Subject: Review: Christopher Priest's _The Extremes_

From: [email-masked] (Paul S. Jenkins)
Date: 06 Mar 2000 11:57:04 -0500

_The Extremes_ by Christopher Priest
	Review Copyright (c) 2000 Paul S. Jenkins

Teresa Simons is a 43-year-old FBI agent who has lost her husband (also
FBI) in a Texas shooting. She has come to England on vacation, but also to
investigate -- in her own time -- a similar shooting that took place in
the quiet Sussex seaside town of Bulverton, on the same day her husband
was killed. By this means she hopes to ascribe some meaning to her
husband's senseless death.

Teresa's FBI training immersed her in the use of virtual reality
scenarios, or 'extreme experience.' In these sessions she assumed the
roles of different people present at shootings of innocent members of the
public. By repeated participation in the scenarios, from various points of
view, she eventually learned how to deal with such situations in real
life.

Set a little into a future where completely involving VR has been
developed -- though how it is accomplished isn't more than hand-waved --
_The Extremes_ is an exploration of how our personal realities impinge on
the realities of others, and how others' perceptions can be changed by our
own.

The commercial version of extreme experience is known as ExEx, managed by
the GunHo Corporation. Teresa is surprised to find a branch of ExEx in
Bulverton, and decides to make use of it. Gradually she spends more and
more time there, and begins to lose track of what's real and what's
virtual.

Priest uses a relaxed, open style, with a transparency that lets the
reader into the minds of the point-of-view characters. Although the point
of view shifts about a lot, it's rigorously logical.

There's a metaphysical aspect to the novel, when Teresa seems to be
experiencing things in real life that couldn't possibly happen. Of course,
this could be the approach of mental breakdown, and not metaphysical at
all.

_The Extremes_ is an engaging and readable novel that raises several
questions, not least about the wisdom of creating virtual realities that
could ultimately permeate the real world.

%A   Priest, Christopher
%T   The Extremes
%I   Scribner (Simon & Schuster)
%C   London
%D   1999 (copyright 1998)
%G   ISBN 0 684 81941 4
%P   393 pp.
%O   paperback GBP 6.99

Paul S. Jenkins | More reviews at: 
Portsmouth   UK | http://www.cix.co.uk/~willowsoft/revup/