Virtual Reality Mash Up

Are virtual reality games you play on your phone, tablet, laptop or portal of preference engagement for entertainment or something more sinister?

Larry Gaudet’s 2024 sci-tech futuristic thriller, “Eris: A Novel”, delves into this question with mixed results: the conclusion is clear but the path getting there meanders with distracting detours along the way.

Don Barton (game handle “GM001”) has created and sold “Greenhouse”, an internationally successful immersive virtual reality eco-game with a 46 + million worldwide base estimated to grow to 2 billion. The company is managed by the ubiquitous Bai Jun, the Chinese CEO for the owners, and colleague of Don’s.

Among the global players is Tony (game handle “T-Redeem”), Don’s teenage son, who gets in a whole lot of trouble when he is befriended in the virtual world and kidnapped in the real world by the mysterious Eris, a shadowy personality and anarchist intent on destroying Greenhouse to liberate players from becoming addicts and slaves of the game.

Eris views Greenhouse as symptomatic of a much bigger issue for the global community:

“So many know there’s a lot systemically wrong in society but feel helpless to do anything but grumble or lash out at scapegoats, often those the most vulnerable. It’s far easier to moan into our media feeds, where so many of us are plainly lost in conspiracy theory and corporate misinformation, or simplistic arguments about what’s wrong and who’s responsible. Our society is sick and getting sicker, epidemically so. And angrier. Still for the most people, the incendiary conclusion that everything in our society should be burned down is not a welcome or legitimate choice.”

And fatalistically sees her personal future as “I’m a warrior for change who will inevitably underestimate the costs of tearing down one world to rebuild it to my utopian specifications.”

Unfortunately, there are other forces surfacing late in the story seeing different opportunities for the deep state providing a cynical twist worthy of a film noir ending.

Getting through the shifting back stories of the five main narrators, their ruminations and questionable relevance to plot development as well as game tech references (presumably for authenticity), takes patience. There are also some curious glitches in my early version that will probably disappear before final publication.

As one character observes half-way through: “Parallel realities are a big part of the problem.”

Eris is ideal for travellers. Whether you're a commuter wanting a hop in hop out book, or on a long distance train and want 1 book for your journey.

Being autistic I found the pacing and format somewhat challenging.

I'd recommend this book to fans of the Matrix and Ready Player One.

I really enjoyed reading Eris, a book that reminded me of a hybrid between Mr. Robot (the TV show) and Ready Player One. The premise was fantastic, with a lot of philosophical intricacies and engaging thought processes included throughout the narrative.

I love video game stories, and I especially love them if they dabble in the cyberpunk sub-genre... Eris absolutely did so! The shifting layers and fleshed out motivations of the characters really added depth to the plot. The author skillfully writes from multiple POVs in a way where it is easy to keep them articulated in the reader's mind. Sometimes with multiple POVs, it can be easy to get characters confused, but each character had a distinct personality and interesting trajectory that kept me flipping pages at lightning speed!

The only criticism I have is that I wish there had a been a little more action. The corporate and philosophical aspects of the story kept it very intriguing, but it might have benefited from a little more drama in the VR world. Still, Eris was a delightful read, and I look forward to engaging with Larry Gaudet's work in the future! The cover is beautiful, and I cannot wait to have it on my shelf.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers at DunDurn Press for sending me an e-ARC for review! I truly enjoyed the ride.

Greenhouse is an online game where you can spend your time, and money, saving the environment. Want to clean up Chinese airspace polluted by coal power plants? Greenhouse is here for you. Simply spend some credits on carbon scrubbers and get to work.

This is an addiction you can feel good about. But, out in the real world, there are some people who do not feel good about Greenhouse or the people who run it and benefit from it.

An unknown number of hackers have gotten into Greenhouse and are making disastrous changes to the environment and players's accounts. Their identities are unknown, they are intelligent, they are everywhere.

They are led by someone known only as Eris. Eris doesn't just want to wreak havoc in-game, she wants to eliminate the corporate tech elites who run these platforms. These elites have turned society into a digital nightmare.

