Godplayers

by Damien Broderick

August Seebeck is in his twenties, a man of average looks and intellect. Then comes the claim of his great-aunt Tansy that she has been finding corpses each Saturday night in her bath (they vanish by morning). August dismisses this tale as elderly fantasy until he stumbles upon a corpse being shoved into the second-floor bathroom window of his aunt's house. Even that wouldn't faze him, but then someone steps out of the mirror....

August suddenly discovers he is a Player in the multi-universe Contest of Worlds and that his true family is quarrelsome on a mythic scale. His search for understanding follows a classic quest pattern of the Parsifal kind, except that August is nobody's fool.

An epic quest that is funny and engrossing, Godplayers is in the best tradition of Zelazny, Van Vogt, and the Knights of the Round Table, from one of science fiction's hottest up-and-coming writers.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Fantasy

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Damien Francis Broderick was an Australian science fiction and popular science writer and editor of some 74 books. The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction credits him with the first usage of the term "virtual reality" in science-fiction, in his 1982 novel The Judas Mandala.

Reviews

[Jon Adcock · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book started promisingly enough, but ended up being something of a disappointment. The book opens with Australian, August Seebeck, returning to his great-aunt's house after spending several weeks in the bush. When he mentions that he's going to take a bath, his great-aunt tells him he can't because it's Saturday night. According to her, every Saturday night for the last 6 weeks he's been gone, a dead body appears in the bath tub during the night and magically disappears by morning. Secretly fearing that his aunt is going senile, August stakes out the bathroom and in the middle of the night surprises two women pushing a dead body through the bathroom window. Eventually, August learns that the women and he himself, are Players in something called the Contest of Worlds that stretches across the Multiverse.

The main problem with the book is that some things happen far too quickly and other things happen far too slowly. There's a perfunctory romance between August and one of the women dumping the body, but it's rushed for some reason. It's immediately love at first sight for August, which is a little odd when you consider that at first sight included seeing her pulling a dead body through his great-aunt's window. Broderick also takes far too long to explain what is going on. The book is almost 3/4ths of the way through before someone finally gets around to explaining a little of what, actually, is happening. That's just way to long to wait.

The book is also disjointed and plot-less to a degree. In between the chapters dealing with August, there are brief chapters dealing with some of the other Players. These chapters are intriguing, but largely incomprehensible given the lack of background information that the reader is given. The plot, such as it is, consists of August bumbling around and falling into various Multiverse worlds where he surprises several of the other players, escapes and then bumbles into another Multiverse world, and so on. The tone of the book is lighthearted enough to include a talking cat at one point and references to other sci-fi works and authors abounds.

I know there's at least one sequel to the book, K-Machines, but I'm really not interested enough to read it.

[Tim Hicks · Rating 2 out of 5]

I would have given this three stars if I hadn't finished it.

First I thought it felt like a tribute to Zelazny, and was pleased to see in the afterword that it was.

Good start, suitable mystery and some well-paced unfolding of details while our hero goes, "WTF?" on our behalf.

Lune appears. Hero's eyes go boing! like a toon, and you know they'll be in the sack within 30 pages. Spoiler: they are. And as others have noted she goes all, "ooh! You're so RUGGED!" despite being an umpty-year-old famous professor of mysteries. Ptui.

Full marks for the hero's handling of his new talents; no complaints there.

And I have a math degree so I'm not bothered by "this is all a computation" in a technical way. It's just that's its all mental wanking, like a Star Trek episode that's all in the holodeck. Not sure what the other-dimensional worlds added, either, except a chance to show off some concepts.

As we near the end, it seems that every chapter rolls out a powerful new player, and most of them don't do anything. It's as if they're reserved for volumes six through ten. We see that there are Levels Within Levels, and that rarely works; it doesn't work here. I think that's because it introduces the idea that everything we see is temporary because The Guy At The Next Level Up can change everything in an instant.

There's a small hint that the Bad Guys are creatures that insist on having at least a touch of reality in their existences, clearly implying that the Good Guys are not so constrained. Well, call me a bad guy, I guess. It would have been amusing if Broderick had had one of the family ask, "Who said we're the good guys?" Maybe the family, as a unit, is Loki, bringing chaos to the world.

And then we come to the ending, and I use the term advisedly. It was in fact where the pages stopped, but in other ways it was not anything like an ending. Leaving the good stuff - and the explanations - for the sequel? Sorry, I won't be reading the sequel.

