Book Review: Ready Player Two

I'm always hesitant to open the cover of a sequel to a bestselling book, fearing the author will not live up to the mark of the first. Ernest Cline did well in Ready Player Two. This sequel, as I told my 14-year-old, is Ready Player One on steroids. The OASIS kicks up a notch and is more addictive than ever. Halliday comes through with another quest with unbelievable odds and consequences. The bad guy's threat is not just the loss of a game, but possibly the loss of Wade's life and countless other lives.

I loved dipping back into the constant 80s references (many I recognized, some left me clueless). However, I did note that at one point in the book, Cline uses a sentence he may have ripped from a negative book review. Sorrento asks, "Don't you kids ever get tired of picking through the wreckage of a past generation's nostalgia?... I mean, look around. The entire OASIS is like one giant graveyard, haunted by the un-dead pop-culture icons of a bygone era. A crazy old man's shrine to a bunch of pointless crap." Still, I spent my teen years in the 80s, so I enjoyed that aspect of the romp.

I enjoyed contemplating the benefits and drawbacks of technology. While I didn't love the ending, the book was a thoroughly riveting read. I struggled with the first 100 pages, but once the background was set and the bad guy made his appearance, I had to fasten my seatbelt. It was a good thing I started the book on a weekend (only 3 days from the due date), because I read the last two-thirds of it in one day. Couldn't put it down.

If I had hesitations about letting my teen read Ready Player One, I had even more with the sequel. It is not a clean read. All the boxes are checked for the things people seem to expect in their literature these days. Since Sean preferred the movie to the book for Ready Player One anyway, he may wait for Ready Player Two to come out in movie form (although, I doubt the movie will be any cleaner).