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3.59 AVERAGE
3.59 AVERAGE
To be quite honest, I am not the target audience for this book. I picked it up from the available advanced copies due to its comparisons to Blake Crouch, whom I adore, in some of my fellow reviewer's feeds. It is an intriguing concept and one that I think my boys (aged 10 and 15) would truly enjoy. When I explained the premise to them they parroted back to me that it sounded kind of like a Jumanji type story where the game takes over reality. I can't say I disagree with that assessment but the author takes the base story down some much darker roads.
Tobey sends us on an exploration of human empathy, jealousy and selfishness that was very intriguing. The group name of The Vindicators, takes on a whole new meaning when "the game" encourages the kids to be vindictive against others and even each other. It felt like each of the characters did have a genuine motivation for their actions and their internal struggles all made sense in terms of the story. That is, until it got to the ending 'twists', they didn't feel quite genuine and maybe a little rushed.
What I had a hard time within the believability spectrum was the ability of "the GOD game" itself to exert its influence on the real world. I understand that the world has made technology into a type of false god, and that is one of the themes that the author is trying to explore, I would have just liked a thicker layer of believability surrounding the game itself and its motivations to make things happen while controlling our main characters. Again, the ending didn't really help clarify things either. As you can imagine, there was some deity related imagery that I wasn't very comfortable with either.
The dialogue in the book made me think that it would work better marketed as a YA novel than as a mass-market release but the story is intriguing and readable. Pick it up for a casual read this summer.
Tobey sends us on an exploration of human empathy, jealousy and selfishness that was very intriguing. The group name of The Vindicators, takes on a whole new meaning when "the game" encourages the kids to be vindictive against others and even each other. It felt like each of the characters did have a genuine motivation for their actions and their internal struggles all made sense in terms of the story. That is, until it got to the ending 'twists', they didn't feel quite genuine and maybe a little rushed.
What I had a hard time within the believability spectrum was the ability of "the GOD game" itself to exert its influence on the real world. I understand that the world has made technology into a type of false god, and that is one of the themes that the author is trying to explore, I would have just liked a thicker layer of believability surrounding the game itself and its motivations to make things happen while controlling our main characters. Again, the ending didn't really help clarify things either. As you can imagine, there was some deity related imagery that I wasn't very comfortable with either.
The dialogue in the book made me think that it would work better marketed as a YA novel than as a mass-market release but the story is intriguing and readable. Pick it up for a casual read this summer.
fast-paced
4.5 stars!
I was immediately drawn to The God Game because of the premise. While I am not a gamer or computer nerd in any sort of sense, I found the idea of a game playing god and the potential consequences associated with it fascinating. What I ended up getting was a something much darker and more sinister that pushed the boundaries of human morality, which I loved.
Charlie and his friends (Peter, Alex, Kenny, and Vanhi) are all in their senior year of high school. They refer to themselves as The Vindicators. They code together and game together. One day they all get a mysterious invitation to join The G.O.D. game, which promises to give them things of their wildest dreams. With each of them battling their own struggles, they jump at the opportunity to finally get something good out of the game of life. However, as with all good things that are too good to be true, they will all learn that the rewards of God come with steep sacrifices…and the only way to leave the game is through death.
Right from the beginning, I was captivated by The God Game. Each of the characters in this book has some sort of flaw that they are grappling with (e.g. suicide ideation, grief following death of a parent, abusive relationships, sexual identity, bullying, etc). While I think that some people are going to think that this is a bit extreme or over the top, I completely see what the author was trying to convey by highlighting these different real world issues that teenagers are plagued with. Additionally, by adding these layers of complications, it is easy to grasp how these teenagers become vulnerable to such manipulation and are willing to commit heinous acts in order to have some semblance of a good life.
I thought the overall writing of the book was well done. The short chapters really made the pages fly by considering this book is just shy of 500. I thought the characters were well defined and appreciated their development. While there were a lot of characters in this book, I didn’t feel that any of them were superfluous. Additionally, the diversity in this book was done in a way that enhanced the story rather than being thrown in for the sake of it.
Honestly, if you’re a fan of Black Mirror and the whole concept of morality being shades of grey versus black and white then you’ll definitely enjoy this fast-paced, thrilling read.
Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for providing a copy for review. This did not influence my review. All opinions are my own.
I was immediately drawn to The God Game because of the premise. While I am not a gamer or computer nerd in any sort of sense, I found the idea of a game playing god and the potential consequences associated with it fascinating. What I ended up getting was a something much darker and more sinister that pushed the boundaries of human morality, which I loved.
