What do you think?
Rate this book
Forced Conversion
Forced Conversion is set in the near future, at a time when mankind has largely retreated to the realms of virtual reality, where resources are unlimited and the problems of the real world violence, conflict, sickness, and pain can all be avoided. Everyone can have heaven, any heaven they want, but some people don't want to go. Unfortunately, those who stay behind in the real world pose a risk to the immortality of those in the virtual worlds. Derek, a soldier in the Conversion Forces (ConFoes), seeks to enforce the Mandatory Conversion Act on the remaining mals (malcontent Luddites, gangbangers, and religious fanatics). He just wants to put in his time and join his family on one of the virtual worlds. But until then, he is forced to deal with his psychotic squadmates, the increasingly brutal tactics of the ConFoes, and a female Lieutenant from a mal religious faction who might just be a better soldier than he is.
Most science fiction deals with worlds transformed by technological advance. Forced Conversion highlights the troubling and chaotic process of that transformation, itself. It combines the adrenaline soaked action of military fiction with the extrapolation of current scientific trends of the best speculative fiction, while dealing with the moral and religious implications of both war and technology. When Moore's Law meets God's Law, the result is forced conversion.
Says Ed Greenwood, Creator of The Forgotten Realms and Author of the bestselling Elminster novels: "I loved it! Many writers have explored hardhitting and brutal possible futures for Earth, and told colorful tales of people trying to stay alive in them, but few have brought such imagined futures as vividly to life as Don Bingle and no other book I can think of examines how and why such a future might just happen as well as FORCED CONVERSION does or provides half the breathcatching twists and turns of Bingle's yarn. A 'good read' of the old school, coupled with all too plausible reasons for everything. A grim warning and a fast action adventure tale, all in one! Highly recommended!"
Says Jean Rabe, Author of The Dhamon Saga: "Though this is Donald Bingle's first novel, it reads like the work of a seasoned thriller author. Forced Conversion is filled with plenty of suspense and surprises, deep and quirky characters, and engaging dialog. It is not easy to set down, so read it when you have time on your hands. It is a helluva trip into the realm of virtual reality."
Technology can be a wonderful thing, when it's not ruining the world completely.
About the Author
Best known for more than fifteen years as the world's topranked player of classic role playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, Donald J. Bingle is not only a writer of a variety of role playing adventures and gaming materials (Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, Chill, Paranoia, Timemaster, and more), but of movie reviews (in early issues of Knights of the Dinner Table), stories, and screenplays.
He has fantasy stories set in the Dragonlance world of Krynn in The Players of Gilean and The Search for Magic, science fiction stories in Earth, Air, Fire, Water: Tales from the Eternal Archives #2, Sol's Children, and Transformer Legends, spooky stories in Carnival/Circus, Historical Hauntings, and Civil War Fantastic, and whimsical stories in Renaissance Faire and All Hell's Breaking Loose (coming next year). He is also the author of Extreme Global Warming, a darkly comedic screenplay about an environmental organization that is about to save the world, but doesn't want to get caught doing it.
He is a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, the Role Playing Game Association Network, the American Bar Association, and the St. Charles Writers Group. Don works as a corporate and securities attorney at Bell, Boyd & Lloyd LLC in Chicago.
- GenresScience Fiction
260 pages, Hardcover
First published November 2, 2004
17 people are currently reading
104 people want to read
About the author
Donald J. Bingle
99 books100 followersDonald J. Bingle (sometimes credited as Don Bingle) is the author of Frame Shop, a mystery thriller set in a suburban writers' group, Net Impact, a spy thriller which incorporates real-world conspiracy theories, Wet Work, the follow-up adventure to Net Impact, GREENSWORD, a dark comedy about global warming, and Forced Conversion, a military science fiction novel set in the near future. He is also the co-author (with Jean Rabe) of The Love-Haight Case Files, an urban fantasy about the legal rights of supernatural creatures in a magical San Francisco. He has also written a variety of short fiction in the fantasy, science fiction, horror, and comedy genres, and also in gaming material, including stories in the Dragonlance and Transformers universes and in a variety of DAW themed anthologies. Many of his published stories have been collected by theme in his Writer on Demand TM series. He was the world's top-ranked player of RPGA Classic roleplaying game tournaments from 1985-2000.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
February 9, 2020
Just didn’t like it . Unrealistic dialogue that comes out of nowhere that is not in keeping with the characters actions or thoughts.
