Review of Tea from an Empty Cup by Pat Cadigan (1998)

A complex crime novel set in a world where virtual reality has become more attractive than real life, and where identity is endlessly alterable.

Chosen by: discovered on the science fiction shelf on a Mill Road charity bookshop

Set in some unspecified time in the future, Tea from an Empty Cup follows the story of  detective Lieutentant Konstantin, whose latest case involves the murder of a virtual reality addict. Just as the gamer 'dies' within the game, his throat is cut in real life. This turns out to be only the start of a series of disappearances and deaths, and Konstantin makes the decision to take on the dead man's virtual avatar in order to investigate the case. At the same time, young Yuki is looking for her missing boyfriend, and also, you've guessed it, takes on his virutal persona to track down his movements.

There's also a bizarre sub-plot about Japan having been overwhelmed by a tsunami, and the inhabitants' attempts to recreate their lost Japan in the virtual world.

It's an intriguing premise, but for me, the novel really failed to grip. The main flaw was that the plot was simply too confusing - with two women on different missions both taking on a character in the virtual world, the result was that I could never remember which was which, who they were pretending to be, and who they were looking for. In a twist about three quarters of the way through something even more confusing happens, but by that point I was pretty much failing to follow the plot, and so cant remember what it was. I certainly wasn't able to develop any relationship or empathy with either of the main characters, and was left unmoved by their cyber-fates.

First published in 1998, the novel is perhaps most interesting today as a relatively early take on the potential implications of virtual reality, and video gaming  (the author was for a conencted with the Cybernetic Culture Research Unit at the University of Warwick). However, for me, the overly complex plot and the under-defined characters let it down.