Subject: Review: Cadigan - Tea from an Empty Cup

From: &rea <[email-masked]>
Date: 17 Nov 1998 15:01:20 -0500

Tea from an Empty Cup by Pat Cadigan
	Review Copyright 1998

Blurb:
        Luckless Lieutenant Konstantin is looking for the RL killer/s
        of some sad AR junkies who end up dead in their suits while
        online.  She finds herself up against the latest thing in
        nervous systems and in to something much deeper than she ever
        imagined - as deep as the ruins of Japan beneath the sea.

        Japan was recently destroyed in a series of earthquakes.  Now
        dispossessed Japanese surfers of the NETsuke, with a unique
        grasp of ritual and the technology concerned, will stop at
        nothing to create New Japan.

        Konstantin finally makes it into the heart of the deadly game,
        but will she ever make it out again?

Reaction:

A short, fast trip into the world of "what is?", "Tea from an Empty Cup"
certainly keeps the reader's interest.  Comparisons immediately spring to
mind with Heydt's "Point of Honor," both extrapolating on the impact of VR
in the near future via the device of an investigation into murder/
attempted murder through simulated worlds.  But while Heydt's "Point"
falls back into real life, "Tea from an Empty Cup" continually leads the
reader to a higher scale of intensity.  The reader, temporarily living the
life of Konstantin, among others, will certainly come out of this one
thinking about what s/he's just been doing.

Recommendation:

Go and buy this one now.  Cyber-sf at its most convincing.

A

%A Pat Cadigan
%T Tea from an Empty Cup
%I Voyager [Harper Collins]/Great Britain
%D 1998
%G ISBN 0 586 21842 4
%O Paperback, $12.95 AU