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Polybius

by Collin Armstrong

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Troy M. said: " Pre-Review non sequitir: This book is set primarily in a fictional town in Sonoma County…I live in Sonoma County! Had no idea this was the case when I got into this book, and it was fun trying to figure out which towns that Tasker Bay was an amalgama Pre-Review non sequitir: This book is set primarily in a fictional town in Sonoma County…I live in Sonoma County! Had no idea this was the case when I got into this book, and it was fun trying to figure out which towns that Tasker Bay was an amalgamation of – best approximation I can make is Bodega Bay, which is a great little NorCal tourist spot if you ever get the chance!

Polybius, for me, was a book of missed chances – dynamite premise, inventive, and a prologue that hooked me immediately, then it kinda just didn’t unfold in the way I was expecting it to. Definitely had some of those ‘80s, grimy arcade vibes that are a lot of fun, and the one-of-a-kind, cursed arcade machine was right up my alley, but it felt like a lot of the plot was teen drama, and the game itself, as well as the affects it causes, were underexplored.

We begin in San Jose, with a moving company hired to clean out an office space – lo and behold, there is an arcade game, in all of its ‘80s glory, with scant labelling and no information. The game has too-good-for-its-era graphics, is oddly addicting, and seems to leave players with violent impulses after they manage to tear themselves from the machine – creepy, right? Fast forward a bit and we end up in a tiny beachside town North of the Bay Area, mid-gentrification, with a funky arcade, a seedy owner, and a sullen teenager with affinity for technology behind the counter. Needless to say, the machine worms its way up there, people get hooked, and chaos ensues. The ensemble of characters include Andi, said girl behind the counter, her mom, recently divorced and the current doctor of the town, a few classmates, including Ro, a love interest for Andi and son of the sheriff, the seedy, drug-dealing arcade owner, and a few other bit-player townies and some of the movers and shakers regarding the gentrification.

As a whole, I liked the cast of characters and the setting(although I am admittedly biased lol). I thought the book tried to go a bit hard down the Stranger Things route, and the teen drama didn’t seem to really hit in the way that it was intended. Especially in a horror novel, it takes away from the gravity of it all a bit, in my opinion at least. I thought that Andi exploring the game’s origins and source code via the earliest versions of the internet was a pretty cool touch – really wish that the author had went a bit more in-depth with the game itself though – like, the whole book is focused around this game, but we don’t get much more of a description than it has good graphics and a figure chases you down hallways.

Overall, it was an enjoyable read for me, nothing groundbreaking or earth-shaking though. Unique take on the cursed object trope, that was a little bit ham-fisted, and the plot/horror didn’t really line up in the ways I’d hoped. Loved the location(obviously) and there were some cool ‘80s arcade vibes for sure.

Also, not for nothing, but having the main character in a video game-based novel dislike playing video games was certainly a choice lol. 3/5 ...more "

Jul 12, 2026 05:54PM · see review