Religion... so sick of religious idiots in books.
Very predictable, and very skim worthy writing.
Religion... so sick of religious idiots in books.
Very predictable, and very skim worthy writing.
May 27, 2017
Overall thoughts
While I was intrigued by the initial premise of the book, I felt somewhat disappointed while actually reading it. Although I liked reading the book, it felt like there were certain aspects that, in my opinion, were largely unexplored, and others that were incredibly pushed into the story. In this respect, something that felt incredibly persistent and obligated to the reader was a religious perspective from some of the characters. This may bother certain readers. In my case, some of these arguments felt repetitive and dull, though the story did maintain a quick pacing in general. As a whole, I would rate the book with 3 out of 5 stars. While I did enjoy it, some things could have been improved or changed. For a more detailed account of my thoughts and comments, please read below, though beware that there might be some minor spoilers.
Plot, themes, and characters
The majority of the novel follows Derek, who is a soldier in a military group known as the ConFoes (Conversion Forces). Due to technological advances, the majority of the individuals in society have moved to live in digital worlds. The aforementioned ConFoes enforce this process of uploading the consciousness of people into the virtual world. During his latest mission, things seem to be going rather straightforward for Derek, at least as much as they can in military operations, though the situation quickly changes when he encounters a particular group of malcontents. These malcontents are those that are resisting against being converted into living in a digital world, though they do so for different reasons. More specifically, Derek meets Maria, a mal (as they are referred to in the book) who ends up being an important part of the story and ends up influencing Derek in certain ways. In regards to the story, the perspective or the focus changes throughout the novel. In some cases, these different scenes seem to be quite random and don’t appear to have an immediate relation to the main story. It takes a long time for some of these events to be shown on how they are connected to everything else, which might be confusing to some, or even deterring.
As mentioned in the previous statement, one of the themes of the book is the religious view that some people hold against this technology. While some of these arguments are presented in a new context, which is that of uploading consciousness into a machine, the arguments themselves aren’t very original nor entirely new. After all, there have been numerous occasions in which science and religion disagree. It is not all negative, however, since there is also a more philosophical exploration of the different themes. Given the use of religious views, I would like to mention that this religious perspective seems to come only from one religion. It would have been better to include more perspectives, though I realize that it would have been challenging to incorporate so many different religious beliefs in the novel.
A second theme in the book is the changes in society that led to the development and reliance on the virtual worlds. These are mostly developed through conversations and not directly explored through the actions of the characters. As such, the perspectives on the historical developments change depending on the moral beliefs of each character. Unfortunately, this wasn’t explored as much as I would have desired. In a way, this theme suffers the same downfalls as the previous theme, which is that the perspective is quite limited. It is implied that this kind of thing is going all over the world, though the story focuses and pretty much only mentions the things that go on in America. It would have been interesting to at the very least get clues on what is going on elsewhere.
Another theme is the behavior of the individuals that are in armed groups. Naturally, this behavior changes whether a person belongs to an official military as compared to someone who belongs to a resisting group. Not only are these differences illustrated, but some differences within the group are pointed out. In the case of this novel, Derek explains his reasons for being part of the ConFoes, though he still disagrees with the actions of some of his brothers in arms. These issues cover the brutal and sometimes even sadistic things that soldiers sometimes do, for example killing for sport and abusing their authority. These themes create a starting point for establishing a connection between the characters since a few disagree with the actions and attitudes that some soldiers have.
The last thing I would like to cover in this section is the characters. In my opinion, while the characters are quite distinct from each other for the most part, they are, unfortunately, not very interesting, complex, nor deep. In general, the characters aren’t very likable nor are they very memorable. Since the book mostly relies on dialogue to explain some of the historical developments and to present some of the new philosophical or moral ideas and discussions, this should have been worked on to be stronger.
Narration and use of language
The book is narrated in the third person. This helps in being able to switch between different perspectives or describing various locations without it being too confusing. As mentioned above, the relevance of some of these scenes are not always clear and sometimes take too long to be explained. The language itself is decent, nothing extraordinary but not terrible either. The narration and the language manage to keep things fast paced, which helps keep the reader’s interest in this case.
