β Scribed by Kelly McCullough
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
Starred Review. Remember the Fates, those ancient Greek spinners, weavers and snippers of life's threads? They're back in McCullough's original and outstanding debut, and still ruling destinyβbut with their own digital web, based on a server called the Fate Core. Power-hungry as ever, they've coded a spell to eliminate human free will. Unluckily for them, one of their demigod descendants is a cheerfully rebellious hacker-sorcerer named Ravirn who, when not studying for college midterms, likes to mess around on their web with the help of his familiar, Melchior, who can change from a goblin to a laptop. Ravirn and Melchior, let loose in McCullough's delightfully skewed and fully formed worldβmuch like our own, but with magic, paranormally advanced technology and Greek godsβset out to thwart Ravirn's "great-to-the-nth-degree aunt[s]," careening from one discovery to another, enlisting unlikely allies and narrowly evading destruction at the hands of both Fates and Furies. McCullough handles his plot with unfailing invention, orchestrating a mixture of humor, philosophy and programming insights that give new meaning to terms as commonplace as "spell checker" and esoteric as "programming in hex." Though a preponderance of techie-talk may put off some readers, this is the kind of title that could inspire an army of rabid fans; it's a good thing a sequel is planned for 2007. (Aug.)
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Although it's yet another variation on mythological creatures interacting with IT, this fast-paced, action-packed yarn is a lot of fun. Ravirn, the multi-great-grandson of the Fate Lachesis (who measures the thread of life), is in trouble. Great-aunt Atropos (who cuts it) has decided that human free will is a great nuisance. She plans to get rid of it by coding a spell into the Fate Core, the server that rules destiny. But there's a problem with the spell. Dedicated hacker Ravirn can catch the fatal flaw in any software but refuses to debug it, in fact is determined to defeat the project. All Hades breaks loose and starts pursuing him. His only allies are his familiar, his gorgeous cousin (a mean programmer herself), and the webgoblin underground. Then Discord and the Furies get involved. McCullough has done an excellent job of weaving myth, magic, IT jargon, and the English language into a bang-up story. Frieda Murray
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