Otherworld

Content warning: Violence, homicide Otherworld will appeal to Westworld fans (I haven't seen the show but the premise sounds similar) in that it contains a simulated world where our characters visit. In the story, the namesake game is a virtual reality world run on anarchy, and where our main character has to find his best friend who is trapped. It relies on the cliche of an evil corporation with 'good intentions', and a lot of secrecy tying it all up. Simon starts getting suspicious about the 'experimental treatment' being offered to his best friend Kat, when it seems too coincidental for a lot of people to be admitted to the same. He goes poking around in Otherworld to find her, but has to cross the various realms created there to reach her, and realizes how much more complex this world was than advertised. The key point of the book is Otherworld, itself, even though the real world also has a bearing on it. Inside Otherworld, pockets of code have gone rogue, and the initial parameters on which the virtual world was built has changed. It plays with the idea of what is real, what is sentience, and how deeply connected they can be yet can be divorced from each other merely by the origin of the thing in question. The realms felt like they were designed in accordance with the Seven Deadly Sins (or at least the bad impulses in humans) and well, from there it is obvious why the concept of Otherworld as a game would have failed in their world. The Otherworld is in upheaval not just because of anarchy, but because this anarchy affects others. It also makes a study of how the worst human impluses unleashed can bring down civilization, and how too much free will can damage a utopia. If you had a world to unleash all your desires without consequence, how much would you let yourself go? Simon, however, feels separate from the cause of the Otherworld population - his goal throughout the book is to only save Kat. He doesn't feel very developed beyond the cursory attachment of his to her, and that being the driving force for his decisions. His concern for the people of Otherworld seems superficial, and it is never made clear why he considers only one part of them to be worth saving. (view spoiler) The characterization is where I feel the book could have improved upon - it is not bad, but it feels lacking in an otherwise richly constructed book. The ending was sort of abrupt, but I am looking forward to further stories in the series. Overall, it is a vividly imagined book, with a good plot and decent writing. Received an advance reader copy in exchange for a fair review from Oneworld Publications, via Netgalley.

Good

Great