This Is Not a Game: A Novel

This Is Not a Game: A Novel

Once upon a time, there were four of them. And though each was good at a number of things, all of them were very good at games... Dagmar is a game designer trapped in Jakarta in the middle of a revolution. The city is tearing itself apart around her and she needs to get out. Her boss Charlie has his own problems -- 4.3 billion of them, to be precise, hidden in an off-shore account. Austin is the businessman -- the VC. He's the one with the plan and the one to keep the geeks in line. BJ was there from the start, but while Charlie's star rose, BJ sank into the depths of customer service. He pads his hours at the call-center slaying on-line orcs, stealing your loot, and selling it on the internet. But when one of them is gunned down in a parking lot, the survivors become players in a very different kind of game. Caught between the dangerous worlds of the Russian Mafia and international finance, Dagmar must draw on all her resources -- not least millions of online gamers-- to track down the killer. In this near-future thriller, Walter Jon Williams weaves a pulse-pounding tale of intrigue, murder, and games where you don't get an extra life. "Interstellar adventure has a new king, and his name is Walter Jon Williams." --- George R.R. Martin "A spectacular far-future space opera." --- Locus on The Sundering "This series is great fun to read, one of the most entertaining space operas in many years." --- SF Site on The Sundering "[Williams'] meticulous inner eye creates a landscape so rich in concrete and metaphysical imagery that it alone is practically worth the price of admission." --- Scifi.com on City of Fire Walter Jon Williams has been nominated repeatedly for every major SF award, including Hugo and Nebula Award nominations for his novel City on Fire . His most recent books are The Sundering, The Praxis, Destiny's Way , and The Rift . Mr. Williams lives near Albuquerque, New Mexico, with his wife.