Two things are currently eating my brain.

[which_chick]

Thing one is the horrible upsell clicky game that is free to lose but pay to be competitive, Hero Wars. I am... playing this. I can't explain it. The darned thing is more of a resource management spreadsheet operation than an actual adventure game, but there you go. As a resource management spreadsheet operation, it is surprisingly compelling. I have a guild. I am running Flaming Scythe Guy, Heavy Drinker, Blue Knife Girl, Two Dipshit Outfits, Turtle Grandma, and Friendly Mandrake as the pet. (Not their real names. That's just what I call them. Game also offers Floating Blue Squid, Medieval Torturer, Snake Girl, Steampunk Chaingun, Poncy Bard, Vampire Goth, Skeleton King, Plant Girl, Technospidergirl, Kitsune Guy, Nerd Boy, Spear Statue, Fist Guy, Antlerman, etc... you have a lot of heroes to choose from. There are like forty. These are just the ones I use.)

Flaming Scythe Guy is the tank. He stands in front and gets hit a lot. Blue Knife Girl and Two Dipshit Outfits deal damage but they are not beefy like the tank. Heavy Drinker is mage-based support. Turtle Grandma and Friendly Mandrake stand in the back and heal the group.

There are also titans and tournaments and stuff. It's... a weird thing but I am currently enjoying it. I've spent about five actual real-world dollars on the game, so it's not eating my bank account, just my free time. I'm about halfway through the campaign itself (15 chapters, I'm at the end of chapter 8) and we'll see how it goes. Anyway, that's thing one.

Thing two is more... long term compelling, I think. It's a hero journey book along the lines of Ender's Game. Space war, wimpy hero leveling up through the power of his hero-ness, smarts, and work ethic. With friends. Military academy with some questionable ethics. It's rather Ender's Game, honestly, but as this is a style of thing that I enjoy reading, that's fine. I first got it on Kindle Unlimited, which you might suspect makes it not-really-a-book but it's way better than it has any right to be. I have read A LOT of KU and, wow, this is a cut above. I gave up and bought a permanent kindle copy for actual money.

The worldbuilding is pretty decent. The teasers (this is book 1) for Future Book Development are delightful. I am a fan. The book is called Iron Prince by O'Connor & Chmilenko and while it is firmly and clearly cut from an Ender's Game style cloth, it is well-crafted and a good example of the genre.

Thoughts:

1. The nature of CAD systems is delightfully expositioned in the exam format for assignment, where we have our hero working through the exam questions AND ALSO infodumping to the reader stuff that they'll need for later. Nicely done.

2. Our hero's specialness is displayed at the front end where the AI passes him on the physical part of the exam despite his actual scores. This has not happened before. (It's OK for a hero to be exceptional. That's kind of the point of them.)

3. The bad guys are Archons. They are "artificial entities" from the frontier. Humans are fighting them... with CAD (Combat Assistive Device) systems more-or-less MADE OUT OF Archon tech, networked into and backed by the universal human-made AI called the MIND.

4. The CAD systems, or "Devices", come with names. Everybody who gets a CAD gets its name with it. The CADs have names. Put a pin in this for later.

5. Right after Valera Dent hands the school acceptance letter to Rei (our hero) she has a conversation with "Kes". "Kes" is ABLE TO ASK QUESTIONS on Dent's NOED (optical display) and does so twice, regarding Dent's interaction with Rei. "Kes" also offers an opinion which Dent agrees with.

6. Valera Dent's CAD is named Kestrel.

7. Throughout the rest of the book, there is NOBODY ELSE IN THE BOOK who could possibly be called "Kes" by Valera Dent. Theory of me: "Kes" is Dent's CAD, which is self-aware.

8. Not all CADs are self-aware. Perhaps this is a thing that happens at S-class? Just atypical S-class? Does S as a class stand for Sentient? Does A stand for "aware" instead of "atypical"? There certainly aren't very MANY A-type CADS. Ain't very many S-class users, either. We need more infomation.

9. Reidon's CAD is named Shido (seed). His own given name is also Japanese. We do not know his parents because he is a ward of the state. He was given up by his parents because of his medical condition (subsequently resolved by his CAD).

10. Maddison is dating "a captain" and I suspect that captain is Valera Dent. If so, yay. They deserve each other.

11. A third of the way through the book, Catcher acts like it's impossible that "a device suddenly came to life and is taking note of our training schedules". So if CADs are self-aware, it's not public knowledge or even "Basic User Handbook" knowledge. But... they have names. And Valera Dent talks to hers. She talks to it. I swear by Crom, SHE TALKS TO IT. I'll fight you on this one. Valera Dent's CAD is self-aware and capable of conversation.

Reader Prediction:

Shido is going to come alive, for realsies, and to announce to Rei that it's done so, likely at the end of the next book. Lasher should make it there too, he's not far from S-class and he's also A-type.

12: Rei's real family is fabulously wealthy. This is disclosed at the tail end of the book. Also, he has a sibling. I expect that eventually he'll get to meet his peeps.

13: This is a book that rewards careful reading. Chancery's extra training hours are revealed well before The Big Reveal, if you are paying attention. So is Viv's chatty relationship with the Mauler. (I don't always catch this stuff THE FIRST TIME but on re-read I do notice these nicely-crafted deets and appreciate them.)

14. There is more to the war with the Archons than we currently know about. There's stuff that the government/military knows that our hero & co. do not know. We need more war information. Possibly the path to victory is not extermination but symbiosis. (This could be very interesting.) We shall see.