This Is Not a Game

By: Walter Jon Williams

Narrated by: Jefferson Mays

Imagine a game with no boundaries - waiting in parking lot, sitting at your computer, walking down the street. You could be called at any moment - and you'd better be ready.

This is not a game.

This is a novel of greed, betrayal, and social networking.

©2008 Walter Jon Williams (P)2012 Recorded Books

Thoughtfully constructed and carefully plotted

TLDR: a firmly grounded, plot-driven, meticulously crafted story that makes the fictional real while being competently narrated. If you want flash or relationship drama this probably isn’t for you.

Published 13 years ago (as I write this) while being set in an ambiguous present, the setting is firmly in the recent past. This can be understood from the state of technology and from the financial figures given. So some parts seem quaint given how fast technology moves, but the author demonstrates an uncommon grasp of the technology. Some parts are a little awkward, either from misunderstanding or simplification for a general audience, but it is rarely wrong and the case I’m thinking of (case sensitive html) is a detail of no consequence to the story itself.

The story unfolds layer-by-layer with a firm foundation in prior prose, inexorably built to reach its inevitable conclusion. This does lack seat-of-pants chaos with tenuous-at-best causality but it does a fine job of making the fictional real.

The author’s own passion for RPGs shows and between games and technology it is a geeky story that understands not just how markets and company startups work but the banality of real world mercenaries—I mean security firms.

The narrator was quite competent but could voice better.

Long, complex and at times confusing

But well written and original, it kept my interest although I had to rewind a few times. Really liked Dagmar. Excellent reader.

Good book. Awesome narrator!

Jefferson Mays, one of the best, makes any book 100% better.. A++
15 words. word 15.

Came for Jeff Mays, LOVED story

Ok Mays is awesome - and this book is really fantastic. Great stories, characters, well-written - very well paced and thrilling to end.

if you like dystopian near future murder mysteries give this a listen

it was a good story with a fun pot and an interesting protagonist. the narrator did a great job giving voice to all the different characters.

Recommended Thriller

This book is actually two books in one...the two parts are of course very interconnected, but I actually liked the first part a bit better than the rest. Williams has created a rather though and resourceful heroine, and the other characters are a little more one-dimensional, but that might be because you get to know the heroine very good in the first part.

The book starts out rather fast, and you will blaze through the first part in no time, but it slows down a bit and you get a little more mystery to all the action. You will however figure things out quite early. Unpredictable this book is not...

All in all quite a good tech thriller. The author has done his homework, and the book works rather well...recommended.

I know now why this was a daily deal.

With the beginning of each trivial minutia "chapter" I debated whether to delete and move on. But hopeful it might get out of whatever the current rut, I pressed on.

It's not really a good book either....

What disappointed you about This Is Not a Game?

I just could not care about the story....it made no sense. I read a book called Hard Wired by this author and enjoyed it the most. I could not finish this one, made it about half way....which was a bummer...I almost fell asleep driving home from the airport. Had to pull the pin.

What was most disappointing about Walter Jon Williams’s story?

I just didn't give a damn about the character and the whole online gaming community approach to the story.

Did Jefferson Mays do a good job differentiating all the characters? How?

The reading was well done and professional.

What character would you cut from This Is Not a Game?

Sigh....maybe the CEO guy that could not find a helicopter...

Any additional comments?

Why do so many people pass out 5 star reviews? People, on a five star scale....how the hell can this rate with the best novels in the world?

DNF

fitting that one of the characters was a failed sci fi writer. I guess write what youbknow