“Do you remember one year when that player – Leeroy something – actually got drafted into the Stormchasers, even though he always just charged in and messed up his entire team’s play? My God, he was terrible.”
You read that right, my loves: Marie Lu references freaking Leeroy Jenkins in her writing. I mean, how could I give this book anything less than all the stars?
When I first finished this book, I was leaning towards 4.5 stars and couldn’t decide if I should round up or down, but once I let the dust settle a little, I realized this book was honestly 99.3% flawlessness.
PLOT ➳➳
Emika Chen is a hacker and a bounty hunter, struggling to make ends meet by searching out criminals who manipulate the legalities of the worldwide phenomenon, Warcross: an augmented reality game that something like 90% of the world logs into at least weekly. While Emika is incredibly good at what she does, times are hard, and she’s about to be homeless when a misplaced hacking move launches her into a very important Warcross game with the entire world watching, and suddenly, she’s being swept up into working for the creator of the game himself to hunt down the biggest Warcross criminal yet.
SETTING ➳➳
I loved the world that Marie Lu built in this book, because it’s just basically a tweaked version of our own Earth, with a few more technological advancements. The game feels like something that could be an actual possibility over the next few decades, so the suspension of disbelief is really easy to come by when you’re reading Warcross. The game itself is magical and incredible, connecting users worldwide in a way that can make them feel as though they’re literally in the same room. They can play games, go shopping, or just meander through their daily lives with a little more “fun” than they had before.
CHARACTERS ➳➳
Emika is a really fun narrator. First of all, she’s a badass hacker without any of the stereotypical “geek girl” cliches that I’ve grown to expect from most books involving internet culture. She’s not a tomboy, she’s confident without being arrogant, she has a social life (and the mentions to her dating life are super sex-positive, which I love, because can we just get over the whole slut-shaming-in-YA idea?); Emika is her own person and she’s carving out her place in the world. Even when she develops feelings for the love interest in the story, she never becomes some gooey, lovesick mess – she keeps a good head on her shoulders.
There are a slew of side characters in this book, and while most of them don’t become tremendously fleshed out, most of them are pretty likable. Hideo is the only character besides Emika who we really learn very much about, but he’s an incredibly enjoyable aspect of the story, despite feeling a little blurry and “grey” for most of the book (I constantly found myself second-guessing his motives).
GAME MECHANICS ➳➳
As someone who has been gaming my entire life, including MMO playing, I loved the explanations of how the game worked, the ins and outs of the teams and their missions, the challenges they faced… It was so much fun and felt soauthentic! I loved that, during every challenge Emika and her team faced, it was so obvious that Marie is writing from experience.
THE TWIST (no spoilers!) ➳➳
As you know from the plot synopsis, Emika is hired by Hideo to hunt down the mysterious hacker who has been evading Warcross’s security measures for some time now. Obviously, being mysterious means the big reveal is a pretty big aspect to the book, so I won’t spoil anything, but what I will say is that I had a LOT of feelings about the end of this book, and it is a huge cliffhanger ending, and now I feel like I’m going to basically fret myself half to death while waiting on the release of book #2.
FINAL VERDICT ➳➳
This book is pure amazingness, and I recommend it to any YA reader, but especially a YA reader with a love for video games, because this will be right up your alley and I can almost guarantee that you will enjoy it at least a little bit (but probably a lot).
Thank you SO much to Edelweiss and the people at G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers for approving me for this ARC! All opinions expressed here are entirely my own.
Releases Sep 12, 2017
Kristin @ Kristin Kraves Books
July 23, 2017One of my most anticipated releases! I can not wait to get my hands on this book! Great review!
Destiny @ Howling Libraries
July 23, 2017Enjoy! I hate that the release is so far away because I need to discuss this book with more people! lol
Life of a Literary Nerd
July 23, 2017Great review, I,can’t wait to read this book!
Destiny @ Howling Libraries
July 23, 2017I hope you love it! I really can’t recommend it enough.
Life of a Literary Nerd
July 23, 2017I have an eARC, I’ll probably get to it for #ARCAugust.
Deanna Reads Books
July 23, 2017So glad you liked this one so much! As soon as I heard about this one I put it on my list, but I had my doubts. I’m excited to read it now!
Deanna reads Books
Destiny @ Howling Libraries
July 23, 2017I hope you love it as much as I did!
kozbisa
July 23, 2017Marie Lu is a genius and I love all her books. Your review was so good and totally has me pumped for this.
Destiny @ Howling Libraries
July 26, 2017Thank you! I’m so glad you liked it. 🙂 This was my first book by her and now I can’t wait to try more! Do you have a specific recommendation to read next?
kozbisa
July 26, 2017The Legend series is one of my top series. I cannot even talk about it without getting chills. Every time I think about how she ended it. The feels!
Destiny @ Howling Libraries
July 29, 2017Awesome! I will definitely move that one up on my TBR, then!
EIise @thebookishactress
July 23, 2017I’m so glad you loved this, Destiny!! I just got an arc and am so happy about it.
Destiny @ Howling Libraries
July 26, 2017Ahhh YAY! I can’t wait to hear your thoughts!
amyriadofbooks
July 26, 2017I’ve heard nothing but amazing things about this book! I wish I could get my hands on an ARC, but I’m holding out! Marie Lu will be about 3 hours away for the book tour so I’m definitely going to see her and get this signed!
Destiny @ Howling Libraries
July 29, 2017Have you tried Edelweiss? That’s where I got mine! Oh man, that’s awesome! 🙂 I’ve never been to a book signing but I think I will be going to one by Victoria Schwab next month and I’m so excited.
amyriadofbooks
July 30, 2017I’ve signed up but I’ve never requested. The downloading part doesn’t seem as easy for my Kindle, and it intimidates me. ?
Destiny @ Howling Libraries
July 31, 2017Oh, it’s kind of annoying! You have to put in your kindle email address, that you find under your Amazon settings, and then add their email address to your approved senders… but once you do it one time, you don’t have to tinker with it anymore. 🙂
amyriadofbooks
August 1, 2017That sounds similar to NetGalley. I’ll have to give it a try.
Destiny @ Howling Libraries
August 1, 2017Yeah, it’s very similar!
Cass, Words on Paper (@cc9309)
July 28, 2017Holy crap. I need to finish off Champion ASAP so that I can start this one when it comes out!!! You just got my excitement levels from a 10/10 to like a million! Yes, yes, yes! This sounds fabulous, and exactly the kind of badass book I have come to expect from Marie Lu! I did my fair share of MMO playing back in high school days, so it’ll be fun to read this one, I’m sure! Thanks for the review!
Cass @ Words on Paper
Destiny @ Howling Libraries
July 29, 2017Definitely do! I hope you love it! 😀