Blog Tour > The Nirvana Effect By Brian Pinkerton > @Flame Tree Press

Book Review and Reaction

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Welcome all, and thank you for stopping as I host todays FlameTreePress Blog Tour Event for Brian Pinkertons shiny new release called The Nirvana Effect. Make sure you visit the other hosts sites to check their awesome content.

Thank you to Anne Cater and The Random Things Blog Tours for giving me a spot as well as for being super nice. I love being able to meet more incredible examples of why the writing community is awesome!

I was provided a copy of this book in exchange for an honest and fair review.

• Ebook available now
• 256 pages
• ISBN: 9781787584891

Synopsis from Flame Tree Press:

Fans of stories centered on the conflict between the virtual and the real will find plenty to enjoy.” — Publishers Weekly

No one goes out anymore.

Society is sheltered indoors. The economy is in ruins. People spend their lives addicted to a breakthrough virtual reality technology, desperate for escapism in a troubled world. The Nirvana Effect has taken over.

Aaron and Clarissa are members of a subculture of realists who resist the lure of a fake utopia. They watch in horror as the technology spreads across the country with willing participants who easily forgo their freedoms for false pleasures. When the young couple discovers a plot to enforce compliance for mind control, the battle for free will begins. What started as a playful diversion turns deadly. The future of the human race is at stake.

Finally, the review:

I fell into this book quick, and was absorbed right away. You should get a copy……I almost left my review there.. But I’ll be generous, and add more details. This book deserves my insights and reactions. I hope to offer some of my thoughts with a minimum of my own natural annoying tendency to be funny along the way. My wife would say your all lucky to not be exposed to my horrible jokes.

Quick sidenote, The synopsis does a great job painting the overall storyline, so I’ll focus on some of my reactions and thought as to how it equalled a great read and kept my imagination in its happy place.

The decision to join a book tour is always tough for me. I hate to not meet someone else’s expectations, or worse, fall short of any agreed on obligations. I have to have a strong feeling that the book will be something I will not just enjoying, but get something out of. More so when the book is a little outside my “go to” genre of space opera and the weirder/darker side of fantasy. Which leads me to say, I took a chance and gambled with The Nirvana Effect. But in the end, I was fully rewarded.

The central concept the story is based around, deals with that often joked about but never really put into a “now” perspective – that our next technological step would be the mass acceptance of a physical connection to information systems and entertainment platforms. More easily put: We’re jacked in directly to our computers.. The reason this book is so successful at making an emotional connection is at the very least twofold. The setting feels like it could be now, and then we have main characters that I felt emotionally connected with although coming from wholly different backgrounds.

The terrifying step that creates a ton of tension and an enthralling series of events (once I was comfortable with a crumbling society resulting from the majority of Americans being plugged in and avoiding all of today’s responsibilities) is when the technology becomes forced by law. Even worse, most people see it as a good thing. I should do a part 2 just to discuss the amazing job Brian does of incorporating addiction and the ugly side of its effects on a person. I’ll pin that for today though.

I loved the main characters genuine appreciation for the real world and what they have to go through to keep that experience. What really gave me chills was that the majority have accepted this artificial reality as the real world and as one character stated while momentarily not “jacked in” that he was only visiting the physical world. How that could be a possible future that I, as a reader, could believe possible is a testament to the skilled writing.

The first 75 pages absolutely flew by and by then, my rear view mirrors, if I had them, would’ve been useless, as the events were a Rollercoaster of emotions. Filled with believable but far enough on the horizon, that It wasn’t completely destroying my hope for the near future of America, and the world. It has a lot to offer readers who deal closely with tech for work or entertainment and hope you’re able to give it a read in the near future.

Thank you again to Anne Cater, Flame Tree Press, and Brian Pinkerton for a great read, and for bringing me on for this exciting tour. Thank you to YOU for visiting and being willing to read my review, please comment with any thoughts or reactions you might have, whether you’ve read the book or not.

AUTHOR LINKS:

• http://www.brianpinkerton.com
• https://www.flametreepublishing.com/the-nirvana-effect-isbn-9781787584891.html
• Author site on Amazon

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Brian Pinkerton @ FlameTreePress

Brian Pinkerton tells stories to frighten, amuse and intrigue. He is the author of novels and short stories in the thriller, horror, science fiction and mystery genres. His books include Abducted (a USA Today bestseller), Vengeance, Anatomy of Evil, Killer’s Diary, Rough Cut, Bender, Killing the Boss and How I Started the Apocalypse (a trilogy). Select titles have also been released as audio books and in foreign languages. His short stories have appeared in PULP!, Chicago Blues, Zombie Zoology and The Horror Zine. 
Brian has been a guest author and panelist at the San Diego Comic Con, American Library Association annual conference, World Horror Convention and many other literary and genre events. His screenplays have finished in the top 100 of Project Greenlight and top two percent of the Nicholl Fellowship of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Three of the scripts have been compiled in a collection, Unreleased.  
Brian received his B.A. from the University of Iowa, where he took undergraduate classes of the Iowa Writers Workshop. He received his Master’s Degree from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. Brian lives in the Chicago area and invites you to visit him on Facebook, Goodreads, Twitter and at http://www.brianpinkerton.com. Brian is also a cartoonist and his web site includes his deranged cartoon series, The Ruts.

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