A typographical mess of a book that tries hard to capture (and capitalize on) a fringe cultural phenomena—the lively underground anarchy of the Internet. Former Mondo 2000 editors and writers Sirius (a.k.a. Ken Goffman) and Jude (a.k.a. Judith Milhon), now contributors to Wired, smartly complain about their co-option by the mainstream, but their self-conscious posing ``on the edge'' just doesn't cut it in such a lame combination of tired wordplay, on-line lingo, and subcult ranting. Set in future, the assemblage of ephemeral computer high jinks here posits a crackdown on user freedom, an assault by the politically correct left and Christian right on the present-day wildness tolerated on the Net. Jude and Sirius become leaders in the ``virtual revolution,'' dedicated to protecting the right to encryption (disguising one's message in code) and thereby protecting free speech among hackers. Both authors supply their diary notes in support of ``the flatout spectacle of human perversity.'' But it's nothing more than the usual Acker-Burroughs nonsense about sex and drugs, fancying itself an ``anarcho Dada scrapbook.'' In fact, it's a collection of e-mail, TV transcripts, magazine clippings, wacky manifestos, and a lengthy correspondence with their editor—an oblivious dupe in the containment of the revolution. Using his rock-bank performance group, Mondo Vanilli, as a vanguard in the movement, Sirius confronts the forces of HADL, who promote the ``New Civility'' and refuse to tolerate on-line pedophiles. Sirius gleefully describes and endorses pirate media pranks and revolution by WEB. The various anarcho-punk-libertarian rants reprinted here are boilerplate in 'zine culture, and would benefit from editing, which seems to be a heresy if this sloppy compilation is any evidence—the tyranny of concision! Beware any cultural artifact that describes itself as ``post- ,'' though this certainly does seem the messy result of some sort of explosion.
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-345-39216-7
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 1995
An audacious epic with more than enough heart to fill its many, many pages.
When Richard "Dodge" Forthrast dies under anesthesia for a routine medical procedure, his story is just beginning.
As the founder and chairman of a video game company, Dodge has a pretty sweet life. He has money to burn and a loving relationship with his niece, Zula, and grandniece, Sophia. So when he dies unexpectedly, there are a lot of people to mourn him, including his friend Corvallis Kawasaki, who is also the executor of his will. To make matters worse (or, to say the least, more complicated), there's something unexpected in Dodge's last wishes. It turns out that in his youth he put it in writing that he wanted his brain to be preserved until such technology existed that his consciousness could be uploaded into a computer. And much to everyone's surprise, that technology isn't so far off after all. Years later, Sophia grows up to follow in her clever grand-uncle's footsteps and figures out a way to turn on Dodge's brain. It is at this point that the novel splits into two narratives: "Meatspace," or what we would call the real world, and "Bitworld," inhabited by Dodge (now called "Egdod") and increasing numbers of downloaded minds. Stephenson (co-author: The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O, 2017; Seveneves, 2015, etc.) is known for ambitious books, and this doorstop of a novel is certainly no exception. Life in Bitworld is more reminiscent of high fantasy than science fiction as the ever evolving narrative plays with the daily reality of living in a digital space. Would you have special abilities like a mythical god? Join your aura together with other souls and live as a hive mind? Create hills and rivers from nothing? Destroy your enemies with tech-given powers that seem magical? Readers looking for a post-human thought experiment might be disappointed with the references to ancient mythology, but those ready for an endlessly inventive and absorbing story are in for an adventure they won't soon forget.
An audacious epic with more than enough heart to fill its many, many pages.Pub Date: June 4, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-245871-1
Page Count: 880
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2019
PROFILES
A fun, unusual contemporary fantasy that doesn’t skimp on violence.
An accident-prone teenage boy named Squib forms an unlikely friendship with a dragon living in a Louisiana bayou.
Squib Moreau can’t catch a break. His kindhearted single mother, Elodie, works long hours as a nurse, and when she’s not worrying about what her son is up to, she’s fighting off the advances of the local constable, Regence Hooke. Elodie and Squib both get the feeling that Hooke is something more dangerous than a sleazy cop, and they’re right: He’s murderous, corrupt, and out to take over the local drug-running business. When Squib sees something he shouldn’t late at night out on the water and Hooke goes after him with a grenade launcher, Squib suddenly finds himself being rescued by a dragon. The dragon in question, Vern (short for “Wyvern, Lord Highfire”), believes he is the last of his kind and lives in secret deep in the swamp. Vern holds a centuries-old grudge against the race that killed off his fellow dragons but finds himself in need of a helper, or “familiar.” Vern may be a dragon, but he has a taste for TV, vodka, Flashdance T-shirts, and all sorts of things he can’t get for himself. Vern reluctantly lets Squib work for him, and over time they develop a camaraderie. But when Hooke sees Vern for himself, he decides to use Squib to force the dragon to do some of his dirty work. Colfer’s best-known writing is geared toward young adults (The Fowl Twins, 2019, etc.), but between some of the gorier scenes and Hooke’s sinister inner monologue, you wouldn’t know it. He writes this book in a folksy Louisiana voice that drawls right off the page: “Squib was as jumpy as a cat in a doghouse traversing the river.” Vern’s taste for modern life (he’s on the Keto diet) is clever, and he is a prickly but lovable foil to the unholy terror that is Constable Hooke.
A fun, unusual contemporary fantasy that doesn’t skimp on violence.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-293855-8
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Harper Perennial/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2019
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