I found Digital Winter to have a
realistic present-day setting full of the probable military linguistics and
security precautions that are appropriate in our digital world according to my
readings in the Federation of American Scientist’s Secrecy Blog. There’s the initial discovery of an self-replicating
computer virus, suspicions of terrorists, the rush of the President to a secure
location and the crumbling infrastructure of a computer-dependent society post-computers.
The story begins with the introduction
of Stanley Elton, a successful CEO for San Diego’s largest CPA firm, and his college
professor wife, Royce. They are the parents of an elusive central character,
Donny. Donny Elton is a 22-year old, monosyllabic computer savant who appears
to be a silent central character throughout the novel. The story then moves in
quick, short scenes that take us from the upper-class suburb of Coronado Island
in San Diego to College Park, Maryland and introduces us to Dr. Roni Matisse
and her husband, Colonel Jeremy Matisse, PhD, who is a major figure in the USCYBERCOM
division of the NSA, who is by the way a Christian. Life through Jeremy’s eyes shows
us the backstage story of the coming digital disaster. It includes enough
description and brief history of the setting to give the reader a sense of
place without becoming bogged down in excessive details. We follow these
characters through standard dystopian events such as losing power, water and
the general breakdown of civic order as officials try to stave off social
disaster and restore some semblance of order.
Even though those of us familiar with
the genre know the story line, we keep reading anyway because we are curious to
see where the story will take us and how Shadow, a recurring symbol throughout
the novel, plays into events. For instance, why is Donny suddenly making full
sentences after years of saying only one word? It is Donny’s opening line of “Shadow,
shadow on my right, / Shadow, shadow on my left, / Shadow, shadow everywhere, /
Shadow has all the might,” that reappears at critical points throughout the
story, leaving us to wonder about its meaning and Donny’s relationship to it.
The only aspect of this novel that felt
surrealistic to me are the main characters. Both the Eltons and the Matisses
are professional couples with long-term marriages who are still deeply in love.
Maybe it’s just my personal history of being raised in a single-parent home, becoming
a single parent myself and not knowing many couples with a long-term love, but their
relationships did make me question their character’s validity.
Other than that, I loved the novel enough
to read the entire thing one Saturday morning. Though the battle between good
and evil is not as flamboyantly obvious as Steven King’s The Stand, but I think that works in the Digital Winter’s favor. I
definitely recommend it and look forward to reading the sequel.
Rhodes
FitzWilliam