[Michaela · Rating 2 out of 5]

Prvá tretina bola zaujímavá. Skutočne som s napätím čakala, kedy a kto sa objaví vo vani a k čomu sa August dopracuje. A hlavne prečo. Ukázalo sa, že je hráč a patrí medzi tých vyvolených, ktorí majú možnosť ovládať "hru" a pohybovať sa medzi svetmi. To bola tá fajn línia. Dokázala som zvládnuť aj hordu príbuzných a na druhej strane hordu robotov, ale zmes "sci-" v tomto diele bola na mňa priveľa. Hrdinova posadnutosť krásnym dievčaťom, za ktorým pobeží až na kraj vesmíru (nie je jeho vzdialená príbuzná, to len tak btw)., bolo tam fakt mix všetkého - dejiny a náboženstvo, veda a fikcia, zabíjanie a milovanie, vesmírna loď, mimozemšťania, vymieranie dinosaurov, šialený vedec, X-kaliber a hlavne kopa svetov, kde sú malé a veľké odchýlky. Akože dobre, no na môj vkus je tam priveľa ontológie, fyziky, matematiky a filozofie. A možno je vesmír matematická rovnica, len ja som z toho magor. Keby to bolo ako poviedka, úplne by to stačilo.

[Jo · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some good ideas, and I absolutely loved the whole cellular automata section. But I was constantly distracted by OK-for-a-first-draft-type writing, & the seedy atmosphere permanently damaged my delicate sensibilities. #GenerationSnowflake

[Andy · Rating 2 out of 5]

At the beginning, I was confused. Then I started to kinda get it, but ended up confused and with ton of questions. I started to orient in all the siblings - when I got a hang of that, aunt Tansy, Miriam, uncle Isak, a talking dog all became the long lost parents? At one point, I wasn't even sure that some of the stuff happened. And what the hell is even the fight? Why did it happen? How does it work? Why is this one family, one species, full of the players? Against whom are they fighting? I need a sequel or maybe to read it again, I don't know.
It's easy to read but the ending was disappointing as well as the main character. I don't like August. He is kinda annoying and fell in love with a girl just because the way he looks in a second, then stalked her a bit. Their whole love story was strange. He was super obsessed with her, way too much. Knowing each other for maybe three days, they acted as if they had a chance to actually fall in love, develop a relationship and get to know each other. He was also a bit sexist in a way that August never let Luna do anything, stopped her from anything, just basicaly treated her as a 'weak girl'. And she let him, even though she is a renewed scientist, everybody knows it and respects her, but when he comes in? Awful! She is obviously such a powerfull woman.
And little extra Easter egg in one of the brothers being gay, probably - or at least in a relationship with a guy! I did not expect it in a sci-fi.

[Franco Atrio · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesante pero lectura confusa

[hannonle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Abandono. No compensa el esfuerzo de leerlo.

[Lorean · Rating 2 out of 5]

Promising at the beginning, but the rest of the story was only confusing.
In this book science and multiverse eclipse the characters and the narration itself.
What a pity.

[Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it. An imaginative sci-fi twist on Arthurian legend with humorous moments and a multiverse of possibilities.

[Julie H. Ernstein · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a pretty good science fiction novel. I say pretty good because it starts out great, stays great, and then wimps out in the last 20-30 pages. (Admittedly, it was late and I will reread that last bit tonight just to be sure it wasn't an instance of Operator Error on the part of a tired reader.) The concept is that a twenty-something Australian medical student named August Seebeck, just home from a six-week stint working in the Outback as a jackaroo, is distraught to be told by his dottering great-aunt Tansy, that for the last six Saturdays a corpse has appeared each night in the upstairs bathroom and disappears by morning. Fearing that she is losing her mind, August is quickly disabused of his mistaken belief that Aunt Tan is hallucinating. Instead, he is quickly pulled into a world of multiple universes and forced to question everything he believes to be real. This is a really fun science fiction work, full of tons of pop culture references and a wide range of likeable--and even some despicable--characters. Regardless of their status in the the Contest of Worlds, they're all fascinating. The book is very well written and reads quickly, the jumping between characters and, indeed, between multiverses, is facilated by the fact that in the upper right hand corner of the beginning of each new chapter the name of the character you are joining appears. It's innocuous and extremely helpful--particularly in the early pages as you haven't yet figured out which particular world you might well be on at any given moment. This could be a hideously ponderous book, but instead it's a really wry one that pokes fun at all the assorted sacred cows. There are tons of mathematical and science references throughout--cleverly deploying and reappropriating certain principles and constants we've worked with in science classes over the years. The major let-down is that the Contest of Worlds in never explained and we never understand the rationale behind the K-machines which seem hell-bent on destruction of the Players and life on the assorted worlds they all zip through. I know there's a follow-up book, but I'm sitting on the fence as to whether I want to make that investment or not. It'll have to wait until I re-read the last 30 pages to see whether I missed some cleverly-concealed resolution or insight that should have occurred.

