'Ready Player One' by Ernest Cline

Official Summary:

It’s the year 2044, and the real world is an ugly place.
Like most of humanity, Wade Watts escapes his grim surroundings by spending his waking hours jacked into the OASIS, a sprawling virtual utopia that lets you be anything you want to be, a place where you can live and play and fall in love on any of ten thousand planets. And like most of humanity, Wade dreams of being the one to discover the ultimate lottery ticket that lies concealed within this virtual world. For somewhere inside this giant networked playground, OASIS creator James Halliday has hidden a series of fiendish puzzles that will yield massive fortune—and remarkable power—to whoever can unlock them.  

For years, millions have struggled fruitlessly to attain this prize, knowing only that Halliday’s riddles are based in the pop culture he loved—that of the late twentieth century. And for years, millions have found in this quest another means of escape, retreating into happy, obsessive study of Halliday’s icons. Like many of his contemporaries, Wade is as comfortable debating the finer points of John Hughes’s oeuvre, playing Pac-Man, or reciting Devo lyrics as he is scrounging power to run his OASIS rig.

And then Wade stumbles upon the first puzzle.

Suddenly the whole world is watching, and thousands of competitors join the hunt—among them certain powerful players who are willing to commit very real murder to beat Wade to this prize. Now the only way for Wade to survive and preserve everything he knows is to win. But to do so, he may have to leave behind his oh-so-perfect virtual existence and face up to life—and love—in the real world he’s always been so desperate to escape.

Review:

I've been holding off on this review for a little while now. To be fair, I probably should have posted something immediately after finishing it in the vain of "OMG OMG This book is AMAHSZING! Ahhhhh!" but I really do try to keep that kind of commentary for in-person, arm waving, full on animated, recommendations only. When writing for TTP, I try to keep it a bit more, um, sedated. And that is where I have failed you.

Because this book is absolutely worth picking up and you should have read it two months ago. Love, loss, science fiction, bad 80's pop culture references - it's got it all in spades.

Bottom Line: Sometimes I should just jump on and write the review, arm-waving OMG's and all. If you like video game culture, weird potential future scenarios, or science fiction written in the style of Stephenson (Snow Crash), you'll love Ready Player One: A Novel

'Double Blind' by Tiffany Pitts - Special Blog Tour Review!

Official Summary:

Delilah Pelham’s brother, Paul, is missing. She should probably be worried about that but honestly, he’s been in trouble since the day he learned the words “trust me." In fact, if it weren’t for his roommate, Carl, she would gladly leave him to his fate.

Carl is a good guy, even if he’s a bit of a dork. Okay, a large slice of a dork. Possibly the entire cake. But he wants to help, as do his gamer friends, which is how Deli finds herself in the middle of Hong Kong with the King of the Dorks, running from creepy guys with slicked-back hair and shiny black guns.

Back at home, Carl’s friends aren’t faring nearly as well. All they had to do was monitor the situation and feed Deli’s cat while she was gone. How could that possibly end in bloodshed? There is an answer, of course, but no one ever thinks to ask the cat.

Review:

Before delving into today's review I'd like to extend a warm welcome to all of those who traveled here through Sage's Blog Tour Portal. It's been an exciting couple of weeks hasn't it? And I've gotta say that I love being a part of the 'Double Blind' welcome wagon. I can say that right? Of course I can! This is my blog and I say what I want!

So, I've just finished this one (thanks to both Sage and Tiffany) and I've gotta say, while I was a bit skeptical through the first 20 or so pages, this one is absolutely fabulous. Not only does it keep you guessing throughout (as it should, given the title and all) but it's brimming with some of the best character's I've come across since 'Trail of the Chupacabra.' 

If I had to say one thing bad about this book, my statement would follow in the form of a question: Why would you give your leading lady the nickname Deli? Her name is Delilah - so why not Dee, or Lila? Just saying that the first few chapters would have probably been a better experience overall if I weren't constantly imagining a submarine sandwich.

Never mind the sweaty guy behind the counter making this.

Even then, this title proved to be so good that I got passed the perspiration dripping, completely out of shape sub shop guy I kept picturing in my head every time the name showed up after a few dozen pages. A feat that I honestly thought would have been impossible if you'd have asked sometime during the first page or two. In fact, I was so engaged in this one, that I found myself opening it up at work.*

Bottom Line: If you love books like ‘Domestic Violets’, ‘Trail of the Chupacabra’, or the Discworld books by Terry Pratchett, I honestly think this one is worth the read. In fact, this one gets the T.T.P. satisfaction guaranteed. Yes, it’s just that good. I promise.

And bonus (!!!) because this is a Blog Tour and not just another book review I've got some additional details to share:

Author Bio

Tiffany Pitts grew up in the Seattle area in a time when the Super Sonics were huge and Starbucks was just a store at the end of the Market. Tragedy struck early in her life as her family moved to New Jersey mere months before Bon Jovi’s “Slippery When Wet” album hit record stores. It took nearly a decade to wean herself off the hairspray. But Seattle called her back, so she went; eventually earning a degree in Botany (pronounced “Bar tending”) at the University of Washington.

