Boy in a White Room by Karl Olsberg

A boy wakes to find himself locked in a white room. He has no memories, no idea who he is and no idea how he got here.

A computer-generated voice named Alice responds to his questions – through her, he is able to access the internet. He gradually pieces together his story – an abduction, a critical injury, snippets of his past … But how can the boy tell what’s real and what’s not? Who is he really?

A gripping YA sci-fi thriller by German and Spiegel-bestselling author, Karl Olsberg. Boy in a White Room was nominated for Deutscher Jugendliteraturpreis 2018, Germany’s most prestigious youth fiction award.  

---

First, as always with books in translation, the quality of the translation. I'm happy to say this one is high. The translation is almost seamless, just a little formal in spots ... and given the topics this book covers, that's very impressive. It can't have been easy to translate. This is a complex book.

Maybe a little too complex in spots. Although I was able to follow what everyone was talking about and what was happening, it took some thinking about. The layers were confusing at times, and the ending was very strange.  I hope the second book gets translated; I'd like to see what happens next and how things turns out.

The descriptions were great and the story was very imaginative. I'd love to be in an immersive Lord of the Rings environment like that ... it's just a shame he didn't meet any of the main characters! Everything was very clever, just occasionally hard to follow. But as I say, I am really looking forward to reading the next one and I found the philosophical questions here really interesting to think about..

Not a casual read, but for the reader who likes to think about what they're reading, this is perfect.

I received a free copy and am giving an honest review.