Darrow lives on Mars as a red. Reds are at the bottom of the color spectrum in the government in the world of Red Rising. After Earth was overtaken by the golds living on Luna and the reds were sent to start preparing Mars for all the colors to live on. Darrow lives underneath the surface of Mars. He is a committed hell driver, a high ranked mining position in his community.  They are mining to make the surface of Mars ready for all the other colors, the reds have been told that the other colors won’t be joined them for many years.  His young wife Eo is killed for finding room that withholds many secrets.  Darrow is hung, but something has prevented him from dying. Ares now has him in their service. Ares plans to overthrow the Golds, but in a way that heavily depends on Darrow, not Darrow the red helldriver from the mines, but Darrow au Andromedus of the Golds and the surface. He is taken to the surface of Mars to witness something that will change everything. The surface is alive with all colors living together, the reds aren’t mining in preparation of the surface, they are mining to sustain it. They were promised to join them when the time came, but they are being lied to and enslaved. Darrow realizes that Eo was right about the reds being treated unfairly, but never to this extent. Darrow has been chosen for a mission of insane danger. He is to be turned into a gold. He will attend the prestigious institute and gain high rank. Darrow is turned gold and accepted to the institute where he must do something he never thought himself capable to get into the game. The game is a giant simulation of war that puts house against house and the best players get the best places in the community and Darrow needs to win. To win Darrow must do things that he knows would make Eo hate him, and him hate himself.

This book is the type of book once you start reading you have to finish. The author wrote enough suspense into this book for 4 whole other books. There is never insufficient action throughout the whole story. I was never once bored reading the book and the author does a good job of fitting a lot of action into the book without it being overwhelming. Another favorable trait of this book is it does a good job of having in depth relationships and the build up of new relationships throughout all the action. Without these relationships all the book would be is killing and more killing to me. The relationships that Darrow forms are crucial for the story and they do not go without great detail. The characters are all in depth as well. Their features are well explained and you get a great idea of their personalities. The characters are also all different. There are not 2 characters that are much a like, they all have distinguishable traits that stand out against the others. I can’t stand to read a book with boring characters that don’t stand out and this book has the exact opposite. You can get invested in this story, with most of the book happening in a large competition with all these in depth characters, all of which have great motives for winning. I found it hard to pick which character I was rooting for. I would give this book 5 out of 5 stars and suggest anyone who enjoys science fiction or action books to read Red Rising.