I haven't done an official book review in a while, and this book got me out of a reading slump that I've been in for... a while, so I decided to share a few thoughts on it (warning: spoilers ahead!)
I've actually had this book since Christmas, but I'm most definitely a mood reader, so I read what I feel like reading fiction-wise, and I haven't felt like reading it until randomly a few weeks ago. And once I started it I couldn't put it down. I read it in one weekend and was completely and entirely obsessed with it.
Currently, a lot of the world is - but first, let me tell you how I got into reading this series and found out about this author in the first place.
First, Calculated
Simulated is actually the second in a four book series, the fourth book coming out sometime this year (spring maybe?). The first book is Calculated and the only reason I ever picked it up was because it was free on kindle for a short time. So I was like well, it's recommended by an author I love and respect and totally trust, and it's free... what's not to love?
Let me tell you there was nothing I didn't love.
It does deal with some heavier topics (like human trafficking and the criminal underworld of China) but they were done in such a beautiful, God-honoring way and really opened up my eyes to the reality that a lot of people miss/forget about/choose not to see.
It was about this girl that is able to... not predict the future exactly... but kind of. She's a math prodigy who can calculate and remember literally every number, and then calculate the odds of things happening before they actually happen.
The story then goes on to show how she was forced to use that for bad people, then escaped and was able to use it for good.
And the best part I didn't even realize until almost the very end - and I won't tell you either because you'll just have to figure it out.
Second, Simulated
But all of that is just Calculated, the book I really want to talk about is the second one, Simulated.
Like I said earlier, I got it for Christmas but didn't end up starting to read it until a few weeks ago. I'm starting to see that's a trend for me - I read the first three books of the Lunar Chronicles... but never finished the fourth. I read Divergent and Insurgent but never got through Allegiant.
Maybe I'm just suspicious of series. Maybe I don't like being in it for the long run with books. Whatever it is, I now realize I most definitely should have read Simulated a long time ago because it's amazing.
Well, if I'm being perfectly honest, the parts I understood were amazing. It's like me watching Ocean's 11 or Terminator or any kind of movie like that that has a complex plot I'm kinda just... lost. And yet I love the movies, and I love this book, despite the complex (and perfectly wonderful plot) going over my head.
I'm not saying it wasn't a good plot - no, the complete opposite. It was well thought-out and felt very real and like something I would see in a movie, and I loved every part of it that I didn't understand. I like to say that it was so good that I just went along with the flow, didn't try to figure anything out and just read it because it was... good.
There are plots and twists (the most EPIC twists!!) and mysteries and all this high-tech amazingness that reminds me of a much cooler version of Spies In Disguise set in Tunisia.
And thing that carried through it all was one theme that I really latched onto, and is probably why I loved the book so much.
Letting go of control and learning to find peace and order in the chaos.
Order In Chaos
Simulated is full of lessons and as I go through this book review I wanted to share a few with you (while also convincing you to read it ;)
I could talk about the plot or the characters or how amazing the fun technology was. I could talk about the themes of hope or the real world problems discussed or the relationships. I could talk about if it was better than the first or worse than the first.
But I don't want to. I want to talk about the themes and messages the author conveyed through her story.
You Are Not What You Can Do
Now that I think about it, the real reason I wasn't too keen on the idea of starting Simulated was because *spoiler* at the end of Calculated, Jo, the main character who's a math prodigy and genius... loses her numbers.
She doesn't stop being smart and still has all the experience she learned while in China, but she lost the ability to calculate every scenario and figure out the odds and measure everything that can possibly be remembered.
And Simulated is all about her finding her numbers again - hence the name Simulated. They were trying to simulate her numbers again.
At first, I didn't really like that. Jo without her numbers wasn't the Jo I had fallen in love with in Calculated. Jo without her numbers was boring. Jo without her numbers... wasn't Jo.
But, I had to give it a try, and the more I read about her simulations (called sims - which were epic by the way) and the tech world she was in and the mysterious Coral Hacker, I was most definitely sucked in.
I slowly realized that Jo without her numbers was the same Jo, just different - maybe even a good different. And it reminded me that we are not what we can do, or where we live, or what school we go to.
We are not our children or how much laundry is on the couch or whether or not the kitchen is clean. We are not our grades or how many friends we have or how we look.
No, we are not defined by anything or anyone outside of our Maker and Creator.
And as Jo faced possibly never having her numbers again, she had to realize that her numbers and her calculations don't define her. They are not her.
That was just one of many lessons that Simulated reminded me of. The second is to trust.
