Perfect State by Brandon Sanderson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Taking the holographic universe to very logical conclusions, or at least just adding a new spin to both the Cosmere and the Matrix as well, I thought this was a fairly interesting read only made better by the end message.

No spoilers, but it's kinda obvious from the start what the tale is about. It's telegraphed pretty heavily.

Still, there's a lot of great things about the novella, with good worldbuilding, a wide and sweeping grandiosity of scenes and settings that really makes this shine.

So what if I find the main character a bit of a blowhard and not very sympathetic? He's uber powerful but he still has to account for himself in the Wode. But to procreate? Oh my, this has just turned into a comedy.

And it is. From that point forward, the novel is a comedy, but only in the traditional sense, where lessons are learned and the MC moves forward, barely sidestepping tragedy by the grace of others.

Pretty cool, all told. A decent and quick tale.

It was nominated for 2016 Hugo for best Novella.

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