Taking cyberpunk to the next level, this conclusion to Edelman’s trilogy (Infoquake, MultiReal) presents a drama of future technology that combines action with psychosocial intrigue. Tension comes as much from the clash of ideas as from physical confrontation. Highly recommended.

I suppose after Rob Sawyer had me resuscitating cyberpunk with defibrillator paddles in hand, it only made sense for me to take cyberpunk up to the next level. Perhaps next I’ll get to take cyberpunk to its room and hook it up to an IV.

• Chat with Me on LibraryThing: From now until next Friday, August 1, I’m participating in my own LibraryThing Author Chat. Which basically means that any LibraryThing member is free to post questions to the author in an open forum, and I’ll answer them. Somebody please log on and ask me something so I can prop up my frail, stunted ego.
• SFFWorld MultiReal Review: Rob Bedford of SFFWorld has given MultiReal what can only be called a rave review. Remember that this is the guy who called Infoquake “THE science fiction novel of the year, if not the past five years,” and said that “the genre might not be quite the same after this book.” So I’ve been looking forward to what Rob has to say. Excerpt:
  

  MultiReal is on par with the previous volume for Edelman’s ability to change the game a bit and still maintain what made Infoquake such a great novel; his growth as a writer is most evident in the characters themselves. If anything, MultiReal may be a bolder novel… MultiReal is also not a “treading water middle book” of a trilogy… it really drives home much of what Edelman was setting up in the first volume and leaves the reader eager for the next volume. David Louis Edelman has crafted another winner with MultiReal… I for one can’t wait to see where Edelman takes the conclusion of this [thus far] spectacular trilogy.

• Listen to My “Key to Publishing” on Audio: The popular podcasts Adventures in SciFi Publishing and I Should Be Writing are jointly holding a Keys to Publishing Contest. Not only will they be giving away copies of Infoquake and MultiReal, but they’ll also be giving away books by my buddies Tobias Buckell, Jay Lake, Sean Williams, and Kay Kenyon (as well as Brenda Cooper, whom I’ve not yet had the pleasure of meeting). As part of the contest, they asked the authors to contribute short audio pieces on the key to getting published. Here’s my contribution, on I Should Be Writing 94. The whole podcast is worth listening to, but for reference’ sake, the intro to the Keys to Publishing sections starts at 3:40, and my audio piece runs from 4:50 to 7:36.)
• Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist Contest Winners: Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist has announced the winners of their MultiReal giveaway contest, which ended up being an Infoquake/MultiReal giveaway contest. (In case you’ve forgotten, Pat called Infoquake “one of the very best science fiction debuts I have ever read.” And he hasn’t reviewed MultiReal yet, so I’m very interested in making sure he’s happy. Can I FedEx you a pillow, Pat?)
• POD People Review: Chris Gerrib of POD People has reviewed MultiReal and given it a rating of 10 out of 10. Says Chris (a self-published SF author in his own right):
  

  MultiReal is a deep book, full of plots and counter-plots, with a stunning vision of the future. It manages what seems to be impossible, making the act of computer programming exciting, while reflecting on the nature of government and business. This is high science fiction at its finest.

  Which prompted this amusing reply from one baron_waste on the LiveJournal mirror of the article:

  In ten years, that book is going to be as embarrassingly dated as any 1950s “Atomic Mutant Vegetables Conquer the World” story. I mean, look at it. Maybe he won’t care — royalty checks are their own currency, in the literal sense of the word — but this ain’t exactly The City and the Stars you’re describing here.

  Fine, baron_waste. Not only do you pick on my book, but you make fun of the title for my next book, Atomic Mutant Vegetables Conquer the World. See if I care.

Yesterday Paul Di Filippo posted a review for my new novel MultiReal for SciFi.com. And not only did Mr. Di Filippo give the book a grade of a solid “A,” but he name-checked half of the greats of science fiction in the process. To wit:

Readers of this distinctive and well-conceived series are sure to spot resonances with past classics of the genre… The notion of MultiReal as a power-leveling weapon seems rather van Vogtian to me. The amount of attention and insight paid to the workings of political and social institutions would please a Heinlein or a Brunner. There’s a definite Spinradian New Wave anger at authority and also a cynicism at work here as well. And the MultiReal experience resembles Paul Atreides’ precog abilities, as described by Frank Herbert… [Edelman] brings all the intellectual firepower and verisimilitude of the digerati like Sterling, Stross and Doctorow to his text. And the ontological twists and implications of MultiReal would do honor to Greg Egan.

Di Filippo then goes on to compare the series to the work of Alfred Bester, an author who I actually had not read until after I had completed Infoquake.

