From rec.arts.sf-lovers Mon Jan 21 10:15:54 1991 Path: herkules.sssab.se!isy!liuida!sunic!uupsi!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!ucsd!ucbvax!TRANSARC.COM!Dan_Bloch From: Dan_Bloch@TRANSARC.COM Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf-lovers Subject: Re: Synners (REVIEW) Message-ID: <8bZrogP0BwwZ5Azu8K@transarc.com> Date: 18 Jan 91 22:56:44 GMT References: <9101162306.AA18809@rutgers.edu> Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Lines: 39 Synners, by Pat Cadigan JDRAPER@trinity.BITNET (Johanna Draper) writes: > I just found this book and picked it up, based mainly on the short story she > wrote that was included in _Mirrorshades_. I found it interesting and very > much similar to/inspired by _Neuromancer_. Anyone else have any opinions? Well, since you asked. The book has a gorgeous cover, and a gorgeous first thirty pages or so as Cadigan introduces the background state of society. After that she gets into plot, characters, and dialog, none of which she handles particularly well. The dialog especially is terrible. And the characters are pretty much all stereotypes; hip stereotypes, but stereotypes nonetheless. None of them is alive enough to care about. And the plot... Wait a minute, let me try to remember. I read it a week ago so I should be able to. Oh, right. There's a new scientific breakthrough, which lets you interface directly between computers and people. For some reason which I forget, this is a Very Bad Thing, which an evil mega-corporation has taken over and is going to market for (gasp) profit motives. Meanwhile some of our heroes have a copy of the data so the evil mega-corporation is after them. And the e.m-c. gets some rock video artist to start generating virtual reality videos with this, and they have this hacker who's supposed to be protecting them from the good guys, and some other guy who works for them is about to lose his job because he spends all his time playing with (crude, last year's model) virtual reality women, and then I think the video artist dies and goes into the computer net ... None of it seems to have much point, and it goes on and on forever. At this point we're about a hundred and eighty pages into the book. I skimmed the last 250 (Yes, that's right, this thing is 430 pages long) so I may have cheated myself, but it certainly didn't seem to get any better. A definite "Must Avoid" rating. Dan Bloch dan@transarc.com From /tmp/sf.15692 Tue Mar 30 18:14:58 1993 Path: lysator.liu.se!isy!liuida!sunic!uunet!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!uwm.edu!biosci!ig!dont-reply-to-paths From: wex@media.mit.edu (Alan Wexelblat) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: FOOLS by Pat Cadigan Message-ID: <9303151442.AA25003@media.mit.edu> Date: 22 Mar 93 22:16:23 GMT Sender: mcb@net.bio.net Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Lines: 78 Approved: mcb@presto.ig.com (temporary rec.arts.sf.reviews moderator) X-Now-Playing: Suzanne Vega -- 99.9 Fahrenheit Degrees X-Dj-In-The-House: Wex Fools by Pat Cadigan Review Copyright (c) 1993 Alan Wexelblat Let me be very plain about this: it is impossible for me to give an impartial review of a Pat Cadigan book. I consider Pat to be a friend and I've known her for several years now. Despite (or perhaps because of) my bias, I recommend her work to anyone who'll listen. With that said, I think I can say honestly that FOOLS is her best work so far. It is a return to the MINDPLAYERS universe that I first enjoyed and a look at some of the problems of that universe's mind-altering technology. At the same time, it is obvious that Cadigan has matured as a writer; she is more confident of and more in control of her writing. In MINDPLAYERS we saw the high end of the technology -- the reality affixers, the neurosis peddlers, the bell-jarrers and their high-class clientele. FOOLS takes us down into the streets among the memory junkies, the paranoia peddlers, the fetishizers, and the other low-lifes who scrabble at the fringes of what the upper class leaves -- and also into the realm of the Brain Police who try to keep tabs on these and other, more dangerous, mind criminals. We also meet another class entirely -- actors who use the Method to create and become characters for theatrical performances. These actors can become famous and sometimes, if they're willing to sell out everything they have, they can become Famous. That is, they can become the original templates from which personalities are cloned for others to assume. When you are Famous, everyone you meet might look like you, dress like you, walk like you, and have your memories. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then the Famous experience the ultimate in being flattered. But what if something goes wrong? What if the imitations can't tell themselves from the real thing? What if there are some memories you don't want other people to have? Sure, you'd like to be Famous and have the associated wealth and notoriety. But do you really want everyone to know who you've slept with? And on the reverse side... what if you took on someone Famous and discovered that you weren't simply being that person for a while, that you *were* that person, and that she/you wanted her/your life back? FOOLS takes us through a blunder much like this one, but with the added twist of being told from the first person point of view. The problem is, *whose* first-person point of view are we seeing, since the narrator is clearly not the conventional sort of personality we're used to seeing. I'm reluctant to say more on this subject because I think it will spoil the suspense and ruin the effect of what Cadigan tries to do in the first part of the novel, but I have read other reviewers complain about the difficulty of sorting out the narrative voices. I think this is sheer laziness on their parts -- they're used to a quick easy read, which this is not. However, it gives nothing away to point out that Cadigan uses such different voices for the characters (and even helps the reader by using different typefonts) that it was quickly obvious to me what was going on. And indeed, my suspicions were confirmed as correct by about page 100. If you, as a reader, are confused early on I can only say you should hang on and trust. All will become clear shortly. One other point which I liked about FOOLS is that the writing seemed tighter than in SYNNERS, a novel which really sprawled. The story in FOOLS is told as three interconnected episodes, similar to the episodes in MINDPLAYERS. This device works well for Cadigan, allowing her to develop each of the sub-stories to just the right length. Buy this book. %A Pat Cadigan %T Fools %I Bantam/Spectra SF paperback %C New York %D 1993 %G ISBN 0-553-29512-8 %O US$5.99 %P 299 pp From /tmp/sf.10445 Thu May 6 19:47:16 1993 Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written Path: lysator.liu.se!kth.se!sunic!pipex!uknet!doc.ic.ac.uk!agate!