Ready Player Two
Summary:
An unexpected quest. Two worlds at stake. Are you ready?
Days after Oasis founder James Halliday's contest, Wade Watts makes a discovery that changes everything. Hidden within Halliday's vault, waiting for his heir to find, lies a technological advancement that will once again change the world and make the Oasis a thousand times more wondrous, and addictive, than even Wade dreamed possible. With it comes a new riddle and a new quest. A last Easter egg from Halliday, hinting at a mysterious prize. And an unexpected, impossibly powerful, and dangerous new rival awaits, one who will kill millions to get what he wants. Wade's life and the future of the Oasis are again at stake, but this time the fate of humanity also hangs in the balance. (Summary and cover courtesy of goodreads.com)
Review:
Ok, ok – we all knew that a follow up on “Ready Player One” was going to be incredibly difficult to pull off, but Ernest Cline – what were you thinking at some points? I think there may have been a dual problem of extremely high expectations and potentially the book being rushed because this needed another edit.
At the beginning we quickly are brought up to speed on what happened since the ending of the last book and Wade proves to be completely unlikeable in so many ways. A sensitivity reader would have a field day with some (probably) well-intentioned comments that came off like a club to the head. And then Wade basically uses money to try to solve his problems and is the embodiment of a Sixer in trying to solve the latest hunt. The character interactions somehow just didn’t flow despite supposedly being “best friends” and the 80’s references felt very forced.
Don’t get me wrong – it was nice to revisit the world from the first book, but I really don’t think the shortcomings were enough to save this one for me!
Rating: 2 stars!
Who should read it? Only those who really really want to know what happens next, but only if you’ve read the first book.
Want to read the whole series?