Warcross

Dinge, die mich gestört haben: langatmige Storyline, unausgereifte Charaktere, Insta-Love, unfassbar vorhersehbare Auflösung am Ende. Sehr mittelmäßig. Kann man lesen, kann man sich aber auch sparen. Marie Lu, das geht besser.

Dinge, die mich gestört haben: langatmige Storyline, unausgereifte Charaktere, Insta-Love, unfassbar vorhersehbare Auflösung am Ende. Sehr mittelmäßig. Kann man lesen, kann man sich aber auch sparen. Marie Lu, das geht besser.

Rating 4,5* Review is on my blog: https://toyangi.wordpress.com/2017/09/30/warcross-by-marie-lu-review/

So here's my not so spoiler free review. Also that's just my personal opinion. First of all: When I heard Marie Lu had a new story out I was so excited! I loved her LEGEND series, even though it wasn't flawless, I really enjoyed it! The world building and diversity is what really got me in that series and I wasn't disappointed in this time around too. The cover is also beautiful! Honestly? Having that book on my shelf is so beautiful, it's such a beautiful book. Anyway, go to the real review. - WORLDBUILDING The Worldbuilding is so good i love it so much? In my opinion that's probably Marie's strong point. I haven't read Young Elites, so I can't judge but the WARCROSS World is great. Because unlike most other YA authors writing stories set in the future only really talk about what happened to America. Like where's the rest of the world? Marie's world building is actually a WORLD building. And WARCROSS? Holy shit, as someone who LOVES stories about virtual reality and gaming, I was so fascinated. WARCROSS is such a cool game and honestly that VR would motivate to do stuff, as I level up and get points for doing stuff. Lmao, yeah, I admit it. And I love stories with group and teams, so the World Championships were so good! I loved the diversity in the teams and how it was handled! To be honest I could read an entire book just about that. CHARACTERS Character wise... I fell for the minor/side characters. The Phoenix team, Roshan, Hammie, Asher, Ren- I loved them. And also Tremaine and the ultimate favorite: Kenn. I have an honest crush on Kenn... I really wanted to see more of him especially. The side characters were all so good? Please, just let me know more about them or the other teams. And the Demons! I loved them so much... (I love my asshole characters). As for Hideo and Emika, the Main Characters, I wasn't feeling them too much. Well, conflicted. Let's go with Hideo first. I loved him, god he was amazing and all. But then halfway through when the romance started, I started to also get annoyed by him. I'll talk about this later. The ending- the big plot twist- was my favorite thing though. God, that redeemed him again. I can't just have him be in love... It felt wrong. Emika... Where do I start? Sorry, but she never stops about her father, which I didn't care about anymore like 200 pages in. I'm sorry, it was too much. And she was... Her personality was cool, but she was this OC that you created when you were 12? Rainbow hair and tattoos, hacker, bounty hunter, dating the rich billionaire... It would've been just better if she was a wlw. Me, a gay, reading her description and that she wears flannel: Harold.... ROMANCE That's what bothered me the most And I can't give the book 5/5 because of it. I wasn't feeling Hideo/Emika. They didn't have chemistry in my opinion to move that fast. Hideo, who always was secretive and reserved to fall for her so fast and to just tell her everything? Unrealistic. It felt kind of forced too. (Hideo... you have a boyfriend and it's Kenn, you can't tell me you're not). Like, the entire romance plot... I wasn't feeling it and it wasn't necessary. You could've written it out except Hideo wouldn't have told her about Sasuke then I guess (Lmao the name). But that part in my opinion was way too rushed. We know they've been talking through messages and meeting up or smth off screen but we never saw it ? How should I believe he was already trusting her so much? That just felt ooc. Forced Hets. Next. PLOT The plot otherwise was nice, except the whole Sasuke as Zero thing was so predictable. But that was redeemed by Hideo being, you know, kinda the antagonist in the end. Which I really liked. I can't wait to see the sequel and Emika and Hideo on different sides. Maybe I'll like the second book more? GIVE ME MORE KENN.

Ich mag virtuelle Realitäten. Von ihnen gehen Möglichkeiten und Gefahren aus, die bisher noch nicht ausgiebig erforscht wurden. Lediglich Autoren nehmen sich dieser Materie seit einigen Jahren an. Daher war ich sehr gespannt, wie die Autorin, die ich von ihrer Serie „Legend“ kenne, ihre Vorstellung davon umsetzen würde. Ehrlich gesagt habe ich von Anfang an das Spiel, das Lu erfunden hat, nicht so recht verstanden. Worum genau geht es, wer kämpft gegen wen, was ist das Ziel dieser Wettbewerbe? Die Autorin reißt die Welt an, springt mitten ins Geschehen, aber erklärt sie nicht genauer und beschreibt nur einzelne Szenen daraus. Für mich war die Faszination, die für die Figuren davon ausging, nicht nachvollziehbar – und das, obwohl ich früher selbst sehr gern und viel MMORPGs gezockt habe. Mich reizten an diesen Onlinespielen stets die faszinierenden alternativen Sphären, in denen man sich bewegte, ihre phantasievollen Lebensräume, das Gesamtkonzept. Ich konnte mir aber während des Lesens keine Vorstellung von „Warcross“ machen und fühlte mich als Fremde in dieser fiktiven Schöpfung. Auch die Charaktere bleiben zu weiten Teilen im Dunkeln. Wir erfahren etwas über die beiden Protagonisten, doch ihre Freunde und Begleiter bleiben farblos, obwohl sie viel zum Geschehen beitragen. Das Ende jedoch fand ich überraschend spannend! Hier zeigt sich, dass die Autorin sich tatsächlich intensiv damit beschäftigt hat, in welche Richtung sich virtuelle Realitäten entwickeln könnten. Ich hätte mir nur gewünscht, sie hätte dieses Thema schon früher im Buch angeschnitten und in die Handlung einfließen lassen. Ich weiß, dass „Warcross“ der erste Band einer Serie ist und dieser Aspekt dort vielleicht/wahrscheinlich intensiver beleuchtet wird. Aber für mich bleibt so dieses Buch weit hinter seinem Potential zurück.

Wow. What a plot twist at the end. I am stunned. I liked the story, even though I am not into hacking, I kind of want to learn more about it now. The only thing I didn’t get is how fast Emika‘s and Hideo‘s relationship started and ended(?). Well I definitely want to read more!

Emika es una hacker que, desde la muerte de su padre, se dedica a cazar a aquellos que infringen la ley actuando como cazarecompensas para la policía. Su meta es llegar a pagar el alquiler y no verse en la calle, pero las cosas se complican en la gran gala inaugural de Warcross. Por accidente se ve envuelta en un escándalo que puede muy bien llevarla a la ruina o a la fama. Tenía muchas expectativas con este libro. La sinopsis me hizo pensar en Ready player one, libro que me gustó y me hizo disfrutar mucho, sin embargo no cumplió con lo que esperaba de esta lectura. El juego de Warcross esperaba que fuera de una forma diferente, si bien tengo que reconocer que a pesar de ser algo conocido tiene toques de originalidad. El mundo virtual superpuesto en muchos momentos a la realidad fue bastante interesante pero me hubiera gustado más visión y profundidad. En cuanto a los personajes no estuvieron mal, la única que tiene mayor protagonismo es Emika, la protagonista, y cierto personaje secundario bastante confuso en su comportamiento. La historia fue bastante lenta al principio, me costó meterme en la historia y conectar con los personajes, pero me pareció excesivamente predecible. En cambio las posibilidades que quedan abiertas al final del libro me da ganas de seguir leyendo para ver qué camino tomará Emika en el siguiente y último libro de Warcross.

I was never a gamer but this book sure is making me want to start with it. It reminded me at first of Ready Player One but changed quickly in another way. I like the characters and their stories. Now I can't wait for Vol. 2 to be published.

ok, that’s kinda hard to review but I’m gonna try because I need to get this of my head right now. So, Warcross got me from the first page, because of its fabulous world building, clever protagonist and good writing. I really liked Emika because she was such as a fan for Hideo Tanaka as I am for some artists out there which made her even more sympathetic to me. Her way to think and do was pretty relatable in the most times. Hideo was like okay, same with the other Charakters in here - there was nobody on which I’d say (accept Emika herself): “You’re really awesome” The plot was really good for me, too. Before reading this, I’ve heard multiple times that people found Warcross predicable from a very early point on, so I knew that i wasn’t gonna read a book which get me hard thinking which I’m wasn’t really sad for. I had a light and fun time reading this and even though I had an idea of who Zero would gonna be, it didn’t ruin it. And there were plots which i hadn’t predicted at ALL (especially some things in the end went crazy which I were surprised about). Even if it says that I read this in a span of 10 days it doesn’t say that it read slowly - the opposite is the right. It read pretty quick for an English book (I’m native German so yeah). So, if you like light hearted sci-fi with cool Charakters and a setting that blows your mind and in which you get to think about internet society than definitely go with this one! btw: does anyone knows if this is a stand-alone or if there are going to be sequels? xx Nel

First of all I gotta say that I'm 100% smitten with Marie Lu's Legend Trilogy so I am kinda biased, but still, I'm a picky reader and I'm not the easiest to please. The book is extremely well written, I did know I enjoy her writing style before and I did here too. I got into the story very quickly and the world building happened naturally along the way. I can't say enough good words about the characters she meets in Tokyo, it's such an amazing group, who are well fleshed out even though they don't get that much story time. There's just such a rich diversity in this characters, which sadly isn't he most common things in stories these days. I decided to keep everything mostly spoiler free. I will mark if I talk anything that does spoil anything. Maybe later I will do reviews that go more into detail but for now I'll stick with this. So let's get to the part I didn't love: the romance. I gotta say im picky with romances and it's hard for me to find one I actually enjoy. When I was lying in bed last night I tried to pinpoint what my issue with the romance in this novel is and I'm pretty sure I found it. Emika is obsessed with Hideo, has been obsessed with him for years. And when they meet, he of course falls for her after like two ten minute meetings and a phone call. Immediately smitten. Now you can scream "It's real love!" and "It's just fiction!" at me but I do like to get a bit more details in the whole falling for each other process, at least more than "They are man and woman and they are attracted, done.". But I think my biggest issue is, that I never felt a real connection to Hideo. I just couldn't connect. He has this painful past and that is revealed but I just couldn't feel for him and I never really got where his head was at. That was especially weird cause I liked all the minor characters so much and felt like I really got to know them but with the main love interest it didn't work, even though Emika thought of him A LOT. In the end I wasn't convinced, it seemed to be just an obsession on her side and he never truly explained what he actually saw in  her and what made him fall for her . If he did, feel free to correct him, but damn, I never saw it. I'll just jump to my conclusion now, before this post is completely out of control. I loved the book. The way it ended completely redeemed the romance  issues for me and I'm very interested in where the second book will take the story. It has loads of promise, that's for sure.  Very enjoyable and only minor hiccups along the way. I would recommend it to anyone who loves YA and is especially looking for more diverse books for disabled or LGBT Characters and those of colour. It definitely had a lot to offer on that front AND it took place in Tokyo, so that was cool as well.