Recommendations
I’d recommend this book to those that are interested in speculative fiction and science fiction, particularly to those that like military elements. As to the people who read this book and want more recommendations or ideas on what to read next, I have different recommendations, focusing on the various elements from the book. For those that want to read another military sci-fi novel, then I would recommend the Spectras Arise Trilogy by Tammy Salyer. There’s actually a novella that serves as a prequel to this trilogy, for those that want to check it out before reading the full novels that compose the trilogy. To a lesser extent, I would also be inclined to recommend SNAFU: An Anthology of Military Horror, edited by Geoff Brown, though as the name suggests, this book is more slanted towards horror though it still has military sci-fi involved. For those interested in delving more into novels that explore the use of virtual worlds, then I would recommend Ready Player One by Ernest Cline and Slum Online by Hiroshi Sakurazaka.
Thanks for reading!
While I was intrigued by the initial premise of the book, I felt somewhat disappointed while actually reading it. Although I liked reading the book, it felt like there were certain aspects that, in my opinion, were largely unexplored, and others that were incredibly pushed into the story. In this respect, something that felt incredibly persistent and obligated to the reader was a religious perspective from some of the characters. This may bother certain readers. In my case, some of these arguments felt repetitive and dull, though the story did maintain a quick pacing in general. As a whole, I would rate the book with 3 out of 5 stars. While I did enjoy it, some things could have been improved or changed. For a more detailed account of my thoughts and comments, please read below, though beware that there might be some minor spoilers.
Plot, themes, and characters
The majority of the novel follows Derek, who is a soldier in a military group known as the ConFoes (Conversion Forces). Due to technological advances, the majority of the individuals in society have moved to live in digital worlds. The aforementioned ConFoes enforce this process of uploading the consciousness of people into the virtual world. During his latest mission, things seem to be going rather straightforward for Derek, at least as much as they can in military operations, though the situation quickly changes when he encounters a particular group of malcontents. These malcontents are those that are resisting against being converted into living in a digital world, though they do so for different reasons. More specifically, Derek meets Maria, a mal (as they are referred to in the book) who ends up being an important part of the story and ends up influencing Derek in certain ways. In regards to the story, the perspective or the focus changes throughout the novel. In some cases, these different scenes seem to be quite random and don’t appear to have an immediate relation to the main story. It takes a long time for some of these events to be shown on how they are connected to everything else, which might be confusing to some, or even deterring.
As mentioned in the previous statement, one of the themes of the book is the religious view that some people hold against this technology. While some of these arguments are presented in a new context, which is that of uploading consciousness into a machine, the arguments themselves aren’t very original nor entirely new. After all, there have been numerous occasions in which science and religion disagree. It is not all negative, however, since there is also a more philosophical exploration of the different themes. Given the use of religious views, I would like to mention that this religious perspective seems to come only from one religion. It would have been better to include more perspectives, though I realize that it would have been challenging to incorporate so many different religious beliefs in the novel.
A second theme in the book is the changes in society that led to the development and reliance on the virtual worlds. These are mostly developed through conversations and not directly explored through the actions of the characters. As such, the perspectives on the historical developments change depending on the moral beliefs of each character. Unfortunately, this wasn’t explored as much as I would have desired. In a way, this theme suffers the same downfalls as the previous theme, which is that the perspective is quite limited. It is implied that this kind of thing is going all over the world, though the story focuses and pretty much only mentions the things that go on in America. It would have been interesting to at the very least get clues on what is going on elsewhere.
Another theme is the behavior of the individuals that are in armed groups. Naturally, this behavior changes whether a person belongs to an official military as compared to someone who belongs to a resisting group. Not only are these differences illustrated, but some differences within the group are pointed out. In the case of this novel, Derek explains his reasons for being part of the ConFoes, though he still disagrees with the actions of some of his brothers in arms. These issues cover the brutal and sometimes even sadistic things that soldiers sometimes do, for example killing for sport and abusing their authority. These themes create a starting point for establishing a connection between the characters since a few disagree with the actions and attitudes that some soldiers have.
