Monday, June 2, 2014

REVIEW: BZRK by Michael Grant



BZRK (BZRK, #1)
Set in the near future, BZRK is the story of a war for control of the human mind.  Charles and Benjamin Armstrong, conjoined twins and owners of the Armstrong Fancy Gifts Corporation, have a goal:  to turn the world into their vision of utopia.  No wars, no conflict, no hunger.  And no free will.  Opposing them is a guerrilla group of teens, code name BZRK, who are fighting to protect the right to be messed up, to be human.  This is no ordinary war, though.  Weapons are deployed on the nano-level. The battleground is the human brain.  And there are no stalemates here:  It’s victory . . . or madness.


BZRK unfolds with hurricane force around core themes of conspiracy and mystery, insanity and changing realities, engagement and empowerment, and the larger impact of personal choice. Which side would you choose?  How far would you go to win?
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MY THOUGHTS
The Gone series is one of my all time favorite series! So it's not a surprise that when I discovered that Michael Grant has another book series, I automatically wanted to read it. But I was disappointed, in a way. I liked this book, but it didn't knock my socks off like the Gone series.

I had one major problem with this book and that is the fact that it was very hard for me to get into. The main reason that I couldn't get into this book very easily was the fact that perspectives were constantly switching. I'm not talking about the usual different person perspectives, but a paragraph would have the perspective of two different things...yet it would be from the same person.
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I know, it is very confusing, which is kind of why it was hard for me to follow. What happens is that a person has these little bug things that actually have some of the person's DNA. This causes that person to see through the eyes of the little bug, while AT THE SAME time still walking around as a normal human. So, basically they were doing two different things at once. This would mean that there would be a sentence explaining what the person just did and directly after that, would be a sentence explaining what the bug thing was doing (and both would use the human's name to describe what they were doing).
CAN YOU SEE WHY I WAS CONFUSED?!

Let's add to this that there was lots terminology that was used to describe things like, well, the bug things and the real world vs. the microscopic world, and other such stuff that I could not fully comprehend (it wasn't until later that I discovered that there was a Glossary in the back of the book).

The good news is that, while it did take me awhile to get into the book, I did begin to get used to the weird switch in perspectives and I begin to learn the terminology, which made me enjoy the book much more. And yes, I did end up enjoying this book. I eventually became invested in this story. The idea of the book was completely unique and entirely different than anything that I've read before! 

IN CONCLUSION
With the strange terms and the strange perspectives, it was hard for me to follow along with the story, but I did end up enjoying this book, just not as much as I hoped. I will be continuing the series and, now that I am used to the strangeness, it will probably be easier for me to get into the sequel. I will warn people that there are some gory scenes in this book, that's just the kind of books Michael Grant writes, but they are not too bad.

I hereby give this book
3 Wheels
Meaning: I liked it.

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