I first read Blake Crouch for book club when we picked up Dark Matter, then again when we read Recursion. Although I don’t ever pick up this genre (sci fi) on my own, I ended up really falling hard into both of those books. So, when NetGalley and Ballantine Books offered an ARC of Upgrade, I knew I had to grab it.
Was it as good as the others? Keep reading to find out what I thought.
The Summary
“You are the next step in human evolution.”
At first, Logan Ramsay isn’t sure if anything’s different. He just feels a little . . . sharper. Better able to concentrate. Better at multitasking. Reading a bit faster, memorizing better, needing less sleep.
But before long, he can’t deny it: Something’s happening to his brain. To his body. He’s starting to see the world, and those around him—even those he loves most—in whole new ways.
The truth is, Logan’s genome has been hacked. And there’s a reason he’s been targeted for this upgrade. A reason that goes back decades to the darkest part of his past, and a horrific family legacy.
Worse still, what’s happening to him is just the first step in a much larger plan, one that will inflict the same changes on humanity at large—at a terrifying cost.
Because of his new abilities, Logan’s the one person in the world capable of stopping what’s been set in motion. But to have a chance at winning this war, he’ll have to become something other than himself. Maybe even something other than human.
And even as he’s fighting, he can’t help wondering: what if humanity’s only hope for a future really does lie in engineering our own evolution?
Intimate in scale yet epic in scope, Upgrade is an intricately plotted, lightning-fast tale that charts one man’s thrilling transformation, even as it asks us to ponder the limits of our humanity—and our boundless potential.
My Review
Have you read Dark Matter and/or Recursion? Both of those just had me frantically turning pages to find out what happened. Even though I never read sci fi (and probably still won’t unless pushed by book club), I just loved the craziness of both of those books. The worlds were so inventive, the science so cool.
So, I started Upgrade expecting to go for a ride. I did, but…
This book didn’t do for me what the previous two did, I’m sad to report! I just couldn’t get lost in this one like I did the other two.
My main issue with Upgrade was the way Logan continuously describes his new abilities. I know we need the details to fully understand what’s happening with his body and mind, but it got to be too much for me, like he was just hitting the reader over the head with “look what I can do now!” kind of stuff.
Now, I’m definitely not saying that this book was awful because of that. It was still a fun and entertaining read! I enjoyed the rivalry in the book, which I won’t go into because it’s a spoiler. It was pretty epic, though.
As far as the science goes, this one was definitely just as intricately researched and detailed as Dark Matter and Recursion. Crouch drops a ton of facts and words about the human genome. At times, though, I did feel a little bit like they were there just for the sake of looking impressive and….well….science-y.
Overall I enjoyed Upgrade, but it definitely was my least favorite of Crouch’s three books. I’m giving it a 3.5.
