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The Digital Effect
Another backlist classic from New York Times Bestselling Author Steve Perry, The Digital Effect is a science fiction mystery set on a wheelworld. M. Gil Sivart makes tiny models of disaster ships, and in his spare time, a bit of private detecting. When a beautiful redhead enters his shop and his front window is blown out, Gil finds himself investigating what appears to be a suicide. The trail is twisty and dangerous, and it leads to places that might be fatal for Gil and his client.
The original version earned four-and-a-half stars on Amazon.com.
The original version earned four-and-a-half stars on Amazon.com.
- GenresScience FictionFiction
317 pages, Kindle Edition
First published May 1, 1997
9 people are currently reading
52 people want to read
About the author
Steve Perry
313 books360 followersLibrarians note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
Steven Carl Perry has written over fifty novels and numerous short stories, which have appeared in various magazines and anthologies. Perry is perhaps best known for the Matador series. He has written books in the Star Wars, Alien and Conan universes. He was a collaborator on all of the Tom Clancy's Net Force series, seven of which have appeared on the New York Times Bestseller list. Two of his novelizations, Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire and Men in Black have also been bestsellers. Other writing credits include articles, reviews, and essays, animated teleplays, and some unproduced movie scripts. One of his scripts for Batman: The Animated Series was an Emmy Award nominee for Outstanding Writing.
Perry is a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, The Animation Guild, and the Writers Guild of America, West
Steven Carl Perry has written over fifty novels and numerous short stories, which have appeared in various magazines and anthologies. Perry is perhaps best known for the Matador series. He has written books in the Star Wars, Alien and Conan universes. He was a collaborator on all of the Tom Clancy's Net Force series, seven of which have appeared on the New York Times Bestseller list. Two of his novelizations, Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire and Men in Black have also been bestsellers. Other writing credits include articles, reviews, and essays, animated teleplays, and some unproduced movie scripts. One of his scripts for Batman: The Animated Series was an Emmy Award nominee for Outstanding Writing.
Perry is a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, The Animation Guild, and the Writers Guild of America, West
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
February 14, 2012
3.5
Set in the early history of the Matador Universe, this was a nice surprise. A gumshoe mystery with some good dialog, the part time PI, the requisite sexy client, the honorable cop and dirty politician with secrets all set on a space colony.
Steve Perry always seems to create a believable world with very few details in how the world works. He concentrates on characters and martial arts. While not as martial heavy as some of the other work in this world, it does play a part. Gil the MC, was the most fleshed out character (appropriate as the story is told from his perspective) but I found that the supporting character I liked the best was the Cop Ray. We get the impression we know more about Ray due to his interactions with Gil that sometimes feature Ray's son. Gil's love interest, his sexy client, is pretty forgettable and the standard male fantasy model (built and a dancer).
Overall a good story that is some what predicable, but still has some good plot twists.
Set in the early history of the Matador Universe, this was a nice surprise. A gumshoe mystery with some good dialog, the part time PI, the requisite sexy client, the honorable cop and dirty politician with secrets all set on a space colony.
Steve Perry always seems to create a believable world with very few details in how the world works. He concentrates on characters and martial arts. While not as martial heavy as some of the other work in this world, it does play a part. Gil the MC, was the most fleshed out character (appropriate as the story is told from his perspective) but I found that the supporting character I liked the best was the Cop Ray. We get the impression we know more about Ray due to his interactions with Gil that sometimes feature Ray's son. Gil's love interest, his sexy client, is pretty forgettable and the standard male fantasy model (built and a dancer).
Overall a good story that is some what predicable, but still has some good plot twists.
May 19, 2023
Creative and realistic
Many books set a century in our future take wild utopian leaps in the kind of technology and how people use it forgetting that people are people and bad people are always part of the mix.
The tech used in this novel is all speculative, but not AI and digital personhood immortality as too many seem to be pining away for. Computers are more advanced, but still serve humans without trying to run society which I greatly appreciate. Artificial gravity has been developed but it hasn't reduced the need for people to actually plan space communities and build them based on solid experience based physical realities. Martial artists can prevail by using their intelligence as much as their training as has always been the case.
All in all I enjoyed this novel and may delve deeper into this fictional universe.
Many books set a century in our future take wild utopian leaps in the kind of technology and how people use it forgetting that people are people and bad people are always part of the mix.
The tech used in this novel is all speculative, but not AI and digital personhood immortality as too many seem to be pining away for. Computers are more advanced, but still serve humans without trying to run society which I greatly appreciate. Artificial gravity has been developed but it hasn't reduced the need for people to actually plan space communities and build them based on solid experience based physical realities. Martial artists can prevail by using their intelligence as much as their training as has always been the case.
All in all I enjoyed this novel and may delve deeper into this fictional universe.
October 22, 2017
Excellent near-future sci-fi. Perry has always been one of my favorite authors and I have to re-read him every so often.
September 18, 2023
Take a minute, take a look!
Steve writes a good yarn. It has it all. Action, adventure and a damsel in distress. Well worth your time and money. Enjoy!
Steve writes a good yarn. It has it all. Action, adventure and a damsel in distress. Well worth your time and money. Enjoy!
February 14, 2016
Another fun Perry story to tide us over until the next Matador novel. This one has many of the trappings of that series- wheels worlds, martial arts, an action hero who meditates his way through problems, etc. The basic concept is recreating the Travis McGee series in space. I'd say this is.
Another fun Perry story to tide us over until the next Matador novel. This one has many of the trappings of that series- wheels worlds, martial arts, an action hero who meditates his way through problems, etc. The basic concept is recreating the Travis McGee series in space. I'd say this is as much a side story to the Matadors as The Omega Cage. Still can't figure out what the title meant, and the cover only makes sense once you get into the book.
Another fun Perry story to tide us over until the next Matador novel. This one has many of the trappings of that series- wheels worlds, martial arts, an action hero who meditates his way through problems, etc. The basic concept is recreating the Travis McGee series in space. I'd say this is as much a side story to the Matadors as The Omega Cage. Still can't figure out what the title meant, and the cover only makes sense once you get into the book.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews