From the Bookshelf of EVERYONE Has Read This but Me - The Catch-Up Book Club…

Ready Player One (Ready Player One, #1)

Ernest Cline

Start date: March 1, 2018

Finish date: March 31, 2018

Discussion: MODERN / POPULAR READS

Why we're reading this: Group Pick for Mar '18 - Bookshelf Reread
Group Pick for Mar '17 - Modern Classic/Popular…more
[close] Group Pick for Mar '18 - Bookshelf Reread
Group Pick for Mar '17 - Modern Classic/Popular

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What Members Thought

Aug 06, 2020 Amber Lea rated it liked it

Shelves: sci-fi, fiction, dystopian, so-bad-its-good

I actually thought I was going to hate this a lot more than I did. Not that I don't hate it, but I thought the plot was going to bore me to death which is why I waited so long to read it. I also thought the 80's nostalgia was going to be delivered in the most obnoxious way possible. And sometimes it is. Sometimes it's two characters shit-talking like a couple of 12 year olds on xbox about who did a better job memorizing trivia. Sometimes it's Parzival's abomination of a delorean that's trying to I actually thought I was going to hate this a lot more than I did. Not that I don't hate it, but I thought the plot was going to bore me to death which is why I waited so long to read it. I also thought the 80's nostalgia was going to be delivered in the most obnoxious way possible. And sometimes it is. Sometimes it's two characters shit-talking like a couple of 12 year olds on xbox about who did a better job memorizing trivia. Sometimes it's Parzival's abomination of a delorean that's trying to be the cars from Knight Rider and Ghostbusters too. (Please no.)

I think the thing I hate about this book the most is that the characters lack personalities. They're walking encyclopedias who sometimes make sassy remarks and that's it. There isn't like a funny one, and a serious one, and a kookie one. They're all pretty boring. So when Parzival falls in love with Artemis, it's hard to understand. What's so great about her? She's pretty unpleasant. Granted, he read her blog before he met her, but we as readers didn't so all we have to go off of is their interactions, and she kind of sucks. So it seems like her infatuation with her comes from the fact that she's internet famous and her avatar is cute. H is the only one with any charisma, and it's pretty weak. There are moments that are just ridiculous. Like everyone cheering for Parzival and admiring him. Uhh, okay. If you say so. He's Captain Bland. It's hard to cheer for him as a reader. He also seems like a thoroughly mediocre gamer and kind of a dumbass until he turns super hacker part way through.

I personally feel like this book would have been better if it wasn't SO focused on pop culture. I wish there was real history and context and it wasn't all video games, movies, and cereal commercials. I think there was mention of the challenger explosion and Reagan being president and that was about it for anything outside 80's consumerism. I think getting into what was going on in the world back then would have given this more depth and made it more interesting.

I also find it kind of comical that the plot of this book is based around the idea that we ran out of oil and basically gave up. This book is supposed to take place 25 years after this review and the real world technology is better now than in this fictional future. Like he rides a bus where the battery has to be charged every hour, which is how batteries were when the book was written. Listen, we're not dependent on oil because it's the best thing out there. We're dependent on oil because the oil industry doesn't want us to move on from oil. If we actually ran out of oil, the industry would die and we would find something else. We would figure it out. Us running out of oil wouldn't be the worst thing for humanity, it would be the worst thing for the oil industry. Like you would think they would go nuclear and improve battery technology. Something. The world being like this doesn't make sense. Who benefits? So the world itself seems like poorly thought out political commentary, lazily slapped together to allow for this world that is somehow obsessed with the 80s.

Anyway, despite all that, this book didn't bore me to death like I thought it would. I actually did find myself wanting to finish it and see what happens. It's definitely 100% a dumb nerd boy fantasy, often to a painful degree, but laughing at it was kind of fun for me. So I feel like it deserves credit for being entertaining. ...more

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Apr 01, 2016 Emma rated it did not like it

This book is a fucking garbage fire of awful pandering references strung together like tortured links in a human centipede by some of the worst fucking prose I've ever suffered from a published author.

Ignore all five star reviews. These poeple are being paid, are suffering mass hysteria, fell in the bath and banged their heads this morning. ...more

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Mar 23, 2016 Hez rated it liked it

I read this for book group (books-to-movies discussion group since this will be a move in 2018). It's a cute story, a fun read, and even thought provoking at times. It's definitely most appreciated by folks who came of age in the 1980's, especially gamers (video, D&D, etc.). While the references weren't lost on me (and sometimes even fun), it got to be a bit much. I would be hard pressed to name a person to whom I'd recommend this book, mostly because of the limited audience to whom it's primari ...more

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