Synopsis:
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?
My review:
I first heard about this book on The Readers podcast. I listened to it again after having read the book and I firmly agree with all of the points Simon and Gav make.
Before I began reading the book, I was worried that I wouldn't get the pop culture references. Although I belong to the demographic of children of the 80s, my family was poor and we lived in so small a town that it couldn't even be called a town. I lived a rather sheltered and backwater childhood. I think most of the references to 80s pop culture that I understand are mostly ones I know about from later in life. Although we had a Commodore 64, that wasn't until the 90s. I think our family and myself have been the opposite of early-adopters. Even though we wanted those things when we were kids, we couldn't afford them and so I think we've just gotten used to having to wait until most of the hype has died down before we get it, if we do at all. The time in one's life when most people tend to become gamers, I was too poor and never had the opportunity for that obsession to grow. Although it is set in a gamer environment, it's not so over my head as to be inaccessible. Most of the video game-related references were lost on me simply because I'm not a gamer. And sadly, "Ghosts 'N Goblins" and "Frogger" were never mentioned. So I just assumed that, aside from OASIS, all of the games, TV shows, and movies were real. And, frankly, I just can't be bothered to actually check if that's true. Whether they are or are not real is just irrelevant. And aside from the video game-specific references, my fears about the book were allayed when I read the definitive reference to the movie "The Last Starfighter".
Getting sidetracked by rereading BBW romances for a few days, I feared that I would lose interest in "Ready Player One". But luckily once I picked it up again, I was sucked back into it.
I was able to connect with Wade's character, mostly because of growing up poor, being good at school, and experiencing unrequited love. And it was easy to root for him and keep reading just to see what would happen next. There's a lot about the futuristic world and OASIS to be described but there is enough of the plot and character development interwoven with it that there's never too much of one aspect. The quick pacing of the story was great even with the exposition. The three main questions I had were "Will he or won't he win the contest?", "No matter who wins the contest, what will happen after?", and "Will Wade and Art3mis end up together or not?" And I am happy with the way those questions were answered.
It was a great book that I thoroughly enjoyed and would recommend to anyone. Because it is a quest novel, it is difficult for me to be interested in rereading it once I know how it ends. I really liked the book a lot but I won't be keeping the copy that has been hovering on my bookshelves since I bought it. But if you are a gamer and/or a geek, you should definitely add it to your own bookshelves.
Read on,
Paula
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