Review: Armada

Armada by Ernest Cline
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

If you liked Ready Player One, you will almost certainly like this. If you didn't, you probably won't. I thought it was a fun romp without much depth.

That said, this is kind of an odd fish. It's quite clearly aimed at a Young Adult audience, but absolutely chock-full of 1980's geek references. News Flash: us 80's geeks aren't young anythings anymore, and the "Yoof a Tuhday" don't exactly think we were cool... So while I am squarely in the target reticule for half of this book (the nerd bit, obviously) I was occasionally annoyed by some of the more overt YA bits. I can imagine the same thing being true for YA audiences, the other way.

The other weird thing about this book is that it mocks itself, but not really in what feels like a self-deprecating way. It pointedly makes fun of the whole genre of power fantasies for teenagers where their mad video game skills end up being relevant and save the day. It calls out The Last Starfighter, Iron Eagle, and others by name and laughs at the implausibility of them. And then tells exactly the same story. And not in a self-aware "Gosh I know this sounds ridiculous..." kind of a way, but more with a "Whew; glad _I'm_ this cool and not that silly" swagger. I don't quite know how to characterize it, but this book didn't _feel_ like it knew it was was making fun of itself.

Quick and easy read, and fun at least for me.

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