I Don't Remember Half Of What Happened Early On Or Very Much At All What Took Place Toward The End

One day I'll come to terms with the fact that genre fiction will never be as objectively compelling and unassailably brilliant in the way that I want it to be. In other words, nothing less than transcending its worth as merely a piece of genre fiction. It's kind of a dick thing to want: if only you were what you set out to be and also insanely good, then I'd be practically moved to tears.

In other words, I've been waiting for a "really good sci-fi" book, thinking I'd been open-minded and accepting of the genre when in reality I've just never enjoyed that type of story — leading you to conclude that eventually there's a point where you just should stop torturing yourself.

All of which is to say, there's probably no point in you reading what I thought about Ernest Cline's Ready Player One. That of course won't stop me from writing it, which is itself just torturous.

I will start with this: I don't understand the glowing blurbs on the back of the paperback. I often don't understand the blurbs — or more accurately, I understand what they're saying but rather I have no idea how people lie to themselves that much. Whatever. Blurbs are not new. But stuff like "time simply evaporates" and "ridiculously fun" seem effusive to the point of seeming ironic. Putting aside the tortured mixed metaphor, I just don't like the idea of time evaporating. One of the reasons I'm so leery of reading is the idea that people seem to do it to kill time. Time shouldn't be treated as a puddle.

Since I already said "whatever," I won't say "whatever." So imagine another transition. Got it? OK.

Then there's the world in which Ready takes place. The premise is that governments everywhere relied too heavily on fossil fuels, and by the year 2044, that stash of fossil fuels ran out, I guess leaving the world without energy (except for those locales serviced by nuclear, hydroelectric, solar or wind energy), and somehow the energy industry disappeared, leading to a collapse of society, while at the same time supporting an entire societal infrastructure within some kind of virtual reality system.

Which is how we get to the main conceit of Player, which in short is that the creators of this virtual reality system grew up in the era of early 1980s computer and gaming equipment: Atari, standup video games, etc. And they also love 1980s music. And no one believes that popular culture progressed past 1989.

So one of the creators of this virtual world dies and then creates this sort of virtual reality scavenger hunt, which is what the book is really about. Oh, and most of the clues have to do with 1980s popular culture, because the guy who died lived through this era and conveniently forgot about everything that happened after 1990. Which is to say, no Nirvana, no Outkast, no Judd Apatow, no Seinfeld, no Kanye (NO KANYE???), no Sopranos, no Mad Men, no Wonderbra, no Forrest Gump, no Crash Bandicoot . . . we could go on and on and on. If you pull yourself out of the head of the character and into the head of the writer whose formative years were in the 1980s, you have to ask yourself: was it at all worth it? Obviously — even in spite of the weird "Nifty 50s" sort of nostalgia about that vapid era — the answer is no. Be real, nobody really [hearts] the 80s. Take a look at the Billboard Year-End Hot 100 Singles of 1986, just for example; it's not pretty (full disclosure: 1983, 1984 and even 1985 come off much, much better).

I guess I "get" that when society has broken down to the point where the only meaningful institutions are in the virtual world, a set of origin myths will rise in the vacuum, leading to a completely unwarranted elegies to Men Without Hats, Family Ties and Radio Shack-manufactured computers (TRS-80).

One works best when it disregards the 1980s nostalgia and focuses on the action. The only problem is that when the action is virtual, sometimes it's unclear what's what. I don't remember half of what happened early on or very much at all what took place toward the end. I do know who Howard Jones is, however.