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Bad Voltage
The Livewires-
High-tech lowlifes, bio-enhanced delinquents, or doped-out street kids, they've learned to survive in riot-torn future Paris, playing simulated war games in the fall-out shelters beneath the city. Soaring high and fast on gravfield skimboots, they head straight into the heart of violence and terror, then out and down to the safety of the tunnels to party until it's time to run again.
But for Lynx, a half-breed orphan of the Race Riots and founder of the Livewires, the allure of the streets loses its addictive power when he meets an Uptown heiress and discovers a life of madness and decadence too frightening to believe. Livewires and Uptowners clash in a cybernetic battle where sadistic revenge reigns, and Lynx struggles to free himself from a world that is slowly claiming his soul.
Written in English
High-tech lowlifes, bio-enhanced delinquents, or doped-out street kids, they've learned to survive in riot-torn future Paris, playing simulated war games in the fall-out shelters beneath the city. Soaring high and fast on gravfield skimboots, they head straight into the heart of violence and terror, then out and down to the safety of the tunnels to party until it's time to run again.
But for Lynx, a half-breed orphan of the Race Riots and founder of the Livewires, the allure of the streets loses its addictive power when he meets an Uptown heiress and discovers a life of madness and decadence too frightening to believe. Livewires and Uptowners clash in a cybernetic battle where sadistic revenge reigns, and Lynx struggles to free himself from a world that is slowly claiming his soul.
Written in English
384 pages, Paperback
First published June 6, 1989
4 people are currently reading
138 people want to read
About the author
Jonathan Littell
28 books415 followersA bi-lingual (English / French) writer living in Barcelona. He is a dual citizen of the United States and France and is of Jewish background. His first novel written in French,
Les Bienveillantes
, won two major French awards.
His father is the writer Robert Littell, also resident in France and who authored numerous spy novels.
His father is the writer Robert Littell, also resident in France and who authored numerous spy novels.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
March 18, 2012
Left to my own devices, this is the kind of crap I would write all the time: unadulterated cyberpunk drivel, filled with profuse drug use, sassy/cynical characters, unabashedly gushy prose, and strews of earnest, embarrassing/cool futureslang: essentially, Neuromancer fan fiction.
The fact that Bad Voltage's inspiration is Neuromancer is no secret: Case from Neuromancer gets name dropped once, and I have the suspicion the character on the cover is supposed to be some badass version of William Gibson.
There's plenty of other inspirations that get trotted out too: along with cameos by Clint Eastwood as the President and Johnny Rotten at a rave, there's Michael Moorcock's Cornelius as an arms dealer and a character named Chthulu. I really groaned when Burrough's Dr. Benway showed up as a sort of major character. That was a bridge too far.
Bad Voltage is certainly an intelligent and well-written enough novel, though, especially considering it's essentially a pulp adventure story. But then again being cyberpunk and science fiction there's always that urge to see Bad Voltage as some prediction or warning or a mirror image of the world as it was when it was written. Of course, if you look at it for too long you would see it's all smoke and glammy mirrors: it doesn't really have anything to say, it's just a breezy, fun ride. It could've used some skimming of fat, and it was hard for me to feel sympathetic toward its bisexual statutory-raping dreadlocked junkie music snob crustpunk-anarchist protagonist, or his supposed disgust at one horrific act of spoiled depravity, especially when it just seemed as insane as everything else in his world.
But it was clear at least to me that the author enjoyed his world, as the maps of Underground France in the back of the book (along with a list of albums including works by Einsturzende Neubaueten and Joy Division and the provocation "If you liked the movie, this is the soundtrack") would imply.
So you can imagine my surprise that when I looked the author up, expecting him to have gone nowhere, I found he had instead wrote ONE other, far more recent book called the Kindly Ones (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/37...). It was written in French and it's about World War II and apparently it's quite famous and successful. Not only that, but apparently Mr. Littel is now embarrassed by his to-date one other published novel, namely Bad Voltage. To which I say: lighten up, asshole! I would've killed to have published a crappy cyberpunk novel in my early 20's!