Control Is Not Ours
Jo was used to not being in control. She was used to people telling her what to do and where to go and who to work for, among other things. I mean, she lived in an underground prison for quite some time as a prisoner to this huge criminal mob boss, so yeah she was used to having zero control on her life.
Except, for her numbers. She could control her numbers, and her numbers allowed her to escape and to take control again and start taking back into her hands everything that had been taken.
Her numbers were her one sense of security, the one thing she could count on when everything else was failing.
And then they were just gone. She didn't have any control over getting them back, and without them she had lost her one last grasp on controlling what she cared about.
So throughout Simulated, she had to learn to slowly give up control. She had to learn to rely on other people and realize that sometimes you just have to let go and stop trying to plan out and control every detail of your life.
Sometimes you just need to look up at the stars and surrender everything to Someone Who is greater and better and is in control.
We can't control our lives, but we can choose to trust the One Who does.
We don't know what's going to happen, but we can place our faith and hope and trust in the One Who is holding the universe in His hands.
Order In Chaos
And finally, last but certainly not least, Jo learned to find order in the chaos.
When she had her numbers, everything was perfect and aligned, and calculated. But without them, it was all chaos.
It was only through the help of a friend that she was finally able to see that chaos was created by the hand of Someone who never makes mistakes - in the chaos, there is order, in the madness, there is a Creator, and in the disarray and wildness of life, He's got it.
The official tagline for the book is "Even in chaos, there is calculation."
And that's so, so true. Even in the brokenness of this world, God is still King. Even in the tears and the screams and the heartache of this world, God still cares.
Even when you don't know what to do and it feels like your world is coming apart around you, God's got it.
This world is chaos. But God has a plan.
God is the calculation and He is always there.
In Conclusion
Earlier I mentioned that the whole world was kind of obsessed with this series, and I wasn't lying. I mean obsessed enough that they're turning them into movies - and I can not wait for those to come out!!
People are saying they're the new Hunger Games or Divergent which honestly, I don't know if they can really be put in the same category. Calculated and Simulated just feel so much more... real.
I do know that the movies are going to be epic, and you should totally, most definitely go read the books. (Also follow Nova McBee on Instagram because she has some super cool movie trailers and news and is just a fun person to follow!)
Here are the Calculated and Simulated official blurbs because I probably did a bad job of explaining and they're so cool.
Calculated
She has many names – Octavia, Double 8, Phoenix, Josephine. She’s a math prodigy, a calculating genius and everyone wants her.
In seventeen-year-old Jo River’s complicated world of numbers, there’s no such thing as coincidence. When she is betrayed by someone she loves, kidnapped by the world’s most wanted smuggler, and forced to use her talent to shore up a criminal empire, Jo deems her gift a curse—until she meets Red.
Fellow captive and unlikely sage, Red teaches Jo to harness her true potential, so she can do more than just escape. Before he dies, Red reveals a secret about her enemies and makes her vow to right his wrongs. But Jo has a vow of her own.
With help from Chan, a bitter billionaire, and Kai, his off-limits son, Jo rises into a new role, ready to take down those who ruined her life. Until a mathematical error comes back to haunt her with a threat much more dangerous than the criminals on the loose.
To beat the odds, Jo must decide who she really is and if risking everything is worth it.
After all, history is not made—it’s calculated.
Simulated
Jo Rivers, safely back in Seattle, asks the same question daily—how does a math genius go from taking down international criminals and saving the world economy to living a normal teenage life?
The only answer she can come up with is—she doesn’t.
With an overprotective father on her back and Kai on the other side of the world, Jo accepts an offer from Prodigy Stealth Solutions (PSS), who may have found a way to get her gift back.
Using a newly developed technology, PSS tries a simulation process on Jo to restore her abilities, but during the attempt, PSS is hacked and a blacklist file containing some of PSS’s most sensitive secrets is stolen. Meanwhile, a mysterious caller who seems to know more than he should delivers a warning to Jo about Kai, who then goes missing.
Despite her father’s concerns, Jo sets off on a risky trip to Tunisia with a PSS team of teen prodigies to find an urgently needed solution for PSS and locate Kai.
All the while, Jo has to trust the mysterious informant who, frighteningly, is like no one she has ever met before.
But, while I know those both sound amazing and you should totally go read them, most important is for us to remember God.
God has a plan for every fraction and millisecond of your life. God is in control, even when we aren't. God doesn't change or fluctuate or lose His power.
And yes, sometimes it feels like everything is chaos and the world we know is crumbling apart around us, but He is the order and the calculation and the thing we can put all our hope and faith in.
He's got you.