Charlie and his friends (Peter, Alex, Kenny, and Vanhi) are all in their senior year of high school. They refer to themselves as The Vindicators. They code together and game together. One day they all get a mysterious invitation to join The G.O.D. game, which promises to give them things of their wildest dreams. With each of them battling their own struggles, they jump at the opportunity to finally get something good out of the game of life. However, as with all good things that are too good to be true, they will all learn that the rewards of God come with steep sacrifices…and the only way to leave the game is through death.
Right from the beginning, I was captivated by The God Game. Each of the characters in this book has some sort of flaw that they are grappling with (e.g. suicide ideation, grief following death of a parent, abusive relationships, sexual identity, bullying, etc). While I think that some people are going to think that this is a bit extreme or over the top, I completely see what the author was trying to convey by highlighting these different real world issues that teenagers are plagued with. Additionally, by adding these layers of complications, it is easy to grasp how these teenagers become vulnerable to such manipulation and are willing to commit heinous acts in order to have some semblance of a good life.
I thought the overall writing of the book was well done. The short chapters really made the pages fly by considering this book is just shy of 500. I thought the characters were well defined and appreciated their development. While there were a lot of characters in this book, I didn’t feel that any of them were superfluous. Additionally, the diversity in this book was done in a way that enhanced the story rather than being thrown in for the sake of it.
Honestly, if you’re a fan of Black Mirror and the whole concept of morality being shades of grey versus black and white then you’ll definitely enjoy this fast-paced, thrilling read.
Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for providing a copy for review. This did not influence my review. All opinions are my own.
The only game played in The God Game was a game of stealing plots from about a thousand other books and films. Don't get me wrong, this story was decent, but the entire time, I felt like I had read this exact story several times before.
The God Game is about a group of friends playing a game with an AI system that thinks it's God. This is a story about morality, hacking, and friendship... no more, no less.
This is really Ready Player One mixed with the new Jamanji mixed with the movie Dare with that Franco brother. There was nothing special. Nothing really surprised me about the plot, and for the most part, I was just generally bored.
The writing was really what saved this book from 2 stars for me. While it was way too long, I thought it was really descriptive and very captivating in the beginning. The first 100ish pages were great, and then after that I was pretty over it.
The God Game is about a group of friends playing a game with an AI system that thinks it's God. This is a story about morality, hacking, and friendship... no more, no less.
This is really Ready Player One mixed with the new Jamanji mixed with the movie Dare with that Franco brother. There was nothing special. Nothing really surprised me about the plot, and for the most part, I was just generally bored.
The writing was really what saved this book from 2 stars for me. While it was way too long, I thought it was really descriptive and very captivating in the beginning. The first 100ish pages were great, and then after that I was pretty over it.
8.8/10. I haven't read thriller in a while, but this was really really good. Makes you realize how terrifying a malicious (well, "omnivolent") AI would be, and how entrenched our lives are in technology. The religious references and all the quotes were really neat, and chilling. I liked the characters for the most part, though at times I was frustrated with their choices and how they played right into the Game's hands, but otherwise the book was a fascinating tangle of moral dilemmas.
St. Martin's Press mailed me an Advanced Reader's Copy of THE GOD GAME in exchange of an honest review. I appreciate it!
The plot sounded like a bunch of fun. It follows a group of computer-coding teenage misfits who call themselves the Vindicators. They are e-mailed an invitation to the G.O.D. Game. It's an AR experience that samples world mythology and religion. It's played using computers, phones, and augmented glasses. The players perform real-world tasks in exchange for in-game currency, Goldz. If they don't do what the game wants, they can receive demerits, called Blaxx. If they got too much Blaxx, there could be serious real-world repercussions.
Unfortunately, the book itself suffers poor execution. I've got three big issues.
The first is the characters. The Vindicators are rather unlikable as a bunch. They're all dark and edgy, without any real redeeming qualities. They all came off as short-hand character sketches. They don't feel like real-life, flesh and blood people. At one point, a character tells another that a bad situation "doesn't mean we're not worth loving." It made me laugh out loud. The characters had depth and were not sympathetic at all. If they were, I would've been 100% behind this sentiment. Instead, it struck me as trite and unearned.
The second is the structuring of the story itself. The book employs short, frenetic, choppy chapters. It's a common technique, particularly for thrillers. By keeping chapters short and brisk, the author gives the reader a sense of forward momentum. Unfortunately, this formatting choice gave the reader many opportunities to stop reading. I often found myself doing that. My wife noticed how often I was putting the book down. When she asked if I was going to finish it, I realized I had to power through it or not even bother.
