The highly inventive, brilliant author of Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon, and Anathem returns with his most accessible novel to date, a high-stakes thriller in which a wealthy tech entrepreneur gets caught in the very real crossfire of his own online fantasy
William Morrow
September 2011
On Sale: September 20, 2011
Featuring: Richard Forthrast
1056 pages ISBN: 0061977969 EAN: 9780061977961 Kindle: B004XVN0WW Hardcover / e-Book Add to Wish List
Four decades ago, Richard Forthrast, the black sheep of an
Iowa family, fled to a wild and lonely mountainous corner of
British Columbia to avoid the draft. Smuggling backpack
loads of high-grade marijuana across the border into
Northern Idaho, he quickly amassed an enormous and illegal
fortune. With plenty of time and money to burn, he became
addicted to an online fantasy game in which opposing
factions battle for power and treasure in a vast cyber
realm. Like many serious gamers, he began routinely
purchasing viral gold pieces and other desirables from
Chinese gold farmers— young professional players in Asia who
accumulated virtual weapons and armor to sell to busy
American and European buyers.
For Richard, the game was the perfect opportunity to launder
his aging hundred dollar bills and begin his own high-tech
start up—a venture that has morphed into a Fortune 500
computer gaming group, Corporation 9592, with its own super
successful online role-playing game, T’Rain. But the line
between fantasy and reality becomes dangerously blurred when
a young gold farmer accidently triggers a virtual war for
dominance—and Richard is caught at the center.
In this edgy, 21st century tale, Neal Stephenson, one of the
most ambitious and prophetic writers of our time, returns to
the terrain of his cyberpunk masterpieces Snow Crash and
Crpytonomicon, leading readers through the looking glass and
into the dark heart of imagination.
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