that I could not put this book down. I did predict one thing but I was also very wrong on another. Which is just fantastic!
*Disclaimer - I generally don't like YA books, so take that into account with this review.
I didn't like this book. I think the best parts were the bits where the VR sport was being played, which were fun sometimes. I am a pretty big fan of sci-fi, although I wasn't able to enjoy most of this since, one reason being that I didn't like the plot. I also usually don't enjoy the romance genre, so I didn't have much fun reading those bits.. I would not recommend this book unless you are a fan of YA novels, since although I didn't really enjoy the book, I can see people liking it. Also, It may just be me, but I believe the new form of law enforcement the 'twist villain' (Hideo Tanaka) presents is actually a decent idea, although somebody else should probably head the operation. One major flaw in this being that Hideo assumes everybody will use the VR headsets. What about people who don't like technology, what about people who own a different brand of VR headset, what about people who don't have enough to buy it, etc. Hideo actually attempts to resolve the last question, though again idiotically assumes that everybody in poverty will be able to have these free VR headsets, which even if they somehow do, the losses for his company will be substantial. Imagine owning a business & making a countless amount of items, just to give them out for free. How much money does Hideo have to be able to afford this? Also, even if everything works out with distributing these products, I wonder if Hideo or somebody else who can gain access to this system can/will make it so that people act even more barbaric than usual. And one more thing, if this method to enforce law is made very well, it will probably still be only in certain areas, like cities.
Why did i not pick this book up sooner!. This was soooooo sooo SOOOOOO good. beyond 5 stars for this one. If you are into hacking/technology/programming/video games this book is for you.
4.5 the book was written in a good pace and didnt drag on. really enjoyed the romance sprinkled in & how it didnt overpower the whole story line and i loved the surprise ending!
Daaaaamn, está muy bueno, genuinamente me tuvo en intriga mucha parte del libro, la construcción del mundo todo el tiempo es impresionante, me recuerda mucho a los geniales mundos que uno lee en Ready Player One pero mezclados con la realidad
Loved it. Loved everything about it. Kept me hooked and wanting more. Finished it in one go and couldn't put it down. Loved the concept and the characters and the writing. Gonna re-read it for sure!
A delightfully quick, young-adult novel. A little like ready player one, with better romance.
O.W.L. Readathon - Charm
read a book with a white cover
Warcross was thrilling and engaging and fast-paced and most importantly really really fun. I had a great time reading it, loved the setting and especially the fight scenes.
My only complaint is the boring af romance and the main character, that had no personality other than “stubborn but still really nice and selfless girl, thats supposed to be morally grey and a criminal but never actually does anything morally grey and when she does its for a greater cause” which I feel like I've read about in a thousand other books now.
But I still hat a lot of fun reading this, so who cares!
So fun! Only saw half of the plot twist coming. Great characters, great concept. Down for the next.
rainbow hair is not a personality trait
EDIT: y'all never consumed sci-fi media and it fucking shows
I didn't expect I would love ‘Warcross' as much as I do right now. It was great tbh. It had its flaws, but I loved the characters ;-;
I'd guessed one of the two big reveals, because, of course it just had to be that. The “hacking” wasn't much different than magic, but the author did a really good job of giving depth to her characters.
I'm real behind on my reviewing, so I've already got the library copy of sequel, Wildcard, in my possession. Matt saw it on the breakfast table this morning, and commented that it didn't look like a book I would normally pick up. So I told him how it was the sequel to a different book, that Warcross was a YA novel with a heroine who's a hacker and who plays this video game and makes friends with/lurrrrves the guy who created the video game but then has to thwart the system he's created and she's is basically the best hacker to ever hack, but she's not really scrappy (Matt asked if she was scrappy because all YA heroines are scrappy) because she's dating a billionaire and that makes scrappiness kind of unnecessary.
Which I felt was a pretty good summary for something he's never going to read. ANYWAY.
