Armada by Ernest Cline (Audiobook Thoughts) ~ Or, does anyone care about Wil Wheaton anymore?

Synopsis & book facts can be found at the end, I just decided to rant and joke around in uninterrupted peace

I’m going to have a hard time writing out a whole review of this book.  It’s literally The Last Starfighter’s plot having a baby with Enders Game, re written with one idea from every science fiction game, tv show, movie, and adjacent pop culture item out there, shoved into one book. It’s like item -> location -> item -> location, ad infinitum. Everything from HG Wells to Team America to Tron.

OH IT FUNCTIONS LIKE THE DEATH STAR -YOU KNOW, FROM STAR WARS!

Ok. Great

Everything was a thing from something else. While this did feed into the plot and make sense at the end, I found that it got boring real quick.  It didn’t help that both the start and ending were weak either.  I love a good pop culture reference as much as the next person but how much can you really take from everywhere else and then slap the actual most half-assed ending ever on it? 

Well friends, read the book and find out.

Or don’t. I had content issues with it too for a YA book but I know I’m on a losing battle with that one, let’s just say the defending generals spent too much pre invasion time mixing business with pleasure 🙄 . Actually I’m not even sure if it’s a YA or not, but Zack is in high school so I assumed so.

Anyway, maybe don’t do what I did. Don’t listen to the audio.  I never particularly had strong feelings one way or the other about Wil Wheaton but his voice irked me for some reason. I can’t take him seriously and I think it rubbed off on my feelings on the book, which by no means is meant to be taken seriously either.  It’s just a big geeky parade of everything.

I actually picked the book up because I was curious as to Wheaton’s narration skills.  Plus what’s he even been doing these days besides raising kids, podcasting, playing games, and narrating a few Ernest Cline books? Who knows.

I can’t really dislike the guy because Sheldon (Big Bang Theory) made him a hilarious long running joke on the show.  I can’t really dislike him because TNG gave him a stupid ending either.  I just, I don’t know, let me pose it to any audience members here:

Does anyone actually care about Wil Wheaton anymore? Did you guys ever have  feelings about him one way or another?

Bookish Quick Facts:

• Title: Armada
• Series: N/A
• Author: Ernest Cline
• Publisher & Release: Ballantine Books, 2015
• Length: 384 Pages
• Rate & Recommend: ⭐⭐✨ sorry not sorry hahah but if you really love sci-fi pop culture and young adult books maybe try this one

Quick note on the audio: obv narrated by Wil Wheaton, I didn’t love it.  Whether he was hollering or sad or just talking, I just didn’t enjoy this book at all.  It’s 11:50 long from Random House Audio

Here’s the synopsis:

Zack Lightman has never much cared for reality. He vastly prefers the countless science-fiction movies, books, and videogames he’s spent his life consuming. And too often, he catches himself wishing that some fantastic, impossible, world-altering event could arrive to whisk him off on a grand spacefaring adventure.

So when he sees the flying saucer, he’s sure his years of escapism have finally tipped over into madness.

Especially because the alien ship he’s staring at is straight out of his favorite videogame, a flight simulator callled Armada—in which gamers just happen to be protecting Earth from alien invaders.

As impossible as it seems, what Zack’s seeing is all too real. And it’s just the first in a blur of revlations that will force him to question everything he thought he knew about Earth’s history, its future, even his own life–and to play the hero for real, with humanity’s life in the balance.

But even through the terror and exhilaration, he can’t help thinking: Doesn’t something about this scenario feel a little bit like . . .  well . . . fiction?

At once reinventing and paying homage to science-fiction classics, Armada is a rollicking, surprising thriller, a coming-of-age adventure, and an alien invasion tale like nothing you’ve ever read before