Patryn Reviews- Otherland V. One by Tad Williams

[The Patryn]

Otherland
Volume One
City of Golden Shadow

I read City of Golden Shadow a few months ago, and finally just received the sequels after much arguement over whether or not a certain Gift Certificate was used or not with Amazon.com (In the end I got them from my aunt ). I'm excited about finally getting these, and I'll most likely be writing reviews for the others as I finish them. Now without further ado, let me share with you why this has become one of my favourite Cyberpunk series...

Excerpt from the back:
Otherland...
Surrounded by secrecy, it is home to the
wildest dreams and the darkest nightmares.
Incredible amounts of money have been
lavished on it. The best minds of two
generations have labored to build it. Now
somehow, bit by bit, it is claiming the
Earth's most valuable resources-its children.

The story begins in Africa, with a school teacher named Renie Sulaweyo. Renie lives with her Father and Brother, her mother having died in a fire. Her father is an awful drunk, so Renie has to run the household day to day. Despite this, Renie loves her family, especially her brother Stephen. That's why she's so upset when her brother falls into a strange coma after sneaking into an online nightclub, and vows to find out what is going on.

Paul Jonas, a soldier fighting the germans on the bloody battlefields of World War One with his comrades Finch and Mullet, finds out that not everything is as it seems after taking what should have been a fatal wound. His dreams begins to drive him insane, and eventually, he decides on desertion and flees the battlefield, becoming, it seems, lost in space and time in the process.

Fourteen-year old Orlando is also the mighty barbarian Thargor, but only in the VR gaming world of the Middle Country where he spends most of his time. When Thargor is due to a strange anomaly in the programming, which Orlando fiercely believes is someone hacking into the system to show him something, he goes on a personal quest with his gaming buddy Fredericks to find the person responsible, and to find the golden city shown to him in the Middle Country.

!Xabbu, a bushman come to the city to learn skills which may help save the spirit of his people. A student under Renie, one that she tutors specially, he volunteers to go with her on her journey to find what has happened to her brother. With the heart of a poet and the soul of a shaman, he will journey with Renie into the depths of evil itself.

Eventually, their searches will lead them all to Otherland, but will they find answers? Or only more secrets?

The characters were a very interesting part of this book. Most were very deep and there was a large range of different personalities. One of the things that defined them the most was their 'Sims', the bodies they wear when inside VR. From Sweet-William the 'Death Clown' to T4b, the Cyborg, even !Xabbu's Baboon sim.

The V.R. worlds, especially the Otherland network, were by far the best part of this book. There many exotic and not-so exotic locales featured, such as:

• The Net's Biggest Mall
  
• The Egyptian Heaven
  
• A 19th century science fiction version of Mars
  
• The Ice Age
  
• Alice's Wonderland
  
• Many, many more...
  
  All the worlds are done very originally. They're what hooked me to this series in the first place. All with their own inhabitants, some puppets, programs designed to imitate humans, or citizens, actual people hooked into the network.
  
  Fortunately, this book's plot lives up to the worlds and characters. I don't want to give much more away than I already have, beacause Otherland is a journey best experienced yourself, but I will say that it will capture you and not let go, taking you on a ride unlike any other. You won't want to put it down.
  
  Weighing in at seven-hundred and eighty pages, CoGS is a large read for the first book in a series of four. The others all roughly the same size. The only thing about it that reall disappointed me was the cliffhanger ending, though you must understand, the Otherland books aren't really meant to stand alone, but are really one book, to be read as closely together as possible. At 700 pages each though, you aren't going to fit these things under one cover.
  
  If you have some money to blow, check out this book and the second, third and fourth in the series. River of Blue Fire, Mountain of Black Glass and Sea of Silver Light respectively. I can guarantee you won't regret it.
  
  P.S. Since this is my first review I'd really appreciate feedback from anyone who actually visits this section. Cheers.

[Magi]

I just skimmed through and the book seems very interesting. Sounds like a good read.

[The Patryn]

'Tis, but so far the second is far better.