Customer Reviews

Paintwork

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In a Wired article last year, Warren Ellis writes "the future isn't dead, we simply overtook it". In the article he speaks about how "science fiction is no longer ahead on the trail, throwing clues to the future back at us". He talks of how William Gibson, one of the pioneers of cyberpunk, in his latest trilogy of books, writes of the present, not of console cowboys in cyberspace. He points out that his new novels, while contemporary still seem just a bit out of sync. It is like we are getting a glimpse of a future only minutes away. In reading "Paintwork", from up and coming Bristol author Tim Maughan, this article and the novels of William Gibson are quick to come to mind.

Paintwork is made up of three stories that share a common vision of a near future with augmented graffiti artists, hackers, nanobot beetles, virtual reality video game celebrities and augmented reality robot battles waged across the streets of Havana.

First of all there is the story Paintwork. 3Cube is an augmented reality street artists that 'writes' over Coca-Cola billboards with help from hacker friend Tera but almost immediately after he has finished his work somebody has written over his work in an decidedly old-fashioned way. While continuing to work on augmented reality street art pieces, he tries to solve the mystery of who is sabotaging his work through his hacker friend, a former rival, and through a homeless vendor of "beetle juice". The description of nanobot beetles, producers of the unique ink used on the billboards, kept in cages, force fed and rumoured to have the brains of real insects is delightfully disturbing. It is towards the end of the story, when Maughan seems to really get a good handle on his prose. There are some definite poetic moments towards the end of the story. After spending 24 hours wracked with doubt , 3Cube admires "his final statement about how he feels his city - his home - can unleash its vibrancy through defiance of those that would attempt to control and regulate space. The city's space. His space." He finds a perfect view point and settles in to watch and guard his creation, falls asleep and dreams: "Bristol was drowning. The drizzle had turned into torrential rain, alternating black and white droplets falling from the heavens. As they hit the forest of decaying architecture they splattered it with toxic paint; acid burning into concrete as clouds of suffocating fumes filled the war-torn streets. With an insidious clanking and scratching the beetles started to emerge from the gutters and alleys in their thousands, mouths turned up to the sky to drink in the poisonous rain..."

In the second story, Paparazzi, documentary maker John Smith is contracted to infiltrate the elite online gaming world and film one of the industries' biggest video game stars as he plays through new beta content for the popular game 'A Wind of Blades'. As a former World of Warcraft addict myself, I had a lot of fun with watching John Smith become immersed in this online world. I felt this story was so close to the mark when it came to big MMORPGs such as WOW. There is a moment in the story where John is amazed at how lifelike and spontaneous the "bots" picking the rice in the fields of the virtual worlds are, only to discover that they are real players and I laughed out loud thinking of all those cooking and fishing quests in WOW. John is recruited because he is a famous machinima documentary director who is famous for having infiltrated a group of hackers that had cracked a US military contract, a training sim. He spends18 months in a virtual world where the hackers "constantly fought and re-fought the Second Battle of Fallujah, 22 years after it really ended, until they got the result they always wanted..." This is a great example of imagining a world that is only a few seconds out of synch with our own. I recognize the gaming community, the hackers, the military simulation software. It is the putting them together that is unique. Having read Havana Augmented previously last year, recognizing, Leo Kim, the celebrity gamer, from that story was a pleasure for me. Seeing the character development of John Smith, a peripheral character in Havana Augmented demonstrates that Maughan truly has a complete vision of his universe and could easily develop a longer story based on the mythos that he has setup in these stories. I am absolutely fascinated with this character now and would be thrilled to learn more of him.

Finally, there is Havana Augmented, the story of two young cuban friends that have hacked a virtual reality mech game Rolling Iron , converted it into an augmented reality game, Street Iron, where gamers can combat and compete their robot battles across the real city's space. Spectators can wear special spectator versions of "spex", the augmented reality eye-gear used by the gamers, to actually watch the game in realtime over the streets of Havana. Although they have technically broken the law, the new version of the game is widely popular. They have released the resulting code as open source across the entire internet and versions of Street Iron have popped up around the world. Popular enough to attract the attention of Sony, international media, and the gamer's guild Sakura, which the celebrity gamer Leo Kim belongs to. An exhibition game between the cuban boys and some of the planet's most famous celebrity gamers is setup. Maughan has a good sense of what I would call street level aesthetics. I liked the blend of graffiti artists and hackers in Paintwork, the obsession of online gamers in Paparazzi but most of all I love the understated moments of the disenfranchised streets of Havana. This story speaks so much of how the openness of the internet breaks down political barriers, of how it can be a great leveller, how the streets can influence even the largest of companies. I loved the pureness of the cuban boys, their simple pride and integrity. It is a great David and Goliath story.