The last thing I would like to cover in this section is the characters. In my opinion, while the characters are quite distinct from each other for the most part, they are, unfortunately, not very interesting, complex, nor deep. In general, the characters aren’t very likable nor are they very memorable. Since the book mostly relies on dialogue to explain some of the historical developments and to present some of the new philosophical or moral ideas and discussions, this should have been worked on to be stronger.
Narration and use of language
The book is narrated in the third person. This helps in being able to switch between different perspectives or describing various locations without it being too confusing. As mentioned above, the relevance of some of these scenes are not always clear and sometimes take too long to be explained. The language itself is decent, nothing extraordinary but not terrible either. The narration and the language manage to keep things fast paced, which helps keep the reader’s interest in this case.
Recommendations
I’d recommend this book to those that are interested in speculative fiction and science fiction, particularly to those that like military elements. As to the people who read this book and want more recommendations or ideas on what to read next, I have different recommendations, focusing on the various elements from the book. For those that want to read another military sci-fi novel, then I would recommend the Spectras Arise Trilogy by Tammy Salyer. There’s actually a novella that serves as a prequel to this trilogy, for those that want to check it out before reading the full novels that compose the trilogy. To a lesser extent, I would also be inclined to recommend SNAFU: An Anthology of Military Horror, edited by Geoff Brown, though as the name suggests, this book is more slanted towards horror though it still has military sci-fi involved. For those interested in delving more into novels that explore the use of virtual worlds, then I would recommend Ready Player One by Ernest Cline and Slum Online by Hiroshi Sakurazaka.
Thanks for reading!
January 19, 2013
Forced Conversion, by Donald J. Bingle, is a compelling read. I know it’s fiction, but it has us from page one, where we’re pinned down behind a splintering Ponderosa pine right along with Derek, whose life never seems to change despite the intense action. Although we can differentiate the other characters within minutes, the standout is Maria Casini—the best female character I’ve encountered in a long time. I also appreciate the fact that Bingle never takes the obvious route with relationships. With our full attention secured, he pushes pause for polemic dialogue—fascinating, but drawn out a bit by old-timer Kurt’s dialect (my preference would be less is more in this regard, but it is a minor point). It made me miss the vivid action—then whoa, we quickly re-enter both the action and the prescient vision of a world that I now can’t help but think of as our inevitable future. The rest of the novel is riveting, and so convincing that you think you are reading an historical account of an inevitable past. (Yes I said that.) Which could conceivably make our future less so.
Read
February 1, 2020I haven't listed a star rating, as this is my own book. I am also the author of two other thrillers, Net Impact (a spy thriller than mixes cutting-edge technology and real-world conspiracy theories) and GREENSWORD: A Tale of Extreme Global Warming (a darkly humorous eco-thriller), as well as numerous short stories in the science fiction, fantasy, horror, thriller, steampunk, romance, and comedy genres in numerous anthologies and in my Writer on Demand collections.
August 22, 2011
Wonderful novella that took me for a ride.
February 11, 2013
Interesting premise and a relatively well developed plot and characters. Suffered from a bit of predictability, especially as twists start to show up towards the end, but still an enjoyable read.
June 12, 2020
New author and a requested read/review which I like doing very much, especially when the book is as good as this one. It has a strange, but not unbelievable plot that's really not revealed until the end. I didn't figure out what was going on until after I had read the book and that's a very good thing.
Our main character is Derek Willinger, a very unhappy soldier. This is Earth far, far in the distant future, I hope. Derek is a member of a Force Conversion squad on a mission to find all the "mals" he can and convert them. "Mals" is a shortened term for a group of people, not all of which are extremely religious. All Derek knows is that he doesn't like what he and his squad are doing.
Military men are not always right in the head. They can and often are exposed to too much horror and violence which makes it difficult for them to tell right from wrong. It's a mental state which is hard to recover from. After all, we start out as civilians being taught that killing is wrong. Yet, when we go into the military, you find out that killing is what you're supposed to do, except you have to only kill the enemy. In Derek's case, anyone not part of the Forced Conversion Forces are the enemy. Unfortunately, the other members of Derek's squad seem to have all become mentally unbalanced and are enjoying the killing way too much.
Then something unexpected happens. A "mal" catches the squad unprepared for the trap she has set. Most of the squad isn't coming back from this mission. Still, this mal has to make sure none of them come go back to their base since they were way too close to Sanctuary! That's where she's from and a whole lot of her friends reside there. If the Forced Conversion squad found them, there would be a lot of killing and forced conversion.
