A review by ambaright
Red Rising by Pierce Brown

adventurous dark tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

If you like The Hunger Games and its dystopian world, Red Rising is for you! It’s packed full with incredible world building, political intrigue, the brutality of war, and a wild cast of characters. 

Darrow is a Red, a member of the lowest caste in the color-coded society of the future. Like his fellow Reds, he works all day believing that he and his people are making the surface of Mars livable for future generations so that one day his children will live in a better world. But Darrow and his kind have been betrayed, and soon he discovers that humanity reached the surface generations ago and that his people merely act as slaves to the ruling Golds. 

Driven by his lost love’s dreams and a longing for justice, Darrow infiltrates the legendary Institute, a school for the next generation of Golden overlords. He will be forced to compete for his life and the very future of civilization against the best and most brutal of Society’s ruling class. There, he will stop at nothing to bring down his enemies… even if it means he has to become one of them to do so. 
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