Is Paintwork perfect? No - but damn, is this exciting fiction! Maughan is an ambitious new writer whose stories sit easily on the shelf with William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, and Cory Doctorow. I say this because these stories make me feel as a reader the way I felt picking up Burning Chrome, Snow Crash and Little Brother for the first time. Where I want to see more from Maughan is in the dynamics of relationships between characters. I want to see some moments of intensity to balance his gift for the subtle. I've made some big comparisons and so I think its important for Maughan to distinguish himself from these writers with a voice that is his own. There are moments of tight prose and brilliance that carry the stories but there are moments that are awkward too. I know that Maughan has a love of techno music and I would love to see him bring that aesthetic into his writing style. I am really talking about the cadence of the words. I want to read them aloud and feel the drum and bass, feel the loops. When I say I want more it is because I really want more. I hope that Maughan will consider giving us more glimpses into the lives of 3Cube, John Smith and Leo Kim.

These stories show the promise of a future hugo winning author and should not be missed. I am excited to be among his first readers. I know I will look back on reading Paintwork and say I knew him when.

I purchased Paintwork after reading a brief review by Cory Doctorow, a writer whose works I enjoy very much. Mr. Doctorow's praise of Paintwork is justified for the stories in Paintwork are quite good.

The Paintwork stories take place in the near future, a time not far from our own. The technologies in the stories are predictable extensions of current technology which renders them as believable and not as magical thinking. This is important as the the technologies are significant in the stories: they are not artifacts to the stories but are integral components. Do not think, however, that the stories are about technology, for they are not. Like all good science fiction, the stories are about humans acting and reacting in the world around them.

Technological advances give humans opportunities to do new things or to do old things in new ways. The technology changes but sadly, often humans do not. Paintwork gives us stories of humans acting in old ways with new technology. This is not a criticism: it simply means that traits which humans have exhibited for thousands of years are still exhibited in a future, more technologically-enabled, world. The worlds of Paintwork are dark but not dystopian. Some of the traits exhibited are positive, creative and useful while others are negative and destructive. But in all cases, the characters have adapted to a world of technology. Their adaptations are very believable, and this makes the stories seem realistic. One could almost believe the stories are news report from a not too distant future.

My only complaint about Paintwork is the number of typos: it seemed a rather large number for a published work. Still, I recommend Paintwork for fans of cyberpunk and science fiction. It is good writing with realistic characters set in a very believable world.

Tim Maughan's excellent Paintwork (2011) focuses on the meaning of artistry in a near-future cyberpunk landscape.

The titular story focuses on a subversive graffiti artist, the second on a documentary journalist and the award-nominated third story, "Havana Augmented", tells the tale of a pair of Cuban gamers. Gaming might not seem like artistry, but Paul and Marcus, our protagonists, take it to that magnificent level. Mr. Maughan's Cuba is a proud island, but one crippled by economic sanctions and a dying tourist trade. Marcus is a computer nut - a genius programmer who cobbles together his own games from the fragments of code he can buy through the black market. Paul isn't a computer whiz, but he's a gifted virtual athlete. Marcus builds the games; Paul wins them.

The most popular game in Cuba is Street Iron, a Marcus-hacked version of the popular global mecha game Rolling Iron. Marcus has taken the rather banal foundation and converted it to augmented reality genius. The players zip around the city on motorcycles and wearing VR 'spex'. Their giant robots follow them and battle to the death. Entire robot wars are fought without anyone ever noticing. Marcus' variant soon eclipses the real thing, and, as videos are leaked around the internet, the game's corporate owners are keen to cash in.