Don Barton is one of those elites, he created Greenhouse. He’s rich and retired and in the middle of a divorce. His son either doesn’t love him or never felt loved by him. The result is the same, his son is rebelling. That rebellion leads him into Eris’s arms and brings Don right where Eris wants him.

Larry Gaudet's Eris is a fast moving, tightly packed cyberpunk novel that resembles our world a little too much for comfort.

This book had so much potential that I think was lost in a morality lesson. The premise was fantastic and exciting, but the execution was borderline painful at times, lectures on the ethics of what Greenhouse was and wasn’t. There was not really a lot of action, which was something I was expecting and hoping for, especially when video games and hostage situations and ransoms are involved! It almost felt like the characters just flew around in planes or in the game and then stood around and had conversations. I think the book holds merit for maybe a philosophy course, but if you’re looking for an escape for a book, this is not the best fit for you.

Such a cool technological thriller that had me on the edge of my seat! Incredibly smart, well-written, and definitely has a lot of layers to it.

Solid book, took a bit to get into but still enjoyed myself. Too many points of view for my taste-
If you’re someone who enjoys that type of back and forth you will really enjoy this.

Okay, yeah, it’s official. I really don’t care for video game stories. I mean, it makes sense. I don’t care for video games, so why would I want to read about them, right? But every so often a work of fiction comes along that is so good that it transforms the previously unengaging subject matter.
Eris wasn’t that book for me. It’s a decent book by all means. Some interesting ideas and solid writing (for which I'm rounding up my rating), but I just didn’t really care about the story or the characters. I’m sure this is a strictly personal perspective and should be taken as such.
The constant POV jumping created a disorientating effect. And it was much too game-centric. Smart, overall, but didactic with it. At least a very quick read, which was nice. User mileage may vary. Thanks Netgalley.

((EDIT: spoilers removed; full review available on Goodreads))

This was my first NetGalley ARC! Very grateful to Dundurn Press for accepting my request to read and review it.
I came into this book excited, thinking it sounded amazing – good premise, nice cover, SF / mystery / thriller, featuring a VR and some cybercriminals, compared to one of my all-time favourites (Ready Player One), and coming from my beloved Canada.
Unfortunately, I have mixed feelings about it after reading it.

PROS:
• The author’s skill at writing character voice. In a book with five different POVs, all in 1st person, they were all distinct. Also, having the five POVs allowed for a glimpse into the characters’ clashing perceptions of each other and the parallels between them. That’s quite challenging, so kudos to him!
• Speaking of the characters, some of them were very interestingly layered, particularly Eris.
• The theme of technology being too pervasive and making life less real is one I can sadly agree with, and it’s cool to see it explored
• The short chapters make for a gripping, fast-paced reading experience which I personally like
• Loved the references to Toronto in there!

CONS:
• This book leaned more into the business / corporate aspects of the VR game rather than into the VR world itself, which I found disappointing given the comparison to Ready Player One
• There seemed to be lots of things going on, presented as important, and not all of them seemed to come strongly into play
• While the fast-pacing experience of the short chapters was nice, some things felt rushed, which detracted from the tension and suspense. There were a couple of chapter endings and transitions that seemed rather abrupt
• Character motivations seemed unclear or weak at points, which made me feel like I was lacking a connecting thread, or like it was there but perhaps not strongly enough.

I think the book would have benefited from being longer, the way many SF and thrillers are, and expanding on the virtual world rather than business aspects, especially since the book is compared to Ready Player One. One of the core reasons why I didn’t love this book as much as I could have was that comparison – I was hoping for a VR-heavy story, where the virtual world felt like one more of the characters, important and alive.
Also, as much as having multiple perspectives was interesting, I kept wondering what the book would be like if it followed Eris exclusively. That could have made for a very strong, complex narrative. Having five different POVs, since the book is not very long, didn’t give me time to fully connect with any of the characters the way I would have liked

All in all, amazing concept but I wasn’t keen on the execution