Words Devoured: Demi-Monde: Winter

 

When I received the e-mail from Morrow Publishing (part of Harper Collins) to choose novel(s) for review, the first one that caught my eye was this one.  The Demi-Monde: Winter.  The blurb offered to reviewers reeled me in, and I couldn't wait to start reading.

Having just finished it (last night) I am thrilled that I did get a copy.  Author Rod Rees has an well thought out, well written, and expansive story here.

The Demi-Monde: Winter takes place in the not-too-distant future.  The United States of America has created a cyber world for the Army to train in.  This world, the Demi-Monde, is populated by sentient copies of some of the worlds most brilliant--and some of the most evil--historical figures.

The Demi-Monde is a scaled-down version of our world.  Split into sectors--such as The Rookeries, which contains Berlin, Washington and London--different beliefs are rampant in the entirety of the Demi-Monde.  However, the SS under the command of Reinhard Heydrich (a copy of the man behind the Holocaust in our world) is intent on cleansing the Demi-Monde of all undesirables.

When Norma Williams, daughter of the President of the United States, is trapped there it's up to an 18 year-old woman, Ella Thomas, to save her.  Thomas is an African American girl (because she is a dead ringer for a backdoor programmed Dupe--the name for the Demi-Monde avatars) who is thrust into a volatile world, set with a near-impossible task.

Rod Rees has created a believable world for his characters to inhabit.  The Demi-Monde itself (represented by a map in the novel) is a steampunk, shrunken, version of the world we live in today. Just a handful of cities set into different sectors is all that makes up the world. The decision for the Demi-Monde to be...restricted (development-wise) to the late 1800s helps to fuel the steampunk atmosphere.

That the Demi-Monde is a copy of our world, not one that is fantastical--set in another world somewhere--really made me believe in its characters.  They weren't uber-powerful super humans, they were normal human everyday humans.  Very easy to believe in.

The story itself is well-planned.  Rees keeps a number of plot lines running throughout the novel, and they intertwine, and separate, and intertwine again.  Eventually, they all come to their own conclusions.  Or, in the case of the end of the novel, they all come to a point where a conclusion will eventually come.  Say, in the form of the next novel.

Also, there are a lot of terms created by the author for use in Demi-Monde: Winter.  They all have some sort of real world basis, and can usually be easily figured out.  He does include a glossary at the end, which I didn't know about until I was nearly done with the novel itself.

I reiterate, I was glad I actually received a copy of this novel to review.  It was a well written story, and it left me wanting more, and caring about its characters.  I will be sure to pick up a copy of The Demi-Monde: Spring when it is released.  Perhaps it will even come up as a review copy!  That would be wonderful!

The Demi-Monde: Winter is available for sale now.  You can find it in local bookstores, or order it from Amazon here: The Demi-Monde: Winter, a novel by Rod Rees