Review - Red Rising

Red Rising by Pierce Brown

5 out of 5 gnomes

Wow, this book is crazy intense (I love it.) Now this, this is a truly great dystopian story. It’s like if the Hunger Games and the Percy Jackson had a baby, a very violent baby.

This story takes place on Mars in a unique color coded society. The different facets of the society and world are built up very well. Darrow is a Red which is the lowest of the colors. He’s a miner and very good at what he does. He seems happy or at least content but then you find out piece by piece that everything is not all hunky dory. He doesn’t seem the rebellious type but then things go horribly wrong.

Darrow's not looking to start a revolution but events drastically lead him to it. You can really feel his pain and the hard decisions he has to make. Lets just say the beginning was very surprising.

He becomes part of the revolution in a very unique way. When he is among the Golds is when the true face behind the society starts to be seen.

Most of the story takes place at the Institute where the elite of the Golds are trained. This training is the most brutal game of capture the flag ever. It involves a lot of real life warfare and more than one death/murder.

The people he meets are surprising and have real depth. I really loved Sevro, Roque and Pax's characters. Then there’s Mustang, she and Darrow have quite an interesting relationship.

Darrow continues to do things his way and sees how he can change the world. After more than a couple of mistakes of course. His way of looking at the world leads to some interesting choices and consequences.

Can't wait to see what happens and if he can follow through on his part of the revolution plan.