After finishing Vurt I’m still not sure how to classify it: is it an alternate-reality Manchester, a near-future quasi-cyberpunk adventure, a virtual reality game based on nanotechnology, or the hallucinations of an addict? Perhaps it is a combination of all of these things.
The novel relates the story of Scribble and the rest of the Stash Riders gang as they search for Scribble’s sister, Desdemona, who was lost in the vurt. The vurt is accessed by placing a feather into the mouth; different coloured feathers transport the character(s) into different genres of vurt experience, which is apparently a sharable, virtual reality. The mechanism of vurt is never explained, which differentiates this novel from computer-based cyberpunk fiction.
There are allusions to Orpheus’ visit to the underworld, Lewis Carroll’s stories (Alice is mentioned, and there is a bar named the Slithy Tove), and Othello (e.g.: Desdemona). There are also a few hints that the reader may be within the vurt, for example: “…maybe you’re in the feather, thinking that you’re reading the novel, with no way of knowing…” (p. 341).
For the first few chapters I was sure I’d love the book: Jeff Noon certainly has an incredible imagination; but, ultimately, I wasn’t pulled into the story or characters in any meaningful way. There are some remarkable sections, but I found the book too fractionated, with too many resolution via computer-game-like deus ex machina, and there was insufficient depth of character and story to fully engage me.
I enjoyed the novel, but didn’t love it.
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db johnston
almost falling 