Finally, the theology that the books put forward is, at best, antiquated. The premise is that all major theological texts were fed into the AI that created the game. and it spat out a regressive, eye-for-an-eye Judaeo-Christian analog. I understand that the game itself is the antagonist, but I couldn't accept this premise. Yes, there are plenty of people who interpret religious texts this way. But there are many who take away a different message. I don't know much about writing computer code, but I would imagine it could have inherent biases. If the AI coder had a beef towards religion, the AI could reflect that. Besides the violence, there's a real us-or-them sense to the game's morality system. A repeated theme is: "hurt someone so that you'll come out on top." I kept thinking of Rene Girard's Mimetic Theory of Atonement while reading. It felt like the author took the scapegoat concept and then extrapolated. Only the data set was incomplete. I have no beef if Tobey has an issue with religion in general. The story would've been more interesting if had explored alternative to religion. Rather, it took religion as a straw man and then beat the stuffing out of it. I wish an alternative had been explored.
All-in-all, I can't recommend this book. It's flaws are copious. They undercut the truly fascinating ideas Tobey was trying to play with. What if we outsourced determining morality to artificial intelligence? Here's hoping Tobey revisits this theme in the future. But with more serious thought about the topic.
The plot sounded like a bunch of fun. It follows a group of computer-coding teenage misfits who call themselves the Vindicators. They are e-mailed an invitation to the G.O.D. Game. It's an AR experience that samples world mythology and religion. It's played using computers, phones, and augmented glasses. The players perform real-world tasks in exchange for in-game currency, Goldz. If they don't do what the game wants, they can receive demerits, called Blaxx. If they got too much Blaxx, there could be serious real-world repercussions.
Unfortunately, the book itself suffers poor execution. I've got three big issues.
The first is the characters. The Vindicators are rather unlikable as a bunch. They're all dark and edgy, without any real redeeming qualities. They all came off as short-hand character sketches. They don't feel like real-life, flesh and blood people. At one point, a character tells another that a bad situation "doesn't mean we're not worth loving." It made me laugh out loud. The characters had depth and were not sympathetic at all. If they were, I would've been 100% behind this sentiment. Instead, it struck me as trite and unearned.
The second is the structuring of the story itself. The book employs short, frenetic, choppy chapters. It's a common technique, particularly for thrillers. By keeping chapters short and brisk, the author gives the reader a sense of forward momentum. Unfortunately, this formatting choice gave the reader many opportunities to stop reading. I often found myself doing that. My wife noticed how often I was putting the book down. When she asked if I was going to finish it, I realized I had to power through it or not even bother.
Finally, the theology that the books put forward is, at best, antiquated. The premise is that all major theological texts were fed into the AI that created the game. and it spat out a regressive, eye-for-an-eye Judaeo-Christian analog. I understand that the game itself is the antagonist, but I couldn't accept this premise. Yes, there are plenty of people who interpret religious texts this way. But there are many who take away a different message. I don't know much about writing computer code, but I would imagine it could have inherent biases. If the AI coder had a beef towards religion, the AI could reflect that. Besides the violence, there's a real us-or-them sense to the game's morality system. A repeated theme is: "hurt someone so that you'll come out on top." I kept thinking of Rene Girard's Mimetic Theory of Atonement while reading. It felt like the author took the scapegoat concept and then extrapolated. Only the data set was incomplete. I have no beef if Tobey has an issue with religion in general. The story would've been more interesting if had explored alternative to religion. Rather, it took religion as a straw man and then beat the stuffing out of it. I wish an alternative had been explored.
All-in-all, I can't recommend this book. It's flaws are copious. They undercut the truly fascinating ideas Tobey was trying to play with. What if we outsourced determining morality to artificial intelligence? Here's hoping Tobey revisits this theme in the future. But with more serious thought about the topic.
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This book!!!! This is the one. Exciting, scary, relatable, questionable, gut-wrenching, high energy. Will get you out of a reading slump for sure. Highly highly recommend!!
Charlie and his friends receive an invitation to play an underground computer game that turns out to be more than they bargained for when the game starts intruding into reality. This book was a real page turner, with a great group of central characters that are each experiencing different difficulties in life and each have their own secrets that get woven into the game. Great story telling that keeps the story grounded in reality and pacing that keeps the action moving forward and the reader on the edge of their seat. I received a free ARC of this novel from the Publisher.
This was a book with plenty of action. It’s not a book I would normally pick up but I like to give new books a try. It is not YA but reads like one and centers around a virtual reality type game that 5 friends play together.