Wildcard

WILDCARD continues right after the cliffhanger at the end of WARCROSS. As a re-do of the Warcross championship approaches, main character Emika Chen must confront Hideo, who wasn’t the boy she thought she knew, and his brother, Sasuke, who has been missing for years. She must do this while avoiding the bounty hunters trying to kill her to claim a hefty sum of prize money. 

This book is a lot more plot-based than the first iteration in this duology and goes into heavy detail about the science behind the NeuroLink program and how it can be used to control minds. Doing so, it raises a lot of moral questions about technology, censorship, and government control. Hideo has the ability to make criminals forget that they want to commit crimes—but should he really have the power to do that? This, along with many other questions, are posed to the reader throughout the story.

The book is also filled with plot twists. Once you think you understand the plot, prepare to be completely thrown off in the next chapter. None of the plot twists are so out there that they are unbelievable, so it is really fun to be left constantly on your toes and surprised various times throughout the story.

Finally, this book further develops all of the characters from the first book in a satisfying way. Each of the members of Emika’s former team has a backstory explained with rich detail in WILDCARD. You’ll learn about their childhoods and their relationships with each other. This duology has a diverse cast of characters that represent different classes, ethnicities, sexualities, and countries of origin and the story benefits immensely from it. If you loved the characters in the first book, you are going to love the character-specific moments in this one.

Overall, this is a great sequel and marvelous closer to an amazing and profound duology. It is the perfect series for those who prefer video games to books and just might help turn a lot of non-readers into new book nerds.