Thursday 9 January 2020

The God Game By Danny Tobey | Book Review


If you are looking for a creative, different, YA sci-fi thriller, then you need to check out The God Game by Danny Tobey*, which was kindly sent to me for review by Gollancz*. Honestly, I have never read a YA thriller like it. 



What is The God Game about?

Five best friends in a high school computer club get sucked into an underground hacker's game run by a mysterious A.I. that thinks it is God. It's all fun and games until people start to get hurt.

And the stakes keep getting higher. As the Game pits them against each other and turns their high school upside down, it offers the ultimate promise - win and learn the meaning of life; die in the game, and die for real.


What did I like about The God Game?

I've read a lot of YA thrillers in my time and I can't lie, the boarding school trope has gotten really old. So when I found out this wasn't set in a boarding school, I was pleasantly surprised. The God Game is different and unique. I haven't read a YA thriller like it before. 

I loved the concept of this book. If you like Stranger Things or have read either Ready Player One or War Cross, I think this book will be right up your street.

This book dealt with a lot of interesting themes. It talked about family, grief, mental health etc. It was jam packed with interesting commentary about life and death but also philosophy and religion (which I got major flash backs from doing my A-levels).

The writing was really good too, it was tense and pacey. The characters were all really complex but unique individuals. I really got sucked into their stories and was rooting for them all.

What did I not like about The God Game?

I really enjoyed this book a lot. One of my only minor complaints, would be that I would have preferred to have had the chapters labelled with the characters names, so it would have been easier to keep track of whose perspective I was reading in each chapter. There was quite a few characters and I did find, especially at the start I was getting lost at points.



Who do I recommend The God Game to?

As I have already mentioned, if you have watched Stranger Things or read either War Cross or Ready Player One, I think you will really enjoy this book. If you enjoy YA thrillers but are bored of the same tropes being done over and over, I think you may also enjoy this one or if you like sci-fi thrillers as this is definitely heavy on the science fiction.

However, I would give trigger warnings for abuse and suicide. If that is something that may upset you, maybe do some research into the book before you decide to pick it up.

Overall thoughts:

I think this is a really creative, original and unique book in the genre. It is definitely a memorable and stand out book for me, when it comes to YA and sci-fi thrillers. I really recommend it if you are looking for something fresh and different to read, that has similar vibes to other popular science fiction titles. 

Audio book, e-book and hardback are released 9th Jan 2020

Thank you for reading, as always X

*This book was sent to me free for review. However, all opinions are my own and I am not being paid to write this review. 
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