Now what is "forced conversion"? Well, it's an interesting concept which I can see happening in a really bizarre world in the future. The author has really hit upon a unique idea that will make you think. Could this be our future? I don't really know. Maybe it's already happened? I just don't know!
Well written book with hardly any errors. Good editing and story telling.
Our main character is Derek Willinger, a very unhappy soldier. This is Earth far, far in the distant future, I hope. Derek is a member of a Force Conversion squad on a mission to find all the "mals" he can and convert them. "Mals" is a shortened term for a group of people, not all of which are extremely religious. All Derek knows is that he doesn't like what he and his squad are doing.
Military men are not always right in the head. They can and often are exposed to too much horror and violence which makes it difficult for them to tell right from wrong. It's a mental state which is hard to recover from. After all, we start out as civilians being taught that killing is wrong. Yet, when we go into the military, you find out that killing is what you're supposed to do, except you have to only kill the enemy. In Derek's case, anyone not part of the Forced Conversion Forces are the enemy. Unfortunately, the other members of Derek's squad seem to have all become mentally unbalanced and are enjoying the killing way too much.
Then something unexpected happens. A "mal" catches the squad unprepared for the trap she has set. Most of the squad isn't coming back from this mission. Still, this mal has to make sure none of them come go back to their base since they were way too close to Sanctuary! That's where she's from and a whole lot of her friends reside there. If the Forced Conversion squad found them, there would be a lot of killing and forced conversion.
Now what is "forced conversion"? Well, it's an interesting concept which I can see happening in a really bizarre world in the future. The author has really hit upon a unique idea that will make you think. Could this be our future? I don't really know. Maybe it's already happened? I just don't know!
Well written book with hardly any errors. Good editing and story telling.
December 30, 2017
I thought this book sounded amazing when I started it. The idea is a nice twist on the post-apocalyptic setting that we see so frequently. (What about the people who are left behind when everyone else goes away?) Sadly, the book fails in execution.
The writing it very slow. The author is descriptive, but rather than adding to the world, it makes it feel like the book is going nowhere. There is very little world building beyond what is in the description. We learn a little about why most of humanity converted, but almost nothing about the world as it is now. Characters are poorly developed, and their interactions do not make a lot of sense.
[SPOILER]
It would have made more sense for Maria to shoot Derek, rather than follow him and then travel with him. Also, the whole thing with the bike messenger was made out to be important, but the Believers did not really use the information she died to deliver.
[END SPOILER]
And then there is the end. What could have been a cool plot twist falls flat because the lead-up is poor.
Overall, this is not a bad book, but it is not one I think I would want to read again. Especially since I now know how it ends, which is what kept me reading in the first place.
The writing it very slow. The author is descriptive, but rather than adding to the world, it makes it feel like the book is going nowhere. There is very little world building beyond what is in the description. We learn a little about why most of humanity converted, but almost nothing about the world as it is now. Characters are poorly developed, and their interactions do not make a lot of sense.
[SPOILER]
It would have made more sense for Maria to shoot Derek, rather than follow him and then travel with him. Also, the whole thing with the bike messenger was made out to be important, but the Believers did not really use the information she died to deliver.
[END SPOILER]
And then there is the end. What could have been a cool plot twist falls flat because the lead-up is poor.
Overall, this is not a bad book, but it is not one I think I would want to read again. Especially since I now know how it ends, which is what kept me reading in the first place.
September 12, 2021
Forced Conversion is the first novel I have read by Donald J. Bingle is Virtual reality isn't a game, it's the future home of mankind. But some people don’t want to go.. Be prepared to set aside a weekend for this novel because you just will not want to put it down. This book is clearly a hang on the edge of your seat page turner. It's an apocalyptic sci-fi with a Christian twist that just took me for a ride through all sorts of "what if" possibilities. Donald work reveals in powerful thrillers that lie at the intersection of intriguing stories and intelligent characters in search of dramatic revelations with global human impact. I highly recommend this novel. I gave this honest, voluntary review after being given a free copy of the book with no monetary compensation.
January 28, 2021
If, in the future it becomes possible to transfer a human consciousness to a computer based virtual environment - how will people react?
