Marie Lu is an amazing writer, and she demonstrates that in her novel, Warcross. Warcross is about a poor 18-year-old, Emika Chen, living on the streets of New York. Much of her income comes from hunting down players in the Neuro Link. The Neuro Link is a way to play Warcross by creating a virtual reality. Warcross is a mix between Overwatch and League of Legends. Anyways, she is essentially a virtual bounty hunter with an incredible ability to hack through and understand the code of Warcross. However, desperate for money, she exploits into a Warcross match to try and steal a valuable powerup, a buff, that can be sold money; however, her coding backfires and she spawns into the game. Because of the attention that this brought Emika, the founder of the Neuro Link, Hideo Tanaka, decides to hire Emika because of her ability to hack. Hideo decides to have Emika go undercover and find information on Zero, a notorious hacker and the leader of the dark web in the Neuro Link. To go undercover, Hideo has Emika join a professional Warcross team, and her mission begins to be a success when she notices her suspicious teammate with an unusual number of firewalls around his avatar. Emika then travels to the dark web and finds DJ Ren, the teammate, working with Zero along with gambling, which is illegal in Warcross. Shortly after Emika’s adventures in the dark web, Zero meets with Emika to see if she wants to work with him to take down Hideo’s Neuro Link contact lenses. The contact lenses interact with the mind, and the lenses would let Hideo have control over the people wearing the lenses. Emika confronts Hideo about this, and he confirms the theory. In the end, Emika looks over what happened at her meeting with Zero, and she ends up finding some important information about the true identity of Zero.
I enjoyed reading this book because I could really relate to the theme. Warcross demonstrates the dangers of technology and how it can be used to control and manipulate us. This relates to modern-day society because while we may not be controlled by a person, our technological devices influence our everyday lives. For example, when I hang out with a friend, after about 3 minutes, we are both on our phones looking through Instagram. It is not just me feeling the influence of technology; thousands of jobs are being lost because of the technological growth of this era: supermarket cashiers, warehouse workers, truck drivers. While it is amazing how far technology has come, it is important to realize its downsides so we do not fall into the trap of complacency similar to that of the characters in Warcross. In conclusion, this book is a light-hearted science fiction novel, but it helps define a deeper meaning about technology in our modern society. That is why I strongly recommend that you guys read Warcross.
~ Ezra Akresh
This seems like a very interesting read, and the theme, like you said, also seems very relatable and true to the world today. After reading this review, I wonder what other books Marie Lu had written especially because you said how great of a writer she is at the beginning of the review.
ReplyDeleteGreat review! I hadn't heard about this book in a long time, but this brings back a lot of good memories I had of when I read this book! I think Marie Lu is a great author, and I hadn't seen her in awhile, so thank you for reminding me of her and her great books!
ReplyDeleteReally great review and summary!!! I used to be a huge Marie Lu fan back in seventh grade and I remember how much I enjoyed the concept of this story.
ReplyDeleteI like your descriptive review and have to say that Warcross seems quite interesting. I've never read a book that includes advanced technology, and after reading your blog post, I am extremely eager to do so!
ReplyDeleteGreat review. Warcross sounds super interesting, and I might check it out! I've played both Overwatch and League before, and I'm curious to see how they relate to the book. I remember enjoying Marie Lu's other books a lot (ex: Legend, The Young Elites); and I'm sure this one is just as good.
ReplyDeleteThe way you described the plot of Warcross reminds me of other sci-fi books like Ready Player One. I think it is interesting to read stories about the application of technology in the future. I like how you drew parallels between the plot of the story and real life. I will definitely keep this book in mind next time I am looking for something to read.
ReplyDeleteI like how you connected Warcross to our current world which is riddled with technology. Maria Lu sounds like an interesting sci-fi author--I have a general knowledge of Overwatch and LoL so I'm interested in how she implemented that into her story. I will definitely have to read her works!
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