WebMage (Ravirn, Book 1) - Softcover

McCullough, Kelly

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0441014259 ISBN 13: 9780441014255

Publisher: Ace, 2006

Synopsis

Magic gets an upgrade in the first WebMage novel featuring a computer savvy sorcerer...

Ravirn is not your average computer geek. A child of the Fates—literally—he’s a hacker extraordinaire who can zero in on the fatal flaw in any program. Now that twenty-first-century magic has gone digital that makes him a very talented sorcerer. But a world of problems is about to be downloaded on Ravirn—who’s just trying to pass his college midterms.

Great Aunt Atropos, one of the three Fates, decides that humans having free will is really overrated and plans to rid herself of the annoyance—by coding a spell into the Fate Core, the server that rules destiny. As a hacker, Ravirn is a big believer in free will, and when he not only refuses to debug her spell but actively opposes her, all hell breaks loose.

Even with the help of his familiar Melchior, a sexy sorceress (who’s also a mean programmer), and the webgoblin underground, it’s going to be a close call...

About this title

About the Author

Kelly McCullough is the author of the WebMage series and the Fallen Blade series.

Reviews

Starred Review. Remember the Fates, those ancient Greek spinners, weavers and snippers of life's threads? They're back in McCullough's original and outstanding debut, and still ruling destiny—but with their own digital web, based on a server called the Fate Core. Power-hungry as ever, they've coded a spell to eliminate human free will. Unluckily for them, one of their demigod descendants is a cheerfully rebellious hacker-sorcerer named Ravirn who, when not studying for college midterms, likes to mess around on their web with the help of his familiar, Melchior, who can change from a goblin to a laptop. Ravirn and Melchior, let loose in McCullough's delightfully skewed and fully formed world—much like our own, but with magic, paranormally advanced technology and Greek gods—set out to thwart Ravirn's "great-to-the-nth-degree aunt[s]," careening from one discovery to another, enlisting unlikely allies and narrowly evading destruction at the hands of both Fates and Furies. McCullough handles his plot with unfailing invention, orchestrating a mixture of humor, philosophy and programming insights that give new meaning to terms as commonplace as "spell checker" and esoteric as "programming in hex." Though a preponderance of techie-talk may put off some readers, this is the kind of title that could inspire an army of rabid fans; it's a good thing a sequel is planned for 2007. (Aug.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Although it's yet another variation on mythological creatures interacting with IT, this fast-paced, action-packed yarn is a lot of fun. Ravirn, the multi-great-grandson of the Fate Lachesis (who measures the thread of life), is in trouble. Great-aunt Atropos (who cuts it) has decided that human free will is a great nuisance. She plans to get rid of it by coding a spell into the Fate Core, the server that rules destiny. But there's a problem with the spell. Dedicated hacker Ravirn can catch the fatal flaw in any software but refuses to debug it, in fact is determined to defeat the project. All Hades breaks loose and starts pursuing him. His only allies are his familiar, his gorgeous cousin (a mean programmer herself), and the webgoblin underground. Then Discord and the Furies get involved. McCullough has done an excellent job of weaving myth, magic, IT jargon, and the English language into a bang-up story. Frieda Murray
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

No time for second thoughts now

 Scorched Earth is not a spell that can be aborted halfway. Ultimately, all spells draw power from the same source, the primal chaos that churns between the worlds. But my family mostly uses the predigested forces my grandmother and her sisters channel into the net via their mainframe webservers. Scorched Earth isn’t like that. It taps directly into the interworld chaos. That means it’s both very dangerous and very powerful. It also means I don’t have to have web access to run it. Melchior’s voice interrupted my train of thought.
 “There’s no carrier wave and no Mweb line,” he said. “I think we just took the entire net down, Boss.”
 “Sweet necessity,” I murmured. “What have I done now?”

Edition details

• Publisher: Ace
• Publication date: 2006
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0441014259
• ISBN 13: 9780441014255
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 310