MetaWars: Battle of the
Immortal by Jeff Norton, MetaWars #3.0
The dead have risen
The Uploaded have crossed over into the real world. Now
the fight for control of the online Metasphere and the offline world has become
a savage battle between virtual and reality.
Jonah Delacroix is on a mission to save the Metasphere,
but as allegiances change again and again he faces a terrible choice: rescue
his Uploaded father, or make the ultimate sarafice.
Who will win the battle of the immortal.
The MetaWars series kicked
of last year with Jeff Norton’s debut: MetaWars: Fight for the Future. This
pacey action packed young adult series is inspired by the several metatrends
that cross influence many aspects of our human life, economically, socially,
environmentally and politically. MetaWars: Battle for the Immortal is already
the third book in the planned quartet of the MetaWars series. The last book,
Freedom Frontier is out due October this year.
Just a quick note up front:
the “The dead have risen” in the synopsis is not referenced to the
undead/zombie. In the second book several events have transpired which lead to
the Uploaded being able to take on the conscience of people from the real
world. Actually a pretty cool thing.
What is MetaWars about? The
world in which it takes place has been destroyed by wars and a lot of other
things. Among the ruins two great forces have risen. The Millennials and the
Guardians. These two forces battle it out against each other. Matthew Granger,
who leads the Millennials has created the MetaSphere as a place of escape,
however it is privatized by him, the Guardians want only one thing, making the
excess free for everyone. By this they plan to take over the for serves that
power and hold the data of the MetaSphere. In this ongoing battle we find
young, Jonah Delacroix who is torn between swearing his allegiance to the
Millennials or the Guardians. He has gone through a lot already also hoping
that his actions turn out to be for the better, but more than often he doesn’t
really think things trough..
The second book in the
MetaWars series left the story quite open for a few consideration in where the
third book could pick up. The Uploaded have broken free in the MetaSphere and
are now usurping humans, taking control of their real life bodies. On one had
this did proved to be in favor for Jonah getting to meet up with his father
once more. But on the other hand, by this, things are getting out of hand in
the MetaSphere, where the Uploaded have a hunger to consume the avatars of the
real people and take over their real life bodies.
The first thing that falls
to notice of this third book is the focus. Where the first two books centered
around getting to the corners, where the MetaSphere servers stand, as soon as
possible. Battle of the Immortal is more a book that ties in with dealing with
all the consequence that were set in motion by Jonah’s actions. It furthermore
stars to wrap up a few things along the way. And lastly, Jeff Norton introduces
a great paragraph of something that I was stressing in my review of The Dead
are Rising.
Almost everything that
happened in the first two books was due to Jonah’s decisions. He always thought
that what he was doing, was for the good of all. Jonah never really stood still
and really thought about the consequences that his actions might have, and how
they could impact everything on a much larger scale, for example his decisions
of releasing the uploaded and thereby creating a lot of other problems as well.
Like I mentioned above Battle of the Immortal focuses on the problems of the
Uploaded, that now run rampant across the MetaSphere, posing both a problem for
the Millennials and the Guardians. They both want to find a solution to the
problem. Though they share a similar vision they do things separately. The
Guardians plan to contain them temporarily, and try to catch the Uploaded by
lassoing them, actually a pretty cool feat when Jonah and Sam are first
undertaking this “hunt”. Matthew again does it different with a more ambitious
premise in mind, creating a virus that catches all the Uploaded. However the
outcome for both is the same, the Uploaded do not like this approach and are
rebelling against it.
However this part of the Uploaded
problem takes place in the MetaSphere, directly as a consequence of the free
Uploaded in the MetaSphere came the Reborn, those Uploaded that have managed to
take over a human avatar and inhabit their real life bodies. Giving them a
second life. In the attempts to free the real life humans of their Uploaded new
host, I actually was kind of intrigued by the approach and idea of Matthew. His
argumentation behind this approach was quite humane and in my opinion maybe one
of the best. However I think that Matthew might be losing his touch on his
followers, that he has an ulterior motive, though it might be sometimes a bit
selfish. His idea to free the Reborn was great but the execution by his people
was quite rough and showed that even though his plans turn out good, you can
only control so much in the real world..
In the first and second
book of the MetaWars series there is both an encounter between Jonah and
Matthew. In Battle of the Immortal there is again such an encounter. And as is
known from Matthews character he is quite charismatic and this time again I
think, if I would have been in Jonah position would have gone for his deal. I
was actually wondering why Jonah wasn’t jumping to the occasion, maybe Jonah
could have accepted it with a bit of twist. Looking back on the earlier books
where Matthew was portrayed as the bad guy, I am getting my doubts. Just
looking at the overall development of his character towards the third book, his
actions and his ideas, though they are sometimes selfish, they do have a
certain sense in them along the lines of
trying to make the world a better place. Though still according to Matthews
rules.. With the tension between the Millennials and the Guardians there is
still some violence taking place mainly in the way of a shoot out. Though you
do not see much of the forces that drive the Guardians, you do still get that
their intentions are still on free the MetaSphere.
Above I mentioned that Jeff
Norton did something that I was stressing in my review of The Dead are Rising.
But come to think of it there are actually two things. Firstly, in Battle of
the Immortal there is for me a perfect balance between the online and the
offline world. You really get pulled in by Jonah’s attempts to save both
worlds. Though the covering of the online world in here is not that much, it
more comes to show that several key things that happen in here show a great
depth for the developing story. I think this balance was crucial, so as not to
get estranged for either worlds. Secondly, character development, YES! And
mainly here I want to stress Jonah’s character. As I recall from the earlier
books, Jonah though a teenboy, came across as a bit of a “hard-ass” he lost his
mother and not barely shedding a treat about it. The ending of Battle of the
Immortal turns this around and I was very pleased by this. There is a dialogue
between Sam and Jonah about losing their parents, this completely showed a
different side of Jonah character, for the better. And as a finisher, the
encounter between Jonah and Matthew, really posed a eye-opening event for
Jonah, he is coming to grow up and seeing that everything you be it in real
life or in the MetaSphere has consequences. This is a wise lesson for our young
protagonist, and I hope he will follow through on it.
MetaWars: Battle of the
Immortal is just like its predecessors. Telling a action-packed, pacey story.
This third book in the MetaWars series started wrapping up several storylines
but leaves enough open for the last book Freedom Frontier. Which is out later
this year in October. Battle of the Immortal transformed the series, further
broadening the storyline of the MetaWars series. The book is written in a
different approach not focusing on the
specific corner to be taken, instead it highlights a great character
development for both Jonah and Matthew. One last question remains still, who
will win the battle; the Millennials or the Guardians?
If you are still thinking which book you could get to get your kids reading more, get them the MetaWars series, they will be entertained for hours!