"Havana Augmented" follows two streams of conflict. Paul and Kim battle with enormous robots which is, frankly, awesome. Mr. Maughan knows how to write an action sequence without letting it take over. The battles are short, streamlined, vicious and very, very fun. The story's true conflict, however, is within Paul. Initially pleased (and stunned) to be out of the shadows, he's suddenly faced with the full force of Global Corporate Decadence (tm). Paul's a fierce Cuban patriot, but one with open eyes. He sees what Sakura could do for his homeland, but can also sees what Sakura could do to it. I'm a sucker for sports movies, especially when the game or match has some sort of Great Significance. Mr. Maughan tugs at my heartstrings with "Havana Augmented" - a giant robot smackdown with a country's future on the line.

The other two stories aren't shabby. "Paintwork" serves as an excellent introduction to the near-future landscape and introduces the theme of struggling artistic integrity in a corporate-owned world. The protagonist of the second story, journalist John Smith, has probably the darkest tale. He's using his documentary skills to explore the (surprisingly seedy) underworld of the gaming clans, and what begins as an innocent assignment turns into something much more conspiratorial. It is, perhaps, the most didactic and least fun of the three stories, but it does connect nicely with "Havana Augmented".

Tim shows a world that's the future but yet, its not. His three short stories combine what is already relevant to our daily life in regards to social media in the present day and show them in their evolved state. It seems apparent that the author takes his loves and creates stories with them using themes that revolve around graffiti, Twitter, and computer games. His first story introduces you to 3Cube and although the ending was not surprising; it still left me with questions. 3Cube seems to be trying to make the world a beautiful place through his art work which is realistic landscapes but someone keeps destroying it in an obvious diss. The tension mounts as the reader wonders who is doing such a thing. I felt the ending of this story was a bit rushed and would love to read more about 3Cube; his character fascinated me.

Paparazzi was my least favorite of the bunch but it was still endearing and I thought this was where I saw the author's dark humor the most especially when he was detailing the gamer lifestyle. I could not stop laughing. Imagine a world where your career is based off being a great gamer and creating great games. Competition is fierce between guilds to the point where one can be forced into slave labor inside a game. This story was a bit fast-paced so it left me a bit confused at times and I felt there wasn't enough interaction between characters in the game and outside of the games.

Now the last story, Havana Augmented is the best of them all. Maughan definitely saved the best for last with this one. What I particularly liked about this one is that he tied in characters from the previous story into this one which was not expected. He also explored, albeit on the surface the political climate of Cuba in a non-judgmental tone and he did it with relative ease. This story was definitely more animated and action-packed, battles between mechas, and I could only imagine seeing huge mechas fighting it out virtually with Cuba as a backdrop...beautiful. I actually found this story to be quite heart-warming while the others were mostly dark and dripping with cynicism, this showed human courage and that sometimes the small ones can win.

I look forward to reading more works by Tim Maughan. This was a quick read and if you're interested in sci-fi that's not over the top, this is for you.

In three stories, Maughan weaves a compelling vision of a dark digital future in the tradition of Dick and Gibson. Maughan displays a rare mastery of the short story form--delivering fully realized characters, visceral imagery, and suspensful action in a tight package. The sole criticism I have of Paintwork is its brevity. I wish I could have stayed in its world of bright light and gritty shadow a little longer. I look forward to future efforts from this author.

I find that I am enjoying a walk through a world that feels like its only been fast-forwarded by at most decade or so: A gritty dirt-under-the-fingernails setting with characters that are likable and flawed and real. The tech can be prosumer-slick or jury-rigged powerhacks or bargain knockoff ware. It's all there. I am reminded of the flavors and textures, the twists and turns in Children of Men and Blade Runner. Perhaps not as grim but so close, so tangible. There's something to how Tim is able to reveal this tactile world with elegant snapshots instead of bogging you down with overly descriptive visuals. It is experiencing immersion with an economy of words.

The characters are engaging and exasperating as anyone in your circle of friends might be so you care when things go well or very very wrong.

These are three short stories set in the same world. My favorite of these is Paintwork. While it could be that the subject matter is closer to my interests than the other two stories, I believe it is because this particular story is simply stronger all around. All the elements work together so well.

Though all the stories are related Paparazzi and Havana Augmented are more closely connected. In fact, though Paparazzi is a stand alone piece with a great ending it feels as though it serves as an introduction to Havana Augmented. A fan of MMORPGs will appreciate the depiction of how inter-meshed real and in-game scenarios and politics are within the gaming society, but it's the characters and personas that make the stories accessible to anyone.