She made one more valiant attempt to leave the PNW after college by travelling around the country doing not much of value and making very stupid decisions. She is thankful every day that the internet was not a huge deal in those years. Then Seattle called again so she picked up and moved home where she spent many years being a scientist of middling talent in several labs that she absolutely did not blow up—except for that one time and everyone agreed not to talk about that any more.

Now she divides her time between writing fiction and raising two kids who are wonderful but, for some reason, won’t stop licking things. 

Tiffany can be found using the following Social Media coordinates:

Twitter:  @snickerpants

Website:  www.snickerpants.com

or on good ol' Facebook: Tiffany Pitts, Author

*And you'll just need to take my word for it when I say that the only other time I've ever been compelled to read a title during work was when I was still in the throws of the vampire mysteries that shall-not-be-named. I'm not going there right now. Really. I might not ever go there ever again. [angry]

'The Martian' by Andy Weir

Official Summary:

Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars. Now, he's sure he'll be the first person to die there.

After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he’s alive—and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive.

Chances are, though, he won't have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old "human error" are much more likely to kill him first.

But Mark isn't ready to give up yet. Drawing on his ingenuity, his engineering skills—and a relentless, dogged refusal to quit—he steadfastly confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Will his resourcefulness be enough to overcome the impossible odds against him?

Review:

There's this guy I work with whose a book geek like myself. Unlike me, he's usually got his nose in the next epic space odyssey (a la Dan Simmons) or technical fantasy novel (think Terry Brooks). Not that I don't appreciate those two genres for what they are - hell, some of my favorite titles are founding members of those categories - but unless they've got a bit more to them, I have a tough time getting into them.

Why am I telling you this? Well, it means that when either of us are gushing about the last best book discovery the other is usually trying really hard to withhold snark comments. Instead, we nod politely to one another and say something in the grandmotherly vein of, "It sounds lovely. I'm so glad you're enjoying it." and the conversation steers itself back on course*.

This time it was different though. This time, he was blabbing on about this amazing new novel he'd just picked up and couldn't put down about some guy getting left behind on the surface of Mars, and blah blah blah... I was feigning interest through cigarette drags as best I could but my glazed over expression must have given me away because after a few seconds he changed tactics.

"The first line is 'Well I'm pretty much fucked. That's my considered opinion. Fucked.' and it just keeps going from there."

I think I chuckled at that point, but even then wasn't 100% convinced. It took another week of him relaying a few choice lines before I conceded and downloaded the title.

I should have downloaded it sooner.

Bottom Line: From the first line to the last this book had me. If you like science fiction, a good laugh or even if you just had a fleeting interest in the movie Gravity you will adore this story, guaranteed. This one is a must read.

*The proper course usually consisting of Doctor Who, Game of Thrones, Almost Human, Helix, or any of the other dozen or so television shows that we both watch. We might not have matching taste in the literary sense, but it's pretty spot on in the T.V. category.

Batman - The Dark Knight Rises

I know this is a book review site but I love a good comic book movie almost as much as I love books and I couldn't resist reviewing this one.

This particulate incarnation, with a focus on Batman's coming to terms with himself, has to be the best entry of the saga to date. Both "Batman Begins" and the "The Dark Knight" have featured a stellar modernization of the classic villains like Scarecrow, Joker, and Harvey Dent so I had been looking forward to this latest adventure for months. I was not disappointed: This one needs to go directly onto you "must see" of the summer list.

Christian Bale has a knack for playing the batty hero of Gotham. Even with the mildly annoying 'tracheotomy voice of disguise' (which I'll be honest, threw me a little in the first movie), presented his fantastically dark and conflicted version of Bruce Wayne without a hitch. The story this time is Wayne's beloved Gotham City is under threat of a nuclear bomb (surprise!) being wielded by the wickedly twisted Bane. His reasons for holding New York Gotham hostage are deeper than what you might be used to for an action film and may just have you thinking on you're way out of the theater.

With all the highs in this movie I don't want to linger too long on any lows, but I found myself wishing that the relationship Bruce has with Miranda (played by Marion Cotillard) was explored deeper than the 10 minutes of screen time it was allotted. By the end some of the motivations seemed altogether too weak and frankly, unjustified. If I'm totally honest though, I didn't really care and I'm kind of glad that time was taken with the more colorful co-stars where there was obviously a tremendous amount of acting chemistry. Beside - would you rather see Batman getting it on with someone who feels like a non-sequitor more than a coherent part of the story or would you rather see more Alfred? 

Lastly, the on-screen chemistry between Bale and Anne Hathaway (The Cat (burglar) Woman) and a last minute Robin reveal truly have me wishing this wasn't the final chapter of this Batman before the inevitable reboot in a few years. I'm happy for the masked man when the story closes but selfishly want him to put on his suit just one more time.