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Living Real | Rating | |
| C | |||
| James C. Bassett | |||
| Series | Related Books | ||
| N/A | N/A | ||
Carver Blervaque is a director. Not of movies - they vanished long ago. He directs realities. Virtual ones, at least. He creates experiences and scenarios and lets people live them. But when he discovers a brand new technique of programing his set, he finds a way to tap into people's unconsciousness. Suddenly he's making programs that do extraordinary things. The government wants the technique, and Carver. They're convinced that not only can it be used for security (or breaching security) but that it already has been, and by him.
For most of its length the story barely manages to avoid hitting some bad buttons with me. The government agency in question is not portrayed as evil so much as overly enthusiastic. Coincidences just keep lining up to make Carver seem guilty of a hack, but a good many of those are of Carver's own making. When he falls in with some social revolutionaries, their philosophy is somewhat doubtful, but Carver himself doubts it as well, so I doubt that it is the one the author himself holds.
But then the climax comes, and everything falls apart. It's a bit confusing as to what exactly happened in those last pages to let Carver get away. In fact, it's never explained. And the very end of the book doesn't feel like the end of the story. It's like the editor lost the last five chapters, or at the very least a lengthy epilogue. We never see the actual results of all Carver and the revolutionaries did. There's just the promise that they will do more. That's not good enough.
This story starts out well, but then gradually slides downhill until it slides off a cliff. Some of the concepts in it are cool, and the revolutionaries at least make you think, since on the surface their argument seems to hold up. But the climax really just kills this thing.
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