The author explores the intersection of religious faith and technological advancement by envisioning such a future.
By following one representative from each side through personal battles and interactions between each other, set against the backdrop of the larger fight - the author draws the reader into the world.
I thought I saw where the author was going several times while reading - but was totally surprised by the conclusion!
Definitely an engrossing read.
The author explores the intersection of religious faith and technological advancement by envisioning such a future.
By following one representative from each side through personal battles and interactions between each other, set against the backdrop of the larger fight - the author draws the reader into the world.
I thought I saw where the author was going several times while reading - but was totally surprised by the conclusion!
Definitely an engrossing read.
May 27, 2023
I met the author at the 2022 Louisville Book Fair. I was very intrigued with his book Forced Conversion and its relation/similarities to the pandemic situation. Even though Don wrote the book in 2004, its like he 'traveled to the future' to witness the pressure being applied to the world's citizenry to get vaccinated. I only hope that our leaders don't go to the extremes that Don envisions in his book to FORCE us to comply. Needless to say, I thoroughly enjoyed the novel.
Thanks for the insight Don,
Ken A
Thanks for the insight Don,
Ken A
September 29, 2024
Not you usual scfi. More like a twilight zone episode on steroids.
Pragmatic characters making tough choices about life and what they wish for in an afterlife, if there is one. Ha.
Pragmatic characters making tough choices about life and what they wish for in an afterlife, if there is one. Ha.
July 25, 2025
The story was an interesting concept and well written. You somewhat started caring about the characters but I found the ending to be disappointing.
January 8, 2017
Not bad. Didn't anticipate the ending until it was handed to me in the story. A good read.
February 13, 2020
A pleasant surprise
A 99p book that intrigued me so i bought it. It's the usual good vs evil and both sides think they are right. But as we go through the book we learn the reasoning behind both viewpoints, and both stand up. It's a good story and well written. I thought the ending was a little weak given the obvious time spent planning the rest of the story but not poor enough for me to give a bad review.
A 99p book that intrigued me so i bought it. It's the usual good vs evil and both sides think they are right. But as we go through the book we learn the reasoning behind both viewpoints, and both stand up. It's a good story and well written. I thought the ending was a little weak given the obvious time spent planning the rest of the story but not poor enough for me to give a bad review.
August 5, 2012
Full disclosure: I'm a friend of Donald J. Bingle, and have published one of his books.
Forced Conversion plays to Donald Bingle's strengths. He is excellent at taking situations and finding both the problems that nobody's ever thought of yet... as well as the solutions to those problems.
The setup is pretty straightforward. In the near future, we've figured out how to upload consciousness (often, though wrongly, treated as synonymous with the Singularity). Most of the world's population has. But there are the (mostly devoutly religious) "malcontents" remaining who threaten the stability of the converted... and there are the Conversion forces who hunt them down to bring them into the fold... or else.
There are aspects of military SF here, but only some. This isn't a John Wayne movie with blasters; there are no clear black and white "good guys" and "bad guys". Ultimately, Forced Conversion is an exploration of the world after the Singularity... and the consequences of that world.
There are twists and turns that you've probably not seen in this kind of near-future fiction before... and better yet, the twists and turns make perfect sense. This is a fully-imagined world, with every action having real and measurable consequences. That kind of attention to detail can (and does) make plot twists that could be cheap hacks into masterful plotting.
There were only two things that nagged at me, both personal preferences. All the characters, were deeply flawed in all-too-human ways. Realistic ways. And I didn't like any of them. The protagonists were far more decent people than many of the other characters, but I had a hard time liking them. Second, there's an occasional intrusion of narrative voice and point-of-view shifts, which is just something that bugs me slightly.
Overall, Forced Conversion is a well-plotted story that takes a trope of modern SF - the ability to "upload" - and examines the probable outcomes of that technological development. Well worth reading.
Forced Conversion plays to Donald Bingle's strengths. He is excellent at taking situations and finding both the problems that nobody's ever thought of yet... as well as the solutions to those problems.
The setup is pretty straightforward. In the near future, we've figured out how to upload consciousness (often, though wrongly, treated as synonymous with the Singularity). Most of the world's population has. But there are the (mostly devoutly religious) "malcontents" remaining who threaten the stability of the converted... and there are the Conversion forces who hunt them down to bring them into the fold... or else.