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!decwrl!netcomsv!netcom.com!dani From: dani@netcom.com (Dani Zweig) Subject: Pat Cadigan: Fools Message-ID: Organization: Netcom Online Communications Services (408-241-9760 login: guest) Date: Mon, 3 May 1993 23:46:06 GMT Lines: 30 "Fools" is placed in the same milieu as some of her earlier work. The time is the not too distant future. The key technological advance has been the cracking of the mental code: Memories can be read, edited, and transfered, personalities can be tailored, machine-mediated mental communication is practical. Society is still adjusting to these advances, and most of the uses we seem them put to are petty: Personalities are franchised, method actors *really* become the people the portray, memory junkies become addicted to other people's experiences. "Fools" juggles a number of viewpoints, but in this case all the viewpoints share the same skull -- and it becomes a matter of some importance to find out which is the real personality and which are borrowed constructs. Is she a method actress upon whom the false memory of a murder has been imposed? Is she a memory junky who thinks she's a method actress? Has an imposed personality taken on a life of its own? The book is written with considerable skill. The author juggles the viewpoints without ever losing control. For all that, I found the book clever, rather than particularly enjoyable. I can admire the craft that Cadigan is displaying -- but a writer has lost half the battle when the reader admires the craft, rather than the story. ----- Dani Zweig dani@netcom.com 'T is with our judgements as our watches, none Go alike, yet each believes his own --Alexander Pope From /tmp/sf.4146 Tue Aug 9 01:41:59 1994 Path: liuida!sunic!EU.net!howland.reston.ans.net!wupost!udel!news.sprintlink.net!dg-rtp!sheol!dont-reply-to-paths From: wex@media.mit.edu (Alan Miburi-san Wexelblat) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Subject: Review: DIRTY WORK Approved: sfr%sheol@concert.net (rec.arts.sf.reviews moderator) Message-ID: <9402141504.AA23587@media.mit.edu> Date: 15 Feb 94 00:18:00 GMT Lines: 54 Dirty Work by Pat Cadigan Review Copyright (c) 1994 Alan Wexelblat If there's an author I like better than Pat Cadigan, I haven't met hir yet. When I first read MINDPLAYERS my immediate impression was that I was looking at the best raw talent and innovative thinker I'd seen since I picked up William Gibson. On meeting Pat and becoming friends with her my impressions were redoubled. She is funny, intelligent, very mentally quick and she writes intense gripping stories which probe into the darkest corners of the human psyche. So what more do you need to know? Go out and buy this book! Oh, you want to know what's in it? Well, it's got 18 stories, most of which have been published before although some have only seen limited press runs. Each story has a few paragraphs of introduction/explanation by the author; Cadigan manages to be enlightening without detracting from the pleasure of reading the stories. The title cut, "Dirty Work" is a Deadpan Allie story, originally written for for one of Ellen Datlow's vampire anthologies. If this doesn't make you hunt up a copy of MINDPLAYERS, nothing will. In her previous short story collection (PATTERNS), Cadigan kept largely to fantastic and horror themes. PATTERNS pushed into psychological cracks relentlessly. This collection has some stories in that vein such as the post- apocalyptic "Home By The Sea." Overall, though, it seems to favor a lighter touch, such as in the sad/funny "Second Comings Reasonable Rates" in hard SF form -- and even in "The Sorceress in Spite of Herself" which is pretty conventional magic-realist fare. Surprisingly (to me, anyway) Cadigan even indulges in real fantasist stuff in "Naming Names" and its semi-sequel "A Deal With God." Of course, she places these tools squarely in the hands of one of her usual no-nonsense female protagonists. If more fantasy had this kind of authoritative honesty I'd be much happier. Perhaps this variety of types and topics is Cadigan demonstrating the range of her talent. Perhaps it's just that she's becoming more confident in what she can do and what of her work she wants to show off. Either way, I finished this book way too fast. Now I have to be patient and wait for the next one. [As noted in an earlier review, Ziesing books are available from the publisher at P.O. Box 96, Shingletown CA 96088, and at more discerning small bookstores, if you're lucky.] %A Pat Cadigan %T Dirty Work %I Mark V. Ziesing %G ISBN 0-929480-27-9 %O $29.95 %D 1993 From rec.arts.sf.reviews Thu Nov 19 14:11:53 1998 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed1.news.luth.se!luth.se!erix.ericsson.se!uabs63.uab.ericsson.se!news.algonet.se!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!netnews.com!howland.erols.net!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: &rea Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: Cadigan - Tea from an Empty Cup Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 17 Nov 1998 15:01:20 -0500 Organization: Avarice Incorporated Lines: 42 Sender: wex@tinbergen.media.mit.edu Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: tinbergen.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2175 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