Wow wow wow. This book is truly a masterpiece. 

   Red Rising is a science fiction, dystopian novel written by Pierce Brown that takes place on Mars. The book is narrated by a character named Darrow who is a Red. Red is a color in the caste system in which Red is the lowest and Gold is the highest. Each caste has a job that contributes to the society. Reds, including Darrow, live in the worst living conditions of Mars, living underneath the surface mining helium-3 all day everyday, and treated horribly, treated like slaves and believing that they are making the surface of Mars livable for the other colors. Darrow later finds out that humanity has already made it to the surface of Mars and that they don’t actually have any need for the Reds that are mining and he is furious, wanting change and justice for his people. Driven by the dream of his dead wife, he infiltrates the Golds’ society and plans to take them down from the inside to do this he enters the Institute, a school where Golds prove themselves to be the next generation of humanity’s governors. He has to win and gain the Golds’ favor so he can bring them down. 

   My favorite part of this book is the characters. They are all so well thought out and so likeable. But, if Brown wants you to hate a character, you will. Brown is an incredible author, he managed to write something so complicated and heavy and made it easy and exciting to read and understand. Almost every paragraph there is a line that leaves me awestruck. Jaw on the floor, eyes watering, heart clenching. Brown makes you feel exactly what Darrow is feeling, hopeless, happy, powerful, and he does it so well. He is amazing at creating imagery so vivid that it doesn’t take much imagination to picture exactly what Darrow is seeing. One thing I was most impressed with was the relationships Darrow grows with the other characters in the book. Brown knew how to write the love and heartache and anger that Darrow felt with each character and each character has a different, but incredibly meaningful relationship with one another. There is so much depth in this book, and I feel like every time I reread it there will be something new to discover. 

   I absolutely love Darrow’s personality and Brown did such a good job of making him likeable but also real. In lots of books the main character is either so obnoxious or too perfect, yet Darrow is amazing. This book puts Darrow through a lot and it gets him down, but you read and watch his growth and by the end of the book he is completely changed. His character development is so fun to read. 

   However, this book may not be everyone’s cup of tea. Brown wrote basically a whole new world with new government structures. There is a lot of detail and it’s easy to get confused. Brown added dialect and differing words depending on where a character was from, and that got a little confusing. There were new names for weapons and tools and machines that I never quite understood exactly what they were. 

   Again, Red Rising is a science fiction dystopian, and it is very, very much those two genres. I know many people aren’t huge fans of those genres and if you are one of those people, this book may not be for you, though it doesn’t hurt to try it out. 

   Overall this book is a 10 out of 10 in my opinion. I’ve never laughed, cried, choked or screamed more than I have with this book. I felt every emotion within only a few pages of each other. I found myself thinking about it constantly, and wanting to be reading it every second of the day. It is my favorite book I’ve read so far and I have a feeling it won’t be beaten. 

   So, if you’re looking for a good story that will stick with you, or even something that you just want to read for fun, this book is for you.