[Danielle · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is well written, fast-paced with a good mix of action and dialog. (It's a funny read with regards to geeks; there are references to Sliders the Sci-fi show, MOO [hyuk-hyuk] and several other massive multi-player online games. None of which have anything to do with me personally, but I've listened to my geek-partner play them throughout the years.)

However, the author completely failed to follow through on the female character he created; a presumably ancient and powerful Player with a vast understanding of Ontology (and a book penned by herself on the subject), etc. When the clueless but randomly powerful (read: super-powers, not intellect) main male character stepped into her life, she immediately took up the role of submissive sex-kitten, perfectly willing to stand meekly behind the male character while he dicked and flopped ignorantly around, enchanted FOR NO DISCERNABLE REASON. It wasn't his confidence, that's for sure, because he didn't know squat. Yet she quietly followed him around, even knowing, as she did, all the things in their 'realities' that he did not. She deferred to him, she admired him, she cooed. Blargh.

[Randal · Rating 1 out of 5]

Strong on the science, weak on the fiction. Barely a novel.
This is a good example of an author exploring the "what if" of a concept to the point there isn't much story left. In this case the science is primarily the "four-level model of a computational cosmos" thought up by prof. Max Tegmark (and lavishly cited in the epilogue). But Tegmark's idea is only a way of rationalizing a concept (intermittently connected multiverse) that has been around for a donkey's years in sci-fi. Much of the book is less of a novel and more of a dissertation explaining the theoretical shape of space/time. And after reading this, I'm at a loss what distinguishes a first- from a fourth-level Tegmark bubble and at more of a loss why I should care.
The Xon star (comprised of matter unchanged from the Big Bang) was cool ... some good puns ... two stars.
Minus one for the beer-ad grade "romance" in which the brilliant, gorgeous woman is immediately smitten by the average schmuck / sheep herder /protagonist.

[Stella · Rating 2 out of 5]

EVERYTHING about this book was PROBLEMATIC and pointless and also awful. It fooled me, the first third I was like 'well this looks like it's going to be really interesting even though the main POV character is really annoying and I hate him' and then by the time I realized it wasn't interesting at all IT WAS TOO LATE. This book is supposed to be about the contest of worlds and I literally... still don't even know what that's about, and I don't know if that's because it was badly explained or just because I skimmed the last a hundred pages because I JUST WANTED THIS TO BE OVER. August was FRIKKING ANNOYING. And this whole 'I'M SO IN LOVE WITH LUNE BECAUSE SHE'S BEAUTIFUL' asklfjalk 'oh and conveniently she loves me back even though WE HAVE HAD NO REASON TO FALL IN LOVE we just like MET EACH OTHER ONCE and then I STALKED HER ACROSS LIKE THREE WORLDS BECAUSE WHATEVER' and just
just
just
no
why
why did I read this.

[Jadon · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm pretty sure this is Broderick's first novel and it shows. The writing is confusing at times, with some things poorly explained. I feel like the key to great science fiction writing is in fleshing out the details and everyday consequences. Besides that, the concept is fantastic, which is why I kept reading. The book introduces a man, unaware of his heritage, who finds brothers and sisters existing in alternate worlds. They are immortal players in a game, fighting for the universe. Sounds a little hokey, I know, but it works. Even with the confusing writing it entertained me sufficiently to recommend it.

[Ridge Cresswell · Rating 2 out of 5]

There comes a point with science fiction where you can try too hard to tie it to science fact. This book is kind of like that. It attempts to reconcile a theory of computational ontology (that the universe is one big mathematical equation) with a story, and it falls kind of flat. I made it through it, but half the time it used so many terms borrowed from physics, math and philosophy that it was basically gibberish. I think I "skimmed" it rather than "read" it as a result. Won't be looking for more from Broderick.

[Jday · Rating 3 out of 5]

The plot and characters were fantastic, but the book ended suddenly without tying up a ton of unresolved plot elements. How did his people come to be? Who the heck are the fighting and why? Etc. The only two things I felt were resolved adequetly were his love interest and where his parents had been. Great writer, but the ending on this one missed for me.

[Laurie · Rating 3 out of 5]

It started very good, so engaging and fun and mysterious... but it got old fast... by page 200 it seems like they'll never explain what's going on... i barely wanted to keep reading but since ''no book is left unfinished'', i did...

[Michael Underwood · Rating 3 out of 5]

Solid quantum SF fun.

[bluetyson]

Godplayers by Damien Broderick (2005)

[Remy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting concept for a book, but a lot of theory to power through.