But the strongest overall vibe I get is that of Alfred Bester — although stylistically Edelman never quite reaches Bester’s pyrotechnical heights. Natch is in many respects a villain and bastard, the complete businessman antihero, like Bester’s Ben Reich. Yet so vivid and fierce are his desires and drives — think Gully Foyle, too — that you can’t help rooting for him. Now, Bester is much admired verbally, but very few authors really try to emulate him in print — he set the bar so high — and Edelman’s success is commensurate with his ambitions.

Finally he concludes with a little zinger that I imagine will find a prominent place on the blurbs page of future books.

[O]nce you realize that Natch is less Neo than he is Steve Jobs, you’re in for a swell ride.

Very exciting stuff indeed. The review’s even listed at the moment in the bottom left corner of the SciFi.com home page, if you hurry.

LibraryThing has a program called LibraryThing Early Reviewers, wherein certain publishers make review copies of their books available to LibraryThing members. All you have to do is sign up for LibraryThing, go to the Early Reviewers Request List, and click the big “Request It!” button next to Infoquake. If you’re selected, you get a copy of the book, which you are then theoretically supposed to read and review on the site.

Of course, it’s by no means a sure thing. As I write this, there are 20 review copies of Infoquake available and 186 reviewers requesting them. That’s five fewer requests than Dali & I by Stan Lauryssens, which is being turned into a movie starring Al Pacino. So all we need to do is overwhelm LibraryThing with requests, and I have it on the highest authority that Pacino will drop the Dali & I film and star in a cinematic adaptation of Infoquake instead.

Really! Would I lie?

In the Locus review — which unfortunately is not online — Paul Witcover clearly engaged with the book and gave its political themes some deep thought, as witnessed by the opening paragraph:

What David Louis Edelman celebrates in MultiReal, the sequel to his highly acclaimed first novel, Infoquake, and the middle book of the Jump 225 Trilogy, is laissez-faire capitalism and enlightened self-interest, as epitomized by the heroic entrepreneur, standing alone and resilient against doubters, do-gooders, and the evil forces of governmental regulation. This novel begs to be considered as a piece of science fiction and as a political screed.

And he’s got some pretty darn complimentary things to say about the book in the rest of the review. This is the excerpt I’ve posted on the MultiReal reviews page, ellipsesed to show only the good stuff:

A brilliant imagining of a near-future that not only extrapolates convincingly from current technology and culture but fills in the gaps with world-building so detailed as to verge on the tedious… Others have imagined a future in which nano-machines have colonized the human body, and indeed every other nook and cranny of the physical world… but few have done so as convincingly as Edelman does in these books. His portrayal of that world is richly evocative… I’ve never encountered an SF writer whose focus is so relentlessly on the nuts and bolts of the entrepreneurial world, from the boardroom to the factory to the sales office, and who — pontification aside — can make the minutiae of that world seem as exciting and dangerous as a military operation.

Of course, behind those ellipses are some critiques over the novel and its (perceived) political slant. There are a few passages in the review like this, which knocks the protagonist Natch for his extreme libertarianism and compares the book to the heroes of The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. (Can you believe I’ve never actually read either of those books?)

As political screed, MultiReal is a lesser book: blunt and dogmatic, very much in the vein of Ayn Rand, with the hero-entrepreneur, an omnicompetent megalomaniac named Natch, who runs the Surina/Natch MultiReal Fiefcorp, playing the Galt/Roark role. I found this aspect sophomoric and irritating, but I have no doubt that others will be enamored of a novel in which the main character is frequently referred to as “the entrepreneur,” as if there were no higher accolade available, and no one else worthy to bear it. Whenever I came across this descriptor, I simply replaced it with “the demigod” and read on.

Overall, a very satisfying review indeed, with caveats. (And incidentally, if you click through to the Locus website right now, you’ll see a very keen banner ad for yours truly, sponsored jointly by Pyr and Solaris.)

In his review on Fantasy Book Critic, Liviu C. Suciu engages in quite a bit of setup and plot summary (including not a few spoilers, for those who care about such things):

It took me some time to fully get into MultiReal, since the motivations, choices and actions of the characters depend a lot on this wonderful Jump 225 world built by Mr. Edelman, and it’s been two years since I read Infoquake… Once I immersed myself in the world of Natch and Jara, the book became a true page-turner that I could not put down, and when the final page came I was sad since I really wanted more.

The review is mostly summarization, although if you skip to the end, you’ll see that Liviu did enjoy it quite a bit:

The combination of extraordinary world building, compelling characters that grow on you in Jara and Natch, legal intrigue, political maneuverings and fast action made MultiReal an even more entertaining book for me than Infoquake, which I loved too. Better pacing and a more compact time frame make MultiReal technically more accomplished too, and I really have the highest hopes for Geosynchron. Highly, highly recommended…

So looks like MultiReal has gotten six highly complimentary reviews and one pan, or 86% positive in Rotten Tomatoes terminology. Which is 6% higher than Kit Kittredge: An American Girl, in case you’re keeping track. So suck it, Abigail Breslin!