Overall, I really enjoyed. I have a small nitpick that might be a bigger nitpick when you think too hard about it, but WHY must every YA novel heroine be the greatest whatever of all time? Like, Emika seems to be a normal struggling bounty hunter that's about to get evicted because she can't pay her bills, and she hacks/glitches into a video game (which, to me, as a not-video-game-player, feels like she's maybe not that good at it if that happens?), and then the billionaire video game designer hires her because when he asked her to find a problem in his video game code it took her like a minute and a half, despite that his engineers whom he pays have spent hours and days and weeks looking for this problem, because she's the greatest hacker to ever hack despite having super out-of-date equipment and also a two year ban from using computers, but magically she's better at this than everyone who gets paid to create and maintain this game.
I know, I know ... because otherwise we have no story. Sigh.
I could punch some other holes in some other things, but like I said, I did like this, so I think I'll just leave it at that. The world within the game that Lu created was fun, Emika's teammates seemed cool even though she doesn't seem like someone you'd actually want to be on a team on (she like never showed up for practice!), the big bad was interesting and clearly I liked it enough to go ahead and request the sequel immediately, which almost never happens.
I listened to the audiobook and the reader was good.
I didn't know I needed this book in my life till I started it. It's populated with my personal wish fulfilment characters in a rainbow of representation.
Quit this shit about third of the way in.
Everyone nowadays is obsessed with the notion of a “strong female character”. I personally find it ridiculous, as a female character who is not necessarily a strong person can still be an interesting and strongly written one. Also, by now we all know it means one specific type of a female character and I don't like that type.
Emika is THAT type. She is 18, orphaned, super street smart. She has rainbow hair, tattoos, she is a master hacker and bounty hunter. Has no personality other than being super ‘cool', she also never really seems to actually do any of the work in connection with her hacking. She just looks at the code and magically knows what's wrong and what to do to fix it. Everything that goes wrong around her is the fault of someone else, because Emika herself is infallible and effortlessly so. Life just hates her, which should be a crime, as Emika is perfect. Casual lines dropped about a modelling agent discovering her as a child and being able to solve a whole programming introduction book as a teen without even reading it or going to class, because her dad had taught her to look at shit and SEE. I'm not making it up.
When your world is so heavily reliant on some sci-fi tech... you should genuinely think about it first. To me saying “the protagonist is just special and she knooooows everything because meh” doesn't cut it. It's a copout to write a book about a magical perfect teenage girl who becomes the most important, world-saving creature ever, while super scientists are also available. YA heroines are always the highest form of intellectual people and for some reason adults just deteriorate after 20. None of them are good for anything.
The totally obvious love interest is a cardboard cutout as well, mysterious dark guy genius youth and all. Who will fall for Emika for sure, because she is just so cool and so smart and so pretty. Blegh.
There is no way I'm reading more of this. It's so trope-filled and lame. It gives nothing special to you and it's cheesy.
Good night, I'm too cross with this to go on.
I found it to be a very intriguing read. The characters are amazing, the entire concept of the virtual reality was a one up from ready player one.
I did find certain parts a bit predictable, which is why I gave a 4/5.
Overall it was a good story and I am looking forward to reading the next one.
I really enjoyed this one! It reminded me a little bit of Ready Player One, but it definitely stands on its own! I will probably want to re-read this one in a few years and I'm looking forward to the sequel!
Emika Chen meretas The International Warcross Championships dan aksinya itu membuat game mengalami malfungsi. Bukannya dipenjara, Emika malah ditawari menjadi mata-mata oleh Hideo Tanaka, sang pencipta Warcross. Tanaka ingin Emika menjadi bounty hunter, melacak pemain Warcross yang bertaruh secara ilegal. Tak disangka, penyelidikannya menguak sebuah plot jahat yang bisa menghancurkan tak hanya Warcross, tapi juga tatanan dunia.
Setelah menikmati karya2 Marie terdahulu, dystopia & fantasy, aku jatuh cinta pad acara penulisannya. Marie Lu salah satu autobuy author bagiku. Kali ini Warcross agak ke sci-fi. Karena aku tidak suka main game jadi membutuhkan waktu yang agak lama supaya masuk ke dunia game, sama ketika aku membaca Ready Player One.
Entah kenapa karya Marie yg ini terasa kurang menyentuhku, berbeda dengan buku2 sebelumnya yang aku baca. Mungkun factor sci-fi juga yang membuatku kurang memahami apa yang ingin disampaikan penulis. Tapi aku pasti akan tetap membaca buku keduanya...