Heir Apparent

Heir Apparent is set in a future where some citizens are trying to limit the access that parents allow their children to video games. Giannine has a gift certificate for a gaming arcade and is determined to use it. She makes her way through a blockade of protestors who carry signs with sayings like

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"Magic = Satanism" and who yell Bible verses. Inside she engages in a game called "Heir Apparent" where the goal is to become crowned as king in two game "days". While Giannine is immersed in the virtual reality game, linked by brain and body to the hardware of the game, the protestors attack the arcade and damage the machinery.

Mr. Rasmussen sends a projection of himself into the game to warn Giannine that the machines are damaged and she cannot exit the system. He also lets her know that there is danger of an overload the longer she stays in the game and she MUST try to win...for her life.

Giannine makes mistakes and dies over and over again. When she starts seeing the characters as real people is it a symptom of the coming overload of the system or something else altogether.

Woven into the game, Giannine sees reflections of her relationship with her emotionally distant father.

I picked this book up at a Scholastic Book Fair and apparently a large portion of the Middle School was intrigued by the title and blurb on this book.

A lot of fun.

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When Giannine gets a gift certificate for half and hour on a virtual reality game at Rassmussen Gaming Center, little does she know that more than her virtual life will be at stake. She has a little over an hour, real time, to solve the challenge - or die.

Funny and suspenseful, Vande Velde's

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writing is definitely up to par. Giannine is an appealing hero, and the story makes the repetitive nature of video games (enter, die, repeat...) interesting.

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This book was very enjoyable. It was written in solid prose, and I enjoyed the story. One couldn't call it "complex," and in the end, that's why I've only given it three stars. The best children's fiction (young adult fiction? - I'll stick with 'children's,' although I suspect that it's intended

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for young adults) tells a deeper story than that which a child can comprehend. As an adult reading it, I was frequently frustrated - not because the story that Giannine has to navigate through was difficult to puzzle out (although the solution wasn't nearly as obvious to me as it ought to have been) but because I kept seeing the ways that the book could have become more edgy and adult and it kept turning directly away from them. I was also frustrated by the way that the love interest was neatly tied up at the end. I wanted a deeper exploration of Giannine's connection to the people in the game: I wanted to know if she mourned them when she left, or if she began to think that they were real, or... what?This is a book I would recommend for anyone looking for a feather-light beach read, a gift for a young person (under 15), or an example of a solid use of the "virtual reality" concept to tell a fantastical story.

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This book was very enjoyable. It was written in solid prose, and I enjoyed the story. One couldn't call it "complex," and in the end, that's why I've only given it three stars. The best children's fiction (young adult fiction? - I'll stick with 'children's,' although I suspect that it's intended

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for young adults) tells a deeper story than that which a child can comprehend. As an adult reading it, I was frequently frustrated - not because the story that Giannine has to navigate through was difficult to puzzle out (although the solution wasn't nearly as obvious to me as it ought to have been) but because I kept seeing the ways that the book could have become more edgy and adult and it kept turning directly away from them. I was also frustrated by the way that the love interest was neatly tied up at the end. I wanted a deeper exploration of Giannine's connection to the people in the game: I wanted to know if she mourned them when she left, or if she began to think that they were real, or... what?This is a book I would recommend for anyone looking for a feather-light beach read, a gift for a young person (under 15), or an example of a solid use of the "virtual reality" concept to tell a fantastical story.

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Vande Velde creates endless scenarios for her character to endure and learn from. Told from first person point of view, the strong protagonist tells her tale of real-life woes of strained familial relationships while playing the game. She finds parallels within each world that help her to find

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alternate pathways to successfully completing the game. Creative chapter titles add humor to the almost never-ending demise of Giannine. As for the suspension of disbelief, the setting is futuristic with a bus talking to Giannine helping to direct her to a safe, alternate destination. Thus, the total immersion virtual reality game appears credible and a natural part of the future---along with the parent protestors who advocate for non-violent, scary, or supernatural.

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Giannine is give a gift certificate by her absent father for the Rasmussen Gaming Center, an arcade for virtual reality immersion gaming. She chooses a game called Heir Apparent. When protesters outside damage the servers, Giannine finds that she is stuck in the game and in the position of having

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to win the game before she has been immersed too long to live. The game is full of intrigue and she must manage the politics of the court, live for 3 days, and claim her place as rightful heir to the throne.

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Gianinine is just an average girl who likes video games. When her father gives her a gift card to a gaming center, she immediately goes the the full immersion scenarios. She chooses a game called Heir Apparent where the object of the game is to be crowned King or Queen. Everything is going smoothly

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when she receives a message from the creator of the game who tells her that protestors have damaged the machine she is playing at and Gianinine must complete the game soon or she could risk serious injury. If they unplug her from the game she could also have serious injury. During the game she is faced with a warrior poet who will chop her head off if she doesn't recite a good enough poem, vicious barbarians, cute princes who she may not be able to trust, a whining queen, various wizards, and a huge dragon not to mention a magical crown that turns things into gold. After numerous tries and many different strategies, Gianinine finally wins, being crowned right before she faints (a result of the damage done to the machine in the real world). It turns out that the creator of the game, a young guy, looks like the guy who helped her in the game.