Paintwork is well worth your time. In fact, I guarantee that, upon reading the last page, you will want more. You'll be among the rest of us eager to see what's next from Tim Maughan.

Tim Maughn confesses in his "About the Author" that he spends way too much time on Twitter. This might be true. I don't have very many Twitter followers and the few that I have are ghost-avatars that have long since been abandoned by their real-world users. Tim, on the other hand appears pretty frequently in my Twitter feed. He's a true native of the digital community and it shows in his trilogy of short stories called Paintworks. No, not because characters are donning eye-to-head gear that allows the real world and the virtual worlds to mesh, or that they use web slang even more fluently than street slang. Sure, those things happen, but this isn't the real testimony to Tim's loyalty to digital urban culture. The real sign of his virtual citizenry is his vivid depiction of the digital environment itself. Location is important in any story; and Paintworks feels both local and international all at once. True to the global nature of the web and the globalization of graffiti culture, his stories and characters span across countries, not as tourists, but as tour guides that are sucking readers into dangerously deep worlds of cyber-crimes against private and intellectual property. It really is a way of wondering about how culture and counter-culture will evolve as advertisers, corporations and even entire governments plaster real urban landscapes with their virtual varnish and create patent protected worlds for gamers to tread and, of course, trespass. Specifically, I'm thinking of the highly original middle story, Paparazzi, which finds a documentary filmmaker turned gaming paparazzi stalking, not celebutantes, but high profile avatars while they're in gaming action - a highly original premise.

Most refreshing is that there is no judgment of this future. These environments, scenarios and characters are illustrated in a way that presumes them to be commonplace. Sci-Fi can sometimes present the future from the perspective of the present, eliciting our exotic reactions; Tim on the other hand assumes all of his future scenarios to be mundane. His characters have long since ensconced themselves in this culture; and they're responding to the faux-world the same as they would the real-one - they're hijacking and hacking it; and getting into heaps of trouble in the process.

(I lack a work knowledge of contemporary SF literature, so pardon if this sounds a little absurd or out of touch about current trends.)

Maughan's Paintwork provides an all-to-brief glimpse into a world that Maughan will hopefully explore more fully in future work.

One of the better aspects of the world Maughan has created is that the corporatism that marks so much cyberpunk is a little less obvious and more insidious here. Instead of our various protagonists facing off against a giant corporation, Maughan wisely extrapolates fanworks being co-opted by corporations for their needs. This gives the narrative world a sense of both familiarity and freshness, which is something all good SF should strive for.

The titular story that leads off the anthology, is the one Maughan feels most comfortable in, both in terms of location and its scene of graffiti artists. It's also here that Maughan does his most extrapolating, especially in the use of QR codes as both ads and forms of ad-busters through works of art. It's a clever use of the ever-proliferating QR codes.

The second story, "Paparazzi", is the weakest of the three in the small collection. It's a too-quick introduction to a larger, more pressing dynamic of this story and the one that follows it. It moves too quickly, John drawn too broadly, and the stakes for his story a little muddled. While the story's general point -- that slave labor has been digitized for MMOs -- I would've liked John interacting with those folks in-game prior to his own enslavement.

"Havana Augmented", like "Paintwork", is a more realized aspect of the world. Like the first story, Maughan feels a bit more comfortable not only with the space, but with the characters and their goals. Cuban politics are quickly drawn, but culturally dead-on, and the impact of cheap technology and amateur coders feel like second nature. The battles between the mechas is exciting and well-written, but not overbaked (thankfully).

All in all, Maughan's concerns about subcultures, corporatism, and gaming are all old hat for cyberpunk, but Maughan nicely updates them in a world that feels well-realized and exciting. Hopefully he'll play in them again soon.

I was very pleased, reading Tim Maughan's new book in my Kindle. He creates a dystopian vision of the future Bristol, England, where the line between reality and 2-D has been rubbed away. If you are a fan of cutting-edge sci/fi, this collection is "must read".
Tim O'Connor

Paintsworks is a wonderful collection of sci-fi short stories that take place in a world only a few years ahead of our own. Maughan has a clean, quick-paced writing style. He's able to bring the stories to life without bogging down the narrative with excessive detail. It's a fascinating world where augmented reality feels as normal as watching TV.

It's a great bargain at $2.99. So skip a mocha latte or slice of pizza for some good sci-fi.