S. L. Huang

ZERO SUM GAME Best of Lists: * Best Books of the Month at The Verge, Book Riot, Unbound Worlds, SYFY, & Kirkus * The Mary Sue Book Club Pick * Library Journal Best Debuts of Fall and Winter A blockbuster near-future thriller, S.L. Huang's Zero Sum Game introduces a math-genius mercenary who finds herself being manipulated by someone possessing unimaginable power... Cas Russell is good at math. Scary good. The vector calculus blazing through her head lets her smash through armed men twice her size and dodge every bullet in a gunfight, and she'll take any job for the right price. As far as Cas knows, she’s the only person around with a superpower...until she discovers someone with a power even more dangerous than her own. Someone who can reach directly into people’s minds and twist their brains into Moebius strips. Someone intent on becoming the world’s puppet master. Cas should run, like she usually does, but for once she's involved. There’s only one problem... She doesn’t know which of her thoughts are her own anymore. "Fresh and exciting... a great start to an exciting series--and an exciting career." --Boing Boing

Zero Sum Game

Colleen

4.5 Stars
 
*A fast-paced, action-packed story about a trigger-happy mathematical genius who falls into the path of a secret society capable of mind control*


I saw Zero Sum Game recommended on Bookstagram. Pretty much any book with a genius female main character is going to grab my attention. So I was excited to see if this lived up to the hype.

The story is narrated in first person, past tense by a young woman named Cas Russell who sees all the world through vector calculus and can instantly compute the best action to take in any scenario. Whether it’s dodging bullets or knocking out guys twice her size, Cas uses her skills to make herself a nearly unstoppable recovery agent. Until a case goes sideways and she finds herself in the crosshairs of a corrupt secret organization capable of controlling people’s minds as easily as they control various governments. Despite having a directionally challenged moral compass, even Cas can see how dangerous this organization is and that far more than her life is on the line.


  “There is something beautiful about the high-speed math of a gunfight. I’ve heard other people opine that gunfights are confusing and disorienting, but to me, they always happen with perfect clarity: every bullet impact leads back to its source, every barrel sweeping through with its own exact trajectory.”

Zero Sum Game opens with Cas being captured by a Columbian drug cartel, and the action and violence never stopped from there. Yes, this book did have a lot of bloody action and a high death toll. I don’t think the violence was too gratuitously described, but Cas’s “Shoot first; ask questions never” attitude did lend the book a notable nonchalance towards murder. Honestly, it felt like the movie “Wanted” was rewritten by a mathlete. Sure, the premise and action were over-the-top but I still enjoyed every page of this. 


  “‘Cas,’ said Rio, ‘She had logical arguments for you because you respond to logical arguments.’ 
I was confused. ‘What other type would someone respond to?’ 
‘It’s clear you don’t often converse with other people,’ said Rio with a hint of irony.”

And yes, the conspiracy theory type secret organization pulling all the strings and literally controlling minds was far-fetched, but it was certainly a page-turner. I am hesitant to actually label this as SciFi though. It’s some sort of crossover between lite SciFi and psychic abilities.

I wouldn’t let the description of mathematics discourage anyone from picking up this book. Although the narrator does throw some terms around, the story isn’t overly focused on how Cas calculates the best way out of every situation – just that she can. Honestly, I would have loved even more nerdy math explanations in some scenes. I wished the story would have leaned into that element and gone into detail about exactly how Cas was using leverage and inertia to obliterate her opponents. Sure, some readers would fall asleep reading that, but I’d rather have the detail than a generic description along the lines of, “Cas did a quick calculation of how to knock down all the mercenaries and then proceeded to do exactly that.” No, that’s not an actual quote. But there were quite a few scenes where the reader is simply told that Cas has mentally calculated the perfect plan of action without much computations to back that up. But then again, I’m the weird one who thought of every Physics class like it was an episode of “Fight Science” and tried to imagine how each concept would apply to my Taekwondo techniques. Didn’t everyone? No? Just me, eh? Well, I’ll just awkwardly change the subject now…

Cas certainly qualifies as a morally grey character. And most of the other characters range from morally grey to outright evil. I won’t go into details on the other characters to avoid giving anything away. But the non-stop action combined with the need to obscure characters’ backgrounds for suspense reasons led to a lack of character development. But I have to admit that despite the surface level development, I was totally invested in the characters. The added bits of sass definitely helped me care about these characters. It did leave a lot of room for growth and exploration in the sequels, so I hope the author delivers on that. I am looking forward to finding out!


RATING FACTORS:
Ease of Reading: 5 Stars
Writing Style: 4 Stars
Characters and Character Development: 4 Stars
Plot Structure and Development: 5 Stars
Level of Captivation: 5 Stars
Originality: 4 Stars

Briar Rose

Stayed up MUCH too late finishing this because it would not let go of my brain. Totally worth it. Longer review coming later.

Sheila

Who knew being a genius at math could be a superpower? (okay, probably everyone that's actually good at math is like "we been knew" but math was never my strongest subject in school so let me have my moment of wonder)

This was a fascinating execution of a unique ~superpower used by a person who has a limited moral compass beginning to learn that she may not have to go through life alone. I thoroughly enjoyed the climax & loved that bit of a cliffhanger to keep me interested in the story. Definitely think I'll check out the rest of this series!

Laura

Fred Carlsen

Chris

ZERO SUM GAME Best of Lists: * Best Books of the Month at The Verge, Book Riot, Unbound Worlds, SYFY, & Kirkus * The Mary Sue Book Club Pick * Library Journal Best Debuts of Fall and Winter A blockbuster, near-future science fiction thriller, S.L. Huang's Zero Sum Game introduces a math-genius mercenary who finds herself being manipulated by someone possessing unimaginable power... Cas Russell is good at math. Scary good. The vector calculus blazing through her head lets her smash through armed men twice her size and dodge every bullet in a gunfight, and she'll take any job for the right price. As far as Cas knows, she’s the only person around with a superpower...until she discovers someone with a power even more dangerous than her own. Someone who can reach directly into people’s minds and twist their brains into Moebius strips. Someone intent on becoming the world’s puppet master. Cas should run, like she usually does, but for once she's involved. There’s only one problem... She doesn’t know which of her thoughts are her own anymore. "Fresh and exciting... a great start to an exciting series--and an exciting career." --Boing Boing At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Zero Sum Game

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