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Red Rising (Red Rising Saga, #1)

Pierce Brown

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What Members Thought

Jan 11, 2015 junia rated it it was amazing

Wow!!!!

I've been bothered by YA lately - it just felt like cotton candy, and they were all recycling the same tired old dystopian plot.

LOVE this.

He did a great job establishing the setting, poking holes and questions into our own mentality and thoughts, and this was just really great.

I love how he didn't fall back on an insipid romance and just how well-paced everything is.

Things connect. You feel. Quotes are GREAT in this book.

Well-written, even.

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Nov 04, 2013 Melissa Rochelle rated it really liked it

Shelves: read-2013, arc, scifi-fantasy

Darrow and I had a rough start. Now that I've finished the book, I understand why the beginning was important. But it was a slow start. I was not interested in the underground Mars life of the Reds, but when Darrow wakes up amongst new friends the book really started moving. It went in a direction I did not expect and I finally understood why so many people were comparing it to The Hunger Games . Hopefully the wait for the next book isn't TOO long!

A great read for fans of The Hunger Games, En ...more

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May 29, 2014 The Book Maven rated it it was amazing

Shelves: read-teen-fiction, read-science-fiction-and-fantasy, read-in-2014, 2014-best-books-read, read-in-2015, read-dystopia-postapocalyptic

Is it possible to make Mars a habitable planet? Darrow thinks so, which is why he and so many of his family and caste--"Reds"--willingly spend their lives under the surface of Mars, mining chemicals to terraform the planet for the future. Life is harsh, especially as they are oppressed by people of higher castes—Greys and Browns and the ruling caste, the Golds. But Darrow has his family and his wife, Eo, to bring him happiness—until a small act of defiance changes everything.

Soon Darrow finds h Is it possible to make Mars a habitable planet? Darrow thinks so, which is why he and so many of his family and caste--"Reds"--willingly spend their lives under the surface of Mars, mining chemicals to terraform the planet for the future. Life is harsh, especially as they are oppressed by people of higher castes—Greys and Browns and the ruling caste, the Golds. But Darrow has his family and his wife, Eo, to bring him happiness—until a small act of defiance changes everything.

Soon Darrow finds himself caught up with a group of terrorists, bent on overthrowing the system, and what they show Darrow completely destroys his faith: Mars is already terraformed, and has been for many, many years. The Reds are fed a lie and kept enslaved to support a decadent lifestyle enjoyed by the beautiful and cruel Golds, as well as the other castes. It is time, Darrow is told, to start the destruction of this system. To do so, Darrow will have to be transformed, utterly, into that which he now loathes: he must become a Gold. However, that’s only the beginning of his trials, for it’s not enough to become a Gold. He must infiltrate the most powerful part of Gold society, become a leader. In order to do this, he’s sent away to the elite training academy, and that’s where this story really takes off. The academy is no Hogwarts—it’s a place where brutality, cunning, power, manipulation, shifting alliances, and even cheating are not only acceptable, but expected. It will take all of Darrow’s resources to simply survive, but to thrive and come out the winner, he must do even more-- forge friendships and bonds with the people who are his unwitting mortal foes.

The world-building in this page-turning novel is FLAWLESS—not overly complicated, and integrated seamlessly into the plot, characters, and dialogue. It’s like The Hunger Games meets Firefly, with a tiny smidgeon of Divergent to boot. And it’s the first in a trilogy, so we get two more books that will hopefully achieve this caliber of awesomeness.
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Apr 17, 2015 Emma rated it it was ok

It's fine as far as sci-fi goes. I don't really buy it as YA just because the MC is 16 at the start. The writing felt stilted and it just felt like the writing was trying a bit too hard. Also for my purposes there is nothing especially "post-apocalyptic" about it.

There is almost no world building in terms of background. We know that Mars is a lousy place to live and Darrow and his clan live as de facto slaves. Why is Mars being terraformed? What happened to Earth in the mean time? No one knows. ...more

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Apr 13, 2016 Kathleen rated it really liked it

The start of a three book series, fantasy and sci fi. Intriguing premise, can't wait to see where it goes from here. Good characters, ambivalent and courageous. ...more

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