Cybernetic Walrus (Wonderland Gambit) [Hardcover]

Jack L. Chalker (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1995 | Series: Wonderland Gambit (Book 1)

EVERYTHING YOU THINK YOU KNOW IS WRONG...
That was the strange message left on Cory Maddox's e-mail--just at the moment when years of work on a revolutionary subspace computer system was about to pay off. Nothing would be the same for Cory again. Suddenly his life was thrown into chaos when the company that controlled his patent was sold out from under him, and instead of imminent wealth, Cory was facing immediate poverty. Then along came Alan Stark, who wanted to recruit Cory for a special research project on virtual reality.
Stark was reviving the secret NSA work of the legendary Matthew Brand, who had disappeared under mysterious circumstances years before. Cory had always idolized Brand, so he was initially thrilled to be involved. But he quickly discovered that there was nothing virtual about the realities he was working on. Instead, he found that Stark was on the verge of controlling the very fabric of reality itself.
Cory was unsure of Stark's ultimate goal, until he began to recall pieces of another life and found himself in the middle of a battle between two groups of people who could use "rabbit holes" in space and time to jump between different realities, personalities, and lives. Whoever had control of the power to shape reality would have the power to become a god--or a devil. But before Cory could combat Stark and his minions, he first had to remember which side he was on...

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

A corporate takeover forces brilliant computer programmer Cory Maddox to look for another job. He accepts a government position too tempting to refuse?to continue the work of the late Matthew Brand, a virtual reality pioneer. After settling into his new environment, Maddox slowly begins to realize that what he has known as "reality" is not what it seems. Veteran sf author Chalker (Shadows of the Well of Souls, LJ 2/15/94) embarks on a new series that explores the boundaries of human identity, space, time, and the nature of reality itself. Chalker once again demonstrates his talents as one of the genre's leading raconteurs. For most sf collections.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

From Booklist

Fresh from a trilogy of episodes in his Well World saga, Chalker quickly inaugurates a new series that explores the mind-bending limits of virtual reality. Cory Maddox is a brilliant programmer for a fledgling computer network company. He is promptly recruited by the National Security Agency when his company suspiciously sells out to a competitor. His new job involves reactivating an aborted virtual reality project pioneered by computer wizard Matthew Brand, whose incorporation of top secret alien technology apparently led to his demise. Checking out the agency's cyberspace realms, Maddox is soon trapped inside a perfect reproduction of base reality with no clear way out or even any certainty that base reality actually exists. Characteristically, Chalker's initially hard-sf premise gives way to increasingly bizarre and sometimes confusing plot developments, including body switching, alien intervention, and alternative universe hopping. Die-hard cyberpunks may want to pass, but Chalker stalkers should be delighted. Carl Hays --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: San Val (November 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1417708107
• ISBN-13: 978-1417708109
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #11,150,297 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars First get a good grip on Reality, September 10, 2002

By 

Worldreels (MANKATO, MN) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Cybernetic Walrus (The Wonderland Gambit, Book 1) (Paperback)

Jack L. Chalker's theory of existence was spelled out in Book I, P. 223: "... Sometime, somebody, in a world we otherwise know nothing about but which has to be far more advanced than the one we now knew, built a vast computer for some reason and put tremendous knowledge and capability into it. Something went wrong, or so it seemed. A group, a small group, of people from that original place, that true universe, had come into the system and gotten lost, then trapped, in an ever-increasing series of exquisitely detailed virtual universes.. [Brand] was the only hope of getting everybody together again and back to reality. ..."
Chalker wrote, "All reality is programming. We cannot know the real: we are trapped in an endless series of simulations, all of us, and some, like myself, in simulations within simulations. ...." He uses an IT, a thing, a faceless one or a gray ancient to speak these lines, rather than a flesh and blood character. This device implied a para-programmer, one outside the mind of man. This invented God is in control not only of the author outside the story's pages but in control of all the characters within the pages of the book.
Reality now has a counterpart, virtual reality. The characters, en mass, stare into the mirror of their own minds and realize that they had no measuring rod with which to gauge their own realities. The mind is self reflective. The mind has no outer objective way to measure either its input or output. The characters reveal the dead end of human thought. The fact that the tactile nerves register solidity reveals little regarding production or projection of such solidity. There is no way to distinguish whether the neurons fire due to sensory input rather than from say drugs or computer generated inputs. Reality, thus loses its previous foundation.
Chalker posits an Existence Computer with limitless memory able to fill in a separate reality for each and every mind. Everyone gets their own set of individual mental constructs. With this god-like computer unlimited universes to surround each person's set of ideas could be created. (P. 211 BK II). Taking this idea one step further, each person is a circuit on the mother board of the universe. Every solid item that surrounds a person is created within another little circuit. The whole universe is the giant circuitry, the mother board of existence. We are all but chips, powered from this hidden source of energy that we call existence. Chalker names his god character Matthew Brand. Brand understands the circuitry and power of the Existence Computer enough to become part of it. Brand was able to join with the energy reactor in order to control the energy flow into the mother board of the Existence Computer.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best cyberspace series yet!, December 19, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Cybernetic Walrus (The Wonderland Gambit, Book 1) (Mass Market Paperback)

Jack Chalker continues his tradition of unique ideas and perspectives in the Wonderland series. What starts out as a classic cyberspace story quickly turns in unexpected directions. This book will definitely get you thinking about the true nature of reality. If you liked the movie, "The Matrix," get this book! The movie stole Chalker's ideas without giving credit, and the book explores the ideas to a greater depth. Too bad Del Rey is so short-sighted and has not reprinted the 3rd book in this series.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I Guarantee You Will Love This Book, April 18, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: The Cybernetic Walrus (The Wonderland Gambit, Book 1) (Mass Market Paperback)

If you are naturally curious, like interesting plot twists and rich environments, then you are going to love this book.

I tend to agree with other reviewers that this work is the inspiration for the movie "The Matrix" and in many ways is a superior work. The ideas in Chalker's work are much more developed than in The Matrix and does a much better job of keeping it's integrity throughout.