Uptown Oracle Reads… WaR: Wizards and Robots

Sara Luring is the founder of robot’s, the age-old foes of wizards. The wizards have sent a team to hunt down Sara and stop robots from being created. Geller, a wizard and Ada Luring, Sara’s daughter must learn to work together with the robots to change the past and secure the future. But they don’t have much time before a mysterious enemy launches its attack on Earth…

As a pre-warning, I’ve tried to be objective but I found this book very difficult to read due to it being a really poorly formatted e-book arc. This means I was (extra) irritable when things I dislike came up. The first thing that irritated me was the love at first sight. Without speaking to the other person, or even actually meeting (She is watched through a video) there’s a romance in this book. This is both unrealistic expectations for a children’s book and also slightly creepy. There was also no development upon meeting – it seemed like the authors had thought they needed a romance and just dropped them into the pairing with no lead up to feelings.

WaR made a good effort for merging the Sci-Fi and Fantasy genre and made good points as to how and why technological advancement and magic can be contained within the same world. I enjoy how they are linked to one another, but I’m still confused about what and who Spawn are. I think the focus on wizards and robots overshadowed the plot line in places and some plot points were dropped. It also maybe took on a bit too much from each genre. It was a very packed book full of tropes (Robots can’t harm humans they’re programmed!) and aspects from the genre’s that just clustered into the pages.

The main story arc was clearly thought out in terms of main events and timelines and it does tie together into a bow at the end. But there was a lack of development outside the main story arc. I also didn’t feel it was that original except that the characters had been made into robots or wizards. I couldn’t quite put my finger onto which book it reminded me of, but it was reminiscent (for me anyway!). The ending also seemed rushed and left you feeling a bit anticlimactic.

Positives

+ Good effort for merging Sci-Fi and Fantasy

+ Storyline merges and ties into one another

Negatives

– Love at first sight (and no development)

– Felt rushed into the ending

– Actual plot didn’t seem all that original

– Includes too much from both genres – a clutter of a book

I received WaR: Wizards and Robots* by willi.i.am and Brian David Johnson from the publisher via NetGalley. This is an unbiased and honest review.