Ready Player Two: A Novel

Ernest Cline

Nov 2020 · Ready Player One Book 2 · Sold by Ballantine Books

About this ebook

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The thrilling sequel to the beloved worldwide bestseller Ready Player One, the near-future adventure that inspired the blockbuster Steven Spielberg film.
 
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE WASHINGTON POST • “The game is on again. . . . A great mix of exciting fantasy and threatening fact.”—The Wall Street Journal

AN UNEXPECTED QUEST. TWO WORLDS AT STAKE. ARE YOU READY?

Days after winning OASIS founder James Halliday’s contest, Wade Watts makes a discovery that changes everything.

Hidden within Halliday’s vaults, waiting for his heir to find, lies a technological advancement that will once again change the world and make the OASIS a thousand times more wondrous—and addictive—than even Wade dreamed possible.
 
With it comes a new riddle, and a new quest—a last Easter egg from Halliday, hinting at a mysterious prize.
 
And an unexpected, impossibly powerful, and dangerous new rival awaits, one who’ll kill millions to get what he wants.
 
Wade’s life and the future of the OASIS are again at stake, but this time the fate of humanity also hangs in the balance.
 
Lovingly nostalgic and wildly original as only Ernest Cline could conceive it, Ready Player Two takes us on another imaginative, fun, action-packed adventure through his beloved virtual universe, and jolts us thrillingly into the future once again.

Ratings and reviews

Way too much political commentary. The book takes great pains to undermine the good characters of the original by suddenly making them these weird, unrealistic comic book type villains. It doesn't feel interesting. It doesn't feel new or different. It doesn't even feel like more of the same. It feels like the author had no idea what to do that wasn't done already, so he changed the personalities of the main characters. He inserted tedious, political narratives to underline the authors personal stances on every sex-related acronym possible. Regardless of where you fall, the author will make you want to disagree with whatever puerile point he's struggling to make. (Example: Everyone is now gay, non-binary, orgy enthusiasts because they watched VR porn once. No, I am not making that up.) What does politics or sex have to do with a YA book about sci-fi virtual reality nostalgia? Absolutely nothing. It's as jarring as you imagine it to be, and has no place in the story.

I give this a 3.5 really. There was some really fun parts of this book. There were moments that would drag too. He didn't pick my favorite points of pop culture to highlight either. I like a lot of the characters he uses, but there's some I would love to see. Now I know more about Pretty in Pink than I ever hoped to. That was fun for a bit. I wish he could've used more comic book, sci fi, or horror references.

I'm going to jump right into this and say that the second half is better than the first. the constant telling the reader about the games and background started to bog me down, and I ended up just plowing through and sort of speed reading whole chapters by just looking for sets of words that seemed intriguing. I never read the first book, so if this one is written in the same style, sorry, but I didn't really appreciate it. don't get me wrong, the action parts and mystery parts were good, but it felt like the author was just trying to make the book longer by adding all the background stuff.

About the author

Ernest Cline is a #1 New York Times bestselling novelist, screenwriter, father, and full-time geek. He is the author of the novels Ready Player One and Armada and co-screenwriter of the film adaptation of Ready Player One, directed by Steven Spielberg. His books have been published in over fifty countries and have spent more than 100 weeks on the New York Times bestsellers list. He lives in Austin, Texas, with his family, a time-traveling DeLorean, and a large collection of classic video games.