I usually wouldn't have any interest in this book, but it was the cover that trapped my attention. The first couple chapters were a bit repetitive as Gianinine had to relive many situations, but once pieces of the story glued together, it started to get going. I really liked the fusion of fantasy with the modern world as it provided me with a new outlook. I loved how she had to try so many scenarios and sometimes forgot key parts (which often happens to me). The only thing that was a little disappointing was the ending. She falls in love with the guy who helped her. That is so common. I would have been better if somehow some of the game characters could have followed her into the real world. Then the book would be open for a sequel. Nevertheless, this was a good read and I would dig into it again if I could. I take that back. I will be reading this again. :)

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Young Adult/kids book. A girl is trapped in a video game when anti-game (pro-family) protesters damage the computers. She has to work her way out.

An enjoyable book that mixes elements of science fiction with that of fantasy. If a nitpick is to be made, I would say that this story doesn't really generate any sense of crisis or tension due to the whole video game nature of the plot. Granted, there is supposedly a deadline (literally) that the

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protagonist has to meet to survive, but without any sense of 'impending peril' except in the form of email progress notes, one loses any sense of true drama as the story rolls along.

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This is my second pass through this book, this time for a middle-school book discussion. It's still a fun book, mixing sci-fi virtual-reality gaming with maybe a touch of historical fiction, but I suspect all historical research was done through video games. Anyway: exciting and engrossing, without

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a whole lot to discuss, but I'll tease something out of it--fanaticism, good vs poor decisions, the future of video gaming, maybe?

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A teenage girl named Giannine receives a girl certificate for a virtual reality arcade for her birthday, and she chooses to be fully immersed in a medieval-fantasy scenario where she has been named the heir of the kingdom over her estranged father’s three trueborn sons. She’s only supposed to

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be in the game for half an hour, but when protesters break in and damage the machine, the company loses the ability to get her out using normal methods. She has to beat the scenario and survive to be crowned queen - but her character keeps getting killed, and her time is running out.

Heir Apparent isn’t an example of great literature, but it is an example of fun literature. Giannine is a snarky protagonist that it’s very easy to get attached to, and the virtual reality game itself is one that many modern-day fantasy fans would absolutely love to get their hands on. The premise doesn’t disappoint in execution, either - the flexible nature of the game means that a character who kills Giannine in one life might ally with her in another if she makes slightly different choices, and vice versa, so figuring out who’s being genuine and who wants her dead is a constant struggle. It’s an incredibly engaging book, and I really recommend it to any fantasy or video game fans.

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Giannine is accidentally trapped in a virtual reality fantasy game. To escape, she has to win the game before her brain melts. With time running out, endless choices to make, and no allies in game, how will she ever survive? VVV has a gift for amusing, sardonic looks at fantasy tropes (see: [book:

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Dragon's Bait], [book: Companions of the Night], [book: User Unfriendly]). I think I'm just a little too old to properly enjoy this book.

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Ok, so maybe it's not worthy of the Newbery, or of a recommendation to people who don't read juveniles. But gosh, it's got that 'Groundhog Day' style of time travel, virtual reality, Kings & dragons fantasy, humor, romance, a smart and courageous teenage girl... I just loved it.

Fun, fun, fun. Girl is trapped in a total-immersion gaming system. The protesters at the game place remind me of the protesters at women's health clinics. Jerks. I'm recommending it to middle-grade kids indiscriminately.

I was going to die. I was never going to get past the first step of the game, and I was going to die.
-Chapter 4

Between the barbarian hordes waiting at our northern border for the first sign of weakness, and the peasant uprisings in the east, now is not the time for an inexperienced sheepherder to

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play at being king.
-Chapter 8

Giannine is playing a virtual reality game called Heir Apparent, using a gift certificate from her father for her 14th birthday. But, a protest group attacked the facility and now Giannine is stuck in the game. Her only way out is to win the game, but her time is limited. If she doesn't defeat the game, the computer could fry her brain. She must use her intelligence and her sarcastic sense of humor to keep going, figure out the puzzles and be crowned king before time runs out.

I enjoyed this book. It is a fresh take on sci-fi. Giannine lives in the future, but she plays a virtual reality game that takes her to medieval times. Most of the time we are with Giannine in the game and it is exciting and frustrating to watch her try to get through the situations with no idea what the right choice is.

Giannine is a great strong female character. She is clever and persistent, but she still has flaws. She gets annoyed and frustrated by her lack of progress, but she never gives up. She has to deal with ghosts, a dragon, barbarians and a royal family who doesn't want her around.

Recommended to:
Grades 4-8. Readers who enjoy fantasy and adventure.

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Heir Apparent is the story of a girl who ends up trapped in a virtual reality video-game, where she is the unexpected heir to a throne. The machine she enters to play the game for fun ends up being damaged, so she is trapped in the game and could die, unless she can finish it and save herself.

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Unfortunately, this isn't the sort of game where there's one path to being queen; Giannine has endless options, and endless chances to die, leading her to have to start all over again.

This book is an interesting piece of sci-fi, although in some cases the story better resembles fantasy, since the realm that Gianinine has to fight her way through has magic, dragons, and all sorts of magical creatures. The story is decently interesting, although not particularly new, and the writing is good. The story is fairly captivating, but it can get slightly repetitive considering the many times that Gianinine has to start all over from the beginning of the tale again. Still, it's not a bad piece of entertaining literature; not particularly taxing, but a good read nonetheless.

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