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A review by emg3
Warcross by Marie Lu
1.0
What I liked: The basic premise was great and that’s what initially caught my attention. The descriptions were vivid and lively in a way that really lent itself to the high tech world of the book. The action scenes during tournaments were really well written - they had solid continuity and were neither rushed nor dragged out. The seedy world down under was probably my favourite part, I would happily read an entire novel based on the Dark World, gangs were mentioned but never actually participated in the story and the assassin’s lottery was a cool idea that should’ve played a bigger role.
What I didn’t like: To me, this relied a bit too heavily on tropes and clichés - there weren’t any surprises and I felt like I had heard the same thing many a time before. The tragic back stories of every character felt gratuitous, particularly as few of these back stories actually had an impact on the plot itself.
Following on from that, the characters seemed to lack depth. They were all a bit bland and there really wasn’t any character development. They never seemed to develop their own unique voices and perspectives. I found the main character irritating at best and this made the first person narration far less palatable. My understanding of the characters was primarily formed by the chunky descriptive paragraphs and the frustratingly instructive thoughts of Emika. I would’ve rather get to know them through their actions and dialogue - features which were unfortunately sparse.
I frequently found myself bothered by the lack of mystery. Everything was handed straight to us, we weren’t given the opportunity to put the pieces together for ourselves or let the story slowly unwind.
A lot of this book was unbelievable and unrealistic, which I suppose can be somewhat excused given its surreal futuristic setting, but the rushed romance and the hasty rags-to-riches aspect of this book were too pedestrian and simplistic to be enjoyable.
Final thoughts: Despite all of its flaws I was still quite entertained by this book - I flew through it, by my standards, over the course of 2 days. Although, perhaps the fast pace was made possible due to its lack of complexity. It satisfied my desire for a quick easy read and for something a little different. It had great potential and some fun, quirky elements.
What I didn’t like: To me, this relied a bit too heavily on tropes and clichés - there weren’t any surprises and I felt like I had heard the same thing many a time before. The tragic back stories of every character felt gratuitous, particularly as few of these back stories actually had an impact on the plot itself.
Following on from that, the characters seemed to lack depth. They were all a bit bland and there really wasn’t any character development. They never seemed to develop their own unique voices and perspectives. I found the main character irritating at best and this made the first person narration far less palatable. My understanding of the characters was primarily formed by the chunky descriptive paragraphs and the frustratingly instructive thoughts of Emika. I would’ve rather get to know them through their actions and dialogue - features which were unfortunately sparse.
I frequently found myself bothered by the lack of mystery. Everything was handed straight to us, we weren’t given the opportunity to put the pieces together for ourselves or let the story slowly unwind.
A lot of this book was unbelievable and unrealistic, which I suppose can be somewhat excused given its surreal futuristic setting, but the rushed romance and the hasty rags-to-riches aspect of this book were too pedestrian and simplistic to be enjoyable.
Final thoughts: Despite all of its flaws I was still quite entertained by this book - I flew through it, by my standards, over the course of 2 days. Although, perhaps the fast pace was made possible due to its lack of complexity. It satisfied my desire for a quick easy read and for something a little different. It had great potential and some fun, quirky elements.