Back In The Day
Was mentioned here:
#29
http://forum.noblerealms.org/viewtopic.php?pid=22537#p22537
From:
http://www.amazon.com/Realtime-Interrupt-James-P-Hogan/dp/0553374540
A rising star in the field of computer simulation, Joe Corrigan is promoted to direct a top-secret project, an entire computerized reality. When corporate rivals plot his downfall, Joe finds his situation abruptly changed from cocky software engineer to desperate prisoner. Trapped in a software world of his own making, Joe must regain control of the computer to save himself and other ‘volunteer' subjects.
An ambitious experiment in virtual reality collapses, leaving project director Joe Corrigan in the lurch with a failed marriage and severe psychological problems. When his attempts to rebuild his life result in continual frustration at being unable to fit into his surroundings, Corrigan begins to suspect that his problems lie not with himself but with the world of his perceptions, a world that just might not be the ‘real world.’
Reviewer: John S. Ryan
The premise, of course, is that virtual reality has reached such an advanced stage of development that it's not easy to distinguish the ‘virtual’ from the ‘real‘; the essential plot element is that Joe Corrigan is trapped inside a simulation he helped to create. The reader knows all of this from the beginning, but for obvious reasons (and some that are not so obvious) it takes the protagonist a while to work it out.
Reviewer: Peter Dykhuis
Realtime Interrupt by James Patrick Hogan is an exploratory novel. What I mean by exploratory is that the novel explores human reaction to stress events that don't exist today. The topic of exploration in this novel is virtual reality and to a limited extent artificial intelligence. I know what some of you may be thinking. Virtual Reality exists today. Well, virtual reality most certainly does not exist in the way in which it is shown in this tale. The story follows one persons story in several stages of the virtual reality experience, creation, testing and moral questioning.
The novel excels in its painting of the primary characters personal growth. The book also does an excellent job of painting a realistic picture of the science involved.
Reviewer: E. M. Hunt
In this story Joe Corrigan finds himself a misfit/outcast in a humorless world filled with identity-less humans. Eventually he realizes that he is inside a computer-simulated world that he helped create. He spends the rest of the novel trying to figure out what went wrong, can he leave, and should he leave.