Portal: A Dataspace Retrieval

After 100 years in space, an astronaut returns to Earth in the 22nd century to discover a planet empty of human life. A single flickering light signals one computer terminal left functioning to tell the story. This program, portentously named Homer, recalls a globe with no poverty, disease or crime, in which every person is watched over by the paternalistic worldnet computer system. Violence still erupts in the form of genetic weaponry that leads to the Mind Wars and stirs teenage genius Peter Devore to build a new science of psychic control, freeing the mind from the body. Formatted to look like computer printout, this novel was, in fact, previously released as computer software. That dubious novelty doesn't explain why it is so dull and lifeless, substituting neologisms and technological double talk for absent ideas, story and characters. (February)