Video Star

Cyberpunk's Elmore Leonard

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In “Video Star,” Walter Jon Williams returns to the glittering but seedy world that he has outlined in his novels “Voice of the Whirlwind” and “Hardwired.” In this case, we have Ric, who fled the collapse of his gang's crime empire - or dukedom, perhaps - in a future Granada, Spain to Los Angeles, of course. What the gang was dealing in is never clear, as is the case in cyberpunk where fortunes are made in information, implants or futuristic pharmaceuticals.

There is double-dealing which leaves Ric low on funds. So, he uses his criminal skills to steal and backstab, but it turns out that he has not gotten away clean. In fact, the revenge is one that is only possible in a cyberpunk world, and it is one that those of us living in the real, non-cyberpunk world, may one day see, if we are not already.

The Elmore Leonard comparison is a good one. This is the future with all the promise and glitter but people are seedy. They remain mired in humanity. Criminals remain essentially grifters and scum for all the cosmopolitan poise they bring.