Because this is my blog, I’ll start with the review on the Grasping for the Wind blog, which is about as good a review as one could hope for. Here’s how John at Grasping for the Wind sums up the book:

MultiReal is an exciting and excellent sequel… This is one of those rare cases (like The Empire Strikes Back vs. A New Hope) where the second movie far surpasses the first in quality and level of enjoyment. Fans of stories that mix philosophy and ethics, with action and technology will enjoy Edelman’s works. It is a Matrix fans’ delight, and a worthy successor to Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game. I highly recommend Edelman as an author, and suggest you read Infoquake and its sequel MultiReal if you are looking for high-octane action, deep thinking, and eloquent writing.

John also praises the turn towards more action he sees in MultiReal:

Edelman has maintained the high level of energy from the previous novel and even ratcheted it up a bit higher… Edelman relates the action with the same skill as the speeches and it is both exciting and epic. Some readers may feel that the way the MultiReal program is used by Natch and some of the other characters may be a little too similar the action of The Matrix. However, it is amazing that a probability program could have such far-reaching implications, and cause so much upset.

Fair enough about the Matrix comparison. Unfortunately, the Wachowskis did such a good job with the concept of biologic software that it’s impossible to talk about the concept now without referring back to The Matrix. Kind of like you can’t write about a heroic quest without looking over your shoulder at J.R.R. Tolkien. Good thing I took out all of the stuff in the early drafts about Magan Kai Lee being a master of martial arts…

Finally, GFTW has some good things to say about my prose style in the book:

The writing in MultiReal has also gotten more adventurous. Edelman is willing to try new ways of writing, including a whole chapter written as a letter from one character to another… [I]t shows that Edelman is willing to take chances with his writing. An author willing to push himself to new heights in style can only be doing the same in the substance of his story, reminding the reader that he or she will never really know what is around the next bend of the story.

All the great things GFTW had to say about MultiReal took the sting out of the review by the UK website SFCrowsnest. Read it for yourself — it’s not good. I couldn’t find a single complimentary thing in GF Willmetts’ review, not even enough for a blurb on the reviews page.

Willmetts starts off by complaining about plot confusion:

It’s been a little while since I read the first book, ‘Infoquake’, in the ‘Jump 225′ trilogy and throwing myself in without a recap at the front of the book wasn’t a good idea… It wasn’t until I was a third of the way through the book that I spotted the recap as the first of eight appendixes… [M]uch of this information really needed to be incorporated within the confines of the story. It’s like looking at a painting and being told about what you haven’t seen. The skill in any storytelling is in putting the information in context and letting the picture build up in the reader’s mind. I frequently came away from reading this book thinking Edelman has internalised too much. He knows what is going on but hasn’t confided enough knowledge to the reader which is a big mistake. None of this is helped by the fact that he’s pushing so much material into the story that there is little room for the characters to breath so this time we don’t see so much depth with their personalities.

Ouch. Willmetts elaborates from there, but it’s clear to me that the reviewer never recovered from his initial plot confusion and thus never invested in the story. Which is fair criticism.

This is a reaction I’ve long been expecting from some reviewers (but I won’t pretend it doesn’t still sting). The problem is that you’ll be totally in the woods trying to read MultiReal if you haven’t read Infoquake first. And even if you have, you’ll still be in the woods if you don’t remember it very well. MultiReal not only picks up soon after Infoquake leaves off, but it extends the themes and metaphors of that book, and makes references to things that happened in the margins of it. I tried to ameliorate this problem by including a four-and-a-half page synopsis of Infoquake in the appendices of MultiReal, but I knew that wasn’t going to please everybody.

For better or worse, I’ve written the entire trilogy to be read in close proximity, preferably in one long pass. In this I was inspired by the ballsy way that Peter Jackson handled The Two Towers. Lost? Confused? Tough. Go rent The Fellowship of the Ring, and come back when you’re done.

Unfortunately, as much as I think it’s worth your time to read Infoquake and MultiReal one after the other so you can pick up the delicate interplay of plot and metaphor, I can’t very well insist that you read them that way. Pyr would never go for it, because they’re planning to, you know, sell these things. All I can do is suggest.

MultiReal seems unreal as a mind-altering reality-changing technology. The tool merges biology with the infinitive of quantum physics in a way that no one ever dreamed of before…

Except for Natch, the cast (including his assistant, Jara, and even Lee) seems two-dimensional, yet no one will care as MultiReal continues the fascinating look at the future possibilities of nanotechnological human bio/logics. Natch is still the same ambitious rogue he was in Infoquake, as he will try anything and risk everything to be number one in his field. Other just as unethical executives act likewise as business and political values are actually singular: the end of being numero uno justifies any means, especially if the cost is paid by others.

I haven’t seen it crop up on Amazon yet, but I’m sure it’s only a matter of time.

Of course, if you know anything about Harriet Klausner, you’ll take her word with a 2001 monolith-sized chunk of salt. The woman has published over 16,600 reviews on Amazon at an average of 5.56 reviews per day (according to this Wikipedia article about her). She’s also known for frequently spoiling major plot points and getting major plot details wrong. And, pardon my French, but she can’t write for shit. (I’ve cleaned up the citation above slightly for grammar and style.)

In her review of MultiReal, there are no plot spoilers, thankfully. But Lieutenant Magan Kai Lee has mysteriously changed gender and become a woman. (I suspect she’s confused Lee with his right-hand woman, Rey Gonerev.) She also says that “Natch pleads with the Melbourne legislature to no avail,” which is not quite accurate — though it’s an element of the plot that’s not actually on the back cover, so I’d score that as evidence that she’s actually read the book.

Whatever. A review’s a review, and praise is praise, right?

A sly variation on the traditional cyberpunk novel, Edelman’s sequel to 2006′s Infoquake views a stunning new technology through the eyes of the cutthroat executives vying to market it. MultiReal, a reality-altering tool combining biological programming and quantum physics, threatens to plunge a far-future world into chaos, but before it can penetrate the furthest reaches of society, Natch, an entrepreneur and rebel, must find a way to market and distribute it. He faces tremendous resistance from legislative bodies, competing business concerns and the ominous black code embedded in the mechanisms that enhance his body. Edelman brings fresh air to the technological thriller, but his characters remain somewhat anemic and caricatured, particularly Jara, Natch’s second-in-command. MultiReal itself is firmly established as one of the most fascinating singularity technologies in years, and the inconclusive feel of this installment will build anticipation for the third Jump 225 book.

It’s a tremendous relief to see a respected third party reviewer say things like “MultiReal itself is firmly established as one of the most fascinating singularity technologies in years,” because I’ve been worrying about how people were going to respond to this book for a long time now. Of course, you know that there’s a dark, slobbering portion of my soul that’s hopping up and down in distress at the “anemic and caricatured” part of the review. But that’s why I keep him locked in the attic, where he can fret quietly to himself without bothering the neighbors.

You can read the review on PW‘s website, right after a starred review for my fellow SFNovelists.com member Gregory Frost’s Lord Tophet: A Shadowbridge Novel. (“Frost brings the charm of an ancient storyteller and the wit of a contemporary tale-spinner to this dramatic tale.”) Congrats, Gregory.

Some excerpts:

David Louis Edelman’s Infoquake just might be one of the very best science fiction debuts I have ever read. The book deserves all the praise it has garnered, and then some! Only rarely will a debut author produce the sort of work which habitually comes from celebrated veterans…

Contrary to a majority of scifi yarns, its the characterization which carries Infoquake forward. Though Natch is a captivating character, the supporting cast is equally interesting, with characters such as Jara, Horvil and Quell. I’m really looking forward to learning more about each of them in the two sequels…

Ambitious, vast in scope, with a deftly executed plot and impeccable prose from start to finish, David Louis Edelman’s Infoquake is a fascinating read. 2006 was one of the best years in memory in terms of impressive speculative fiction debuts. Had I read it when it was originally released, Infoquake would have trumped Scott Lynch’s The Lies of Locke Lamora, Naomi Novik’s His Majesty’s Dragon, Brian Ruckley’s Winterbirth, and Joe Abercrombie’s The Blade Itself.

He concludes by giving the book a solid 8 out of 10 and then makes a pitch for the imminently arriving sequel MultiReal as well.

“One of the very best science fiction debuts I have ever read”? Hah! Take that, Dune, Ender’s Game, and Neuromancer, not to mention Frankenstein. I’m crashing your party. Let’s hope you’re stocked up on Doritos.

Overall, John of SF Signal seems to have enjoyed the anthology, though Michael Moorcock’s Jerry Cornelius story seems to have dragged the whole thing down for him. Unfortunately, he didn’t particularly care for “Mathralon” either, stating that “the text’s meta-observation… seems to break the editorial representation that was created, leaving it in a no-man’s land between fiction and essay.” Nevertheless, he goes on to say that “Edelman’s prose is otherwise engaging and swift, and the situation that is ultimately outlined (the dangers of putting all your eggs in one basket) is a worthy premise.” He gives the story (and indeed the whole book) 3 stars out of 5.

Oh well. As William Shakespeare said in King Lear (or maybe it was Henry V?), “In such a method doth the cookie crumble.” At least SF Signal hasn’t caught on to George Mann’s nefarious scheme to capitualize on the George Clooney/Steven Soderbergh movie in a desperate attempt to shovel books down the throats of unsuspecting bookstore patrons by putting “Solaris” in the title. So far only this guy seems to have noticed.