"Minecraft: The Island" by Max Brooks

This is actually one of the better-done Minecraft books I've read. Unlike The Woodsword Chronicles or Winter Morgan's books, it takes both Minecraft and itself seriously; it also manages not to insert things into the story that aren't actually in Minecraft, unlike Diary of an 8-Bit Warrior or Mark Cheverton. (Not to say that Diary of an 8-Bit Warrior and Mark Cheverton aren't good books; they are.)

So, plot synopsis, it starts out basically the same as half the Minecraft books out there. Some normal person is suddenly INSIDE Minecraft, and has to figure out how to survive because we don't know if respawning works or not and aren't eager to test it. 

The main character handles himself about as well as I did the first time I played Minecraft with mobs on: running around screaming, almost dying about eight times, digging myself into a hole, making fifty-two rookie mistakes in five minutes, et cetera.

My main annoyance with the guy is, while most of it can be excused by him waking up with amnesia and not remembering how to play Minecraft (actually, it's unclear if he ever did or not, unlike the Woodsword players or Winter Morgan's protagonists, there's no excuse for them): whenever things are going really well, he'll get overconfident and accidentally incinerate important stuff or make an extremely dumb mistake.

But that aside, it's a well-written book. This is actually the first of the official novels I've read (Woodsword doesn't count, they're not novel-length), and it didn't disappoint me.

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: E10+ for fantasy violence. Which is convenient, as Minecraft itself is rated E10+ for fantasy violence.

The book itself gets four stars; I didn't dislike it enough to give it three or two, but it's also not good enough to get five.

I don't have any favorite lines; the (unnamed) main character is the only sapient being in the story, and the only dialog is him talking to a cow. Nothing particularly interesting.

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