The fact that Bad Voltage's inspiration is Neuromancer is no secret: Case from Neuromancer gets name dropped once, and I have the suspicion the character on the cover is supposed to be some badass version of William Gibson.
There's plenty of other inspirations that get trotted out too: along with cameos by Clint Eastwood as the President and Johnny Rotten at a rave, there's Michael Moorcock's Cornelius as an arms dealer and a character named Chthulu. I really groaned when Burrough's Dr. Benway showed up as a sort of major character. That was a bridge too far.
Bad Voltage is certainly an intelligent and well-written enough novel, though, especially considering it's essentially a pulp adventure story. But then again being cyberpunk and science fiction there's always that urge to see Bad Voltage as some prediction or warning or a mirror image of the world as it was when it was written. Of course, if you look at it for too long you would see it's all smoke and glammy mirrors: it doesn't really have anything to say, it's just a breezy, fun ride. It could've used some skimming of fat, and it was hard for me to feel sympathetic toward its bisexual statutory-raping dreadlocked junkie music snob crustpunk-anarchist protagonist, or his supposed disgust at one horrific act of spoiled depravity, especially when it just seemed as insane as everything else in his world.
But it was clear at least to me that the author enjoyed his world, as the maps of Underground France in the back of the book (along with a list of albums including works by Einsturzende Neubaueten and Joy Division and the provocation "If you liked the movie, this is the soundtrack") would imply.
So you can imagine my surprise that when I looked the author up, expecting him to have gone nowhere, I found he had instead wrote ONE other, far more recent book called the Kindly Ones (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/37...). It was written in French and it's about World War II and apparently it's quite famous and successful. Not only that, but apparently Mr. Littel is now embarrassed by his to-date one other published novel, namely Bad Voltage. To which I say: lighten up, asshole! I would've killed to have published a crappy cyberpunk novel in my early 20's!
August 11, 2020
The very definition of guilty pleasure!
I'm a sucker for Cyber punk in general and Neuromancer specifically. Imagine my excitement when browsing through Bad voltage which is basically a mash-up of every conceivable Cyber punk trope sprinkled with an not-so-subtle homage to Neuromancer.
It's pretty derivative at times and the writing is so so, but it's a fun, balls to the wall ride that I for one thoroughly enjoyed.
I'm a sucker for Cyber punk in general and Neuromancer specifically. Imagine my excitement when browsing through Bad voltage which is basically a mash-up of every conceivable Cyber punk trope sprinkled with an not-so-subtle homage to Neuromancer.
It's pretty derivative at times and the writing is so so, but it's a fun, balls to the wall ride that I for one thoroughly enjoyed.
July 2, 2013
I read this book as a teenager - and whoah! dug it so much. Then I re read it later - twice - it's so cool... still.
May 22, 2024
This is a book I've been looking for for many years, I read it around 1989/90 by could not remember the title but did remember the Paris cover. Finally found it here yesterday, no ebook versions but amazon has used copies, purchased immediately. Truly hope my memories of killer cyborgs, plugged in data ports behind ears, arm computers etc are accurate 😁, sad to read the author both regrets writing this book and there are no sequels. Always a Sci fi / fantasy fan but I think this was my first cyberpunk read
March 17, 2017
Has a writing style that conveys the setting without muddying the meaning. A decent historical background provided as you read. However, a little to live in the moment, followed by what seemed like character change, but ultimately wasn't, making the story kind of unsatisfying.
September 7, 2011
Part of the popular/mainstream response to cyberpunk writers like Gibson and Sterling, this "pulp" cyberpunk novel rehashes most of the technocultural, cybercultural tropes of late-80s sci-fi including near-future urban setting (this time Paris), youth culture, drugs, techno music, high-speed chases, jacking in, gang warfare, and downloaded consciousness. However, as I write about in my dissertation, Littell's Bad Voltage offers an interesting counterpoint to Gibson's Neuromancer in how it deals with the embodiment/disembodiment binary and how it incorporates queer/queer of color characters into the mix.
February 7, 2014
Can not rate this high enough. One of my favourite books of all time! Captures the feeling being young to a T. The brain eating though... yuch!
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews