*I received the PDF copy from the author for Rockstar Book Tours. All reviews are my own.*
Wheeew!! This book was a ride! I never knew something to be deliciously terrible and terribly delicious all simultaneously. Independent author Will Scifi pens his "cyberpunk" dystopian novel Nova's Blade, and I have to say, this story was wildly entertaining. Between the page-turning storyline and the hair-pulling plot hole structure, I honestly couldn't get enough of Nova and her journey to becoming the Last Valkyrie. Confused already? Let's break it all down.
"After a long war, corporations have replaced countries. Sports are fought to the death. The most popular game is Last Valkyrie, a live tournament where women kill each other for marriage into a powerful family.
For Nova, living in poverty with her mother and sister is a harsh reality that she cannot escape. But when she is kidnapped and forced to fight on the show, her world changes. If she refuses to fight, the bomb in her head goes off. Now winning means her freedom.
With death lurking at every moment, Nova has no idea if her next fight will be her last. But one thing she knows for certain: only one is making it out alive."
Reminiscent of Dead Dead Girls, Nova's Blade needs a serious revision. I have no problem with the story and got immediately pulled in, but I was also distracted by the numerous mistakes most independent authors go through. Aside from the typical spelling errors and sentence fragments, one of the biggest things Scifi failed to accomplish was filling out the plot holes he created. After almost two years of reviewing, my biggest pet peeve is not circling back to the original statement. It made a lot of the scenes a pointless addition to the story. Some of the subplots came back so late in the game I almost forgot that they were mentioned in the first place. I also noticed that Scifi tried to add definitions to the character's personalities, but it didn't quite fit in the situations. There are many minor characters that Scifi did not give backstories for, but he places them on a high enough pedestal to think that they are an essential fixture in the story – when they're not. It was like breaking the 4th wall. This could have been because the story is told from Nova's point of view and a random bystander decided to speak.
The last thing I will criticize is the story's lack of description. Scifi could have done a better job describing the characters and their scenes. I think he did a good job of world-building, especially after pulling from other dystopian genres such as Hunger Games, Squid Games, Ready Player One, Apocalypto, etc. But when it came to introducing characters or at least moving to the next scene, I had to guess who these people were and try to find and fit pieces of a puzzle to get a more precise outcome.
I know I wrote a lot already, but I haven't even told you about the good parts of the story. As mentioned before, Nova's Blade relies heavily on Hunger Games and, most recently, Squid Games. If you are a fan of the genre, this book is for you. I like that this timeframe is set in the future, but the universe wasn't destroyed. The world more likely evolved. Usually, when you read a story like this, some tragic natural accident happened that wiped out the world's population, but it's the latter. It's interesting to envision a world of pure technology and subscriptions. It's a wild concept to subscribe to the neighborhood police for guaranteed protection or a hospital to get emergency medical attention. This reminded me of a real-life situation where a man's house caught fire, and the firefighters refused to put it out because he had no insurance. The man begged and offered to pay for the services right then, but he was still denied. The firefighters jumped in only when the fire looked like it was getting too close to the neighbor's house, who did have fire insurance. It's a sad situation to witness, but in Nova's world, it's a reality.
The story was surprisingly fast-paced. With the mistakes mentioned above, I thought I was going to have a tough time reading this. No! I was entertained by Nova's personality and her journey to becoming a Valkyre. Don't get me wrong, she is bull-headed and very naive, but it's what made her character something to watch.
Overall, I'm rating it 3.5-stars. I cannot stress enough that I enjoyed the story. It may not seem like it, but I loved its potential. There were some things in the story I didn't care about, like the romance element, the lack of explanation of the terrorist group, and the unbelievable dialogue Nova engaged in. The story was captivating but poorly written. Hopefully, he will have a better execution within his writing whenever Scifi drops book 2 (because, yes, there is a cliffhanger).
Hey peeps, liked the review? If you did (or didn't but are still curious about the book), Rockstar Book Tours is doing a giveaway for Nova's Blade! One winner will win a copy of Nova's Blade. Sorry international baddies, but it is U.S. only. Click the link below to enter! The giveaway ends April 25th, 2022