Virtual World - Hardcover

Imagine a virtual world so realistic, so powerful that it begins to bleed into life beyond the computer screen. Jack North, a teenage computer junkie and gaming wizard, has come across the ultimate virtual reality game--Silicon Sphere. It's got such a hold on his life and senses that he can feel himself being sucked into the screen, into the Sphere. The weirdest thing is that when he ends sessions of the game, he seems to bring back little bits from the world beyond--sand, crumpled notes, and more. When kids around the world begin to disappear, he starts to wonder if they've become trapped in the Sphere.

Chris Westwood has woven a tale of teenagers driven by their passions, a tale of virtual reality so clear that it becomes more than real. Westwood's grip on Internet protocol is firm enough that sophisticated, Net-savvy teens will stay glued to the book until its surprising ending.

Grade 8-10?A timely, high-tech offering set in Britain in the near future. Computer aficionado Jack North is ecstatic to get hold of a pirated copy of a new video game. However, the 14 year old soon learns that Silicon Sphere employs an operating system that can co-opt his very being, thrusting him and his friends into a dangerous and strange maze-filled virtual world. Almost too late, he discovers that the players have become pawns in a deadly face-off between Eddie Matrix, the once innocent, now vengeful creator of Silicon Sphere, and Leon Speakes, a ruthless entrepreneur who has stolen Matrix's powerful software. The premise of this cyber-adventure?that virtual reality can exploit human reality to create a virtual environment inhabited by humans?is an intriguing science fiction theme, but Westwood's cardboard characters and the story's omniscient narrator who leaves little to readers' imagination dilute the inherent mystery. The novel is also unnecessarily fragmented by alternating Eddie and Jack's parallel stories. Nonetheless, readers will be fascinated and provoked by the scary implications of the book's theme. They might question how Jack eventually and miraculously escapes the prison of his virtual world, but they won't forget the nightmare he endures.?Jack Forman, Mesa College Library, San Diego
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.