Publisher's Summary
The Best of F&SF, March-April 2003
"Aaron A. Reed's Shutdown/ Retrovival explores the ever-shifting worlds of virtuality and the social consequences of interactive gaming in a fast-paced imagistic tour-de-force."
He had been raised in the impossibly tall asteroid forests of Ebb, flitting between crystalline trees on invisible wings while the Galactic Core seared the skies above him. Years later, fighting the British in the Revolutionary War or hunting with his pride on the plains of New Africa, he could still feel phantom tinglings from those wings in the moments before sleep, though they had long since been abandoned in favor of less juvenile forms. And yet often he realdreamed of drifting through a million scintillating branches, the only sound his racing heart.
bluejack.com
"The premise here is that the ultrawealthy have retreated into a permanent multi-generational virtual reality; but outside this reality, humans carry on, keeping the wealthy bodies alive in their immersion tanks, inventing new sims for their virtual pleasure, and generally resenting the fact that they are outside."
John Joseph Adams
F&SF Assistant Editor
"Actually, when I read Shutdown/ Retrovival by Aaron Reed, I thought it was brilliant, but I wasn't at all sure Gordon would like it (but he did, so good thing I showed it to him, eh?). I don't recall wavering at all in my decision to set that one aside because of how strongly I felt about its merit."
bluejack.com
"It's an engaging story, enjoyable in its own right, and a very credible first-publication credit for Aaron Reed, but it does suffer from comparison to the groundbreaking works it builds on: this has neither William Gibson hip, nor Matrix style. Although what Reed has to say is not derivative, it is not quite enough to breathe new life into cyberpunk."
Michael P. Belfiore
Tangent Online
"The parallel plots dovetail nicely to suitably bleak effect, raising important questions about class and its relation to technology--issues all to often ignored in science fiction. ...for me the best of this issue."