There are aspects of military SF here, but only some. This isn't a John Wayne movie with blasters; there are no clear black and white "good guys" and "bad guys". Ultimately, Forced Conversion is an exploration of the world after the Singularity... and the consequences of that world.
There are twists and turns that you've probably not seen in this kind of near-future fiction before... and better yet, the twists and turns make perfect sense. This is a fully-imagined world, with every action having real and measurable consequences. That kind of attention to detail can (and does) make plot twists that could be cheap hacks into masterful plotting.
There were only two things that nagged at me, both personal preferences. All the characters, were deeply flawed in all-too-human ways. Realistic ways. And I didn't like any of them. The protagonists were far more decent people than many of the other characters, but I had a hard time liking them. Second, there's an occasional intrusion of narrative voice and point-of-view shifts, which is just something that bugs me slightly.
Overall, Forced Conversion is a well-plotted story that takes a trope of modern SF - the ability to "upload" - and examines the probable outcomes of that technological development. Well worth reading.
March 5, 2017
In a future not too far removed from now, the technology of virtual worlds has been perfected to the point that people, minds, can be digitized and given a choice of their own particular paradise. There are those that rebel against this idea as unholy and abominable because of religious belief that it either destroys or imprisons the soul in a computerized purgatory whose only escape can be a damning virtual suicide. The majority of humanity sees it as the answer to all problems of want, and thus is instituted the Mandatory Conversion Act whereby all people must convert (digitally) or die.
While I was initially put off by the main premise of this book, the excellent writing style and plot pacing kept me reading. I'm glad it did, too, because the ending was not what I expected. The characters are compelling, and flawed, but seem real. The various viewpoints on the main concept of Conversion are fairly well discussed. There might be a hint of bias against the religious side of things, but if so, it was mild enough for me not to get my hackles up. The after-affects of the Forced Conversion act on the world are very interesting thought experiments, and made this book a Very Good Read.
Normally this would be a three start book for me, but I'm giving it the fourth one because the ending was excellent and successfully caught me by surprise. That's hard to do!
Happy Reading!
While I was initially put off by the main premise of this book, the excellent writing style and plot pacing kept me reading. I'm glad it did, too, because the ending was not what I expected. The characters are compelling, and flawed, but seem real. The various viewpoints on the main concept of Conversion are fairly well discussed. There might be a hint of bias against the religious side of things, but if so, it was mild enough for me not to get my hackles up. The after-affects of the Forced Conversion act on the world are very interesting thought experiments, and made this book a Very Good Read.
Normally this would be a three start book for me, but I'm giving it the fourth one because the ending was excellent and successfully caught me by surprise. That's hard to do!
Happy Reading!
April 22, 2017
Forced Conversion is a fast-paced novel of a not-too-distant future that will scare the gigabytes out of you. With no apologies, author Donald Bingle drops the reader into the middle of a Rocky Mountain landscape, tracking insurgents with a team of heavily-armed soldiers. They are ConFoes, conversion forces, tracking down religious zealots and malcontents through the rugged terrain. Their mission is the forced conversion of these last humans to resist being digitized and downloaded into virtual reality. In a world with increasing populations and dwindling resources, the technology has been developed to transfer individuals’ consciousness to avatars in totally digital existence.
Bingle keeps things moving quickly as we follow two characters in their unlikely alliance: Derek is a sensitive ConFoe recruit, and Maria a religious malcontent. He wants only to complete his mission and find peace in virtual reality, while Maria still hopes to save flesh-and-blood humanity in one last fight for true reality of the physical kind. Readers barely have time to consider the implications before another twist comes hurtling onto the scene. My advice: Hurry up and finish this book and hustle outside for a walk in the sunshine.
Bingle keeps things moving quickly as we follow two characters in their unlikely alliance: Derek is a sensitive ConFoe recruit, and Maria a religious malcontent. He wants only to complete his mission and find peace in virtual reality, while Maria still hopes to save flesh-and-blood humanity in one last fight for true reality of the physical kind. Readers barely have time to consider the implications before another twist comes hurtling onto the scene. My advice: Hurry up and finish this book and hustle outside for a walk in the sunshine.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews