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WebMage

by Kelly McCullough



      This was just plain fun, combining some of my favorite things - computers and mythology. Greek myth meets cyberpunk, where leaving things up to the Fates is more than just a metaphor and a pretty dicey thing to do. It reminded me a bit of Roger Zelazny's second Amber series, when it began with the flippant, semi-black sheep scion of the godlike ruling family off at college on our earth with his computer based familiar. This sort of integration of mythology is also very Zelazny-like. But this is no copycat, offering plenty of fresh ideas and new directions all its own.

Raviron is the great-to-the-nth-degree grandson/grandnephew of the ancient Greek Fates. Who are still around - spinning, measuring, and cutting the threads of human life. They represent the forces of order, and one of them - Great Aunt Atropos (she snips) - is carrying that to extremes by trying to program a spell to eliminate all that messy free will stuff. When she runs into problems, she decides she needs and will get help from Raviron, whether he wants to or not. He may not be the most elegant programmer, but he can hack and debug with the best of them. Raviron wants no part of this, and as Atropos presses him, moves into active opposition. That's when all hell breaks loose, with Raviron literally cursed by Fate, on the run from Harpies, and caught between the forces of chaos and order after finding trouble on the Fate mainframe (where he had no business being in the first place). Not to mention his upcoming midterms, with Great Grandmother Lachesis raising the stakes into unbearable if he fails.

The integration of magic and hacking/programming is really well done. I think you can enjoy the story without it, but you'll probably like this a lot more if you're computer savvy enough to get things like the server and hacking references and the workings of the mweb. An impressive debut made up of solid storytelling, plenty of action, interesting characters, and humor, all presented through smooth, addictively readable writing. Highly recommended and I can't wait for the sequel, CyberMancy, next year.

The Book

ACE Fantasy
August 2006
Mass Market Paperback
ISBN-10: 0-441-01425-9
ISBN-13: 9780441014255
SF - Fantasy/cyberpunk
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Excerpt
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The Reviewer

Kim Malo
Reviewed 2006
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© 2006 MyShelf.com