WILLIAM GIBSON: VIRTUAL LIGHT

1993

TIME: 2005

pure information is the greatest high and the mind can be a terrible thing to crash.

1

There is a courier who gets these glasses. Mexico. Makes reservation to go to SF.

2

Gunhead police van. Reidel. Ex-cop. Cops son. Hard boiled detective. Maverick. LA. multi-cultural setting. Danger. high tech. Friend named Sublet. he was in a videosect. God in television. lower class white. militant radical right wing.

New world order. North and Southern Cal split. COPS in TROUBLE. helps cops who are unfairly treated. Refers to a man named Shapely. Deathstar. Police satellite. Rev. Fallon - video sect.

Line between police and private security blurred.

Reidel is working as a security agent for infosecure. He busts this place in Gunhead, He is set up, though, wrong data. He gets fired. He was with Knoxville, Tenn police. Problem with hostage situation. Fired.

3

Chevette is a courier in SF, crashes party at Cody's -— steals glasses from this jerk. (Connects with Cap. 1). (Courier was killed. Cops thank person who took glasses killed him. Looking for Chev.)

4

Reidel is out of job. Tries to sell clothing. Antiques. Contact with Intensecure wants him to work as chauffeur in Northern Ca.

5

Courier wakes up and has no glasses.

6

Was a big earthquake in SF. The Bay Bridge has been left standing. Taken over by homeless. A dangerous place to be.

Japanese. sociology student Yamazaki who is interviewing this guy Skinner about what SF used to be like before the big Quake and the settling of the Bridge with its unique culture. Gibson’s way of giving background narrative.

Chevette lives with Skinner - not lovers. He takes care of her - like a guru.

7

Hernandez - Intensecure contact in LA - job for Reidel as driver in NoCal.

8

Chev and Skinner talk. He's semi-invalid. Has to get up and down on elevator. The Bridge is between SF and Treasure Island. She helps him - goes out for him.

9

Reidel takes flight from Burbank to SF. Sits next to irritating old woman. He looks like Tommy Lee Jones. Meets Freddy - black - tech assistant to Warbaby, who will be R's boss. Looking for glasses. Drive around in a high-tech van - Ford Patriot - Warbaby is mixed -

Yamazaki interviews Skinner - Skinner calls him Scooter (p/ 105) Social realignments at all levels.

Future world run by corporations which are based on info.

Chevette rides bike for delivery service - double rush.

Chev.'s friend is black.

Reidel is confronted by two SF cops who are exKGB.

Intensecure has hired Warbaby to get the glasses back. Warbaby has hired Reidel.

Warbaby and police are on different sides in this.

There's another corporation. DataAmerica, credit is connected to security corporation,, Intensecure.

Cars in SF need to be protected - violence everywhere.

Chap. 13

Chev - her boss tells her a guy is looking for glasses.

Scooter is confronted by Lovelace at bar.

Chap. 15

Crime scene where courier was killed. Warbaby is wearing VR glasses like the ones that have been stolen. They replace eyes - bypass optic never and go directly to the brain. Can project data. Reidel tries on glasses and sees that Warbaby has been scanning file of Chevette Marie Washington, delivery girl. Warbaby thinks she did it.

Chevette is talking to Sammy (friend) - going to throw out glasses because she thinks they're trouble. Has boyfriend named Lowell who is a member of the Cognitive Dissidents, does drugs, high tech anarchist.

She came from Oregon, street kid, end up at SF, met Sammy who got her the job.

She and Sammy go back to Skinner's and she tries on glasses - has data from Sunflower Corp. Just then Scooter comes in followed by an armed man, Lovelace.

Chap. 17

Reidel gets paid with credit card. Wants him to go onto the bridge to get Chevette because everyone else is afraid, including the cops.

Shapely helped make a vaccine for aids by allowing tests to be run on him. Because of him, US was saved from aids.

Back to Bridge. Lovelace wants glasses. He's very violent. She escapes. Sammy gets blown off the bridge.

Chap. 19

Scooter stays to help Skinner. Chev goes into hiding. She is in the handcuffs they tried to put on her

Chap 20

C goes back to work to get someone to help her. Nigel helps her. Goes back to Treasure Island with the glasses. Scared. Tries to hook up with Lowell who is with CD's. Reidel’s on the Island looking for her. Goes to bar there following her. She gets busted by the cop.

Reidel helps her escape. They go off together. C explains to R what has been happening. As they leave the Bridge, cops are there. They cuff the two together. He realizes he hates everyone he works for as well as the cops. Lovelace, Warbaby and the cops are all the same. So they aren't in completion.

C gets saved by her own people. RE and C run off together. Take off in the Patriot. with glasses. p. 223

He doesn't know why he makes this decision. He just does.

Back to Scooter and Skinner. Watches BBC about how Shapely helped develop vaccine for HIV. Had something in his system.

C and R are running away in Haight. Go to tattoo parlor. C explains how she got the glasses.

Reidel realizes he has been set-up by DataAmerica and Intensecure.

Black guy named Fontaine finds Scooter and Skinner. Helps him.

C and R ditch Patriot. They meet old lady who says she's going to drive a van back to LA. They ride with her. Takes them to a deserted mall — Mrs. Elliot is an agent for Intensecure and she takes him to Lovelace.

Chev. gives Lovelace a spiked drink.

Lovelace is going to kill them so he talks.

DATA HAVENS: drug cartels started data havens — provide secure storage — Intensecure owns the data in the glasses — everyone is related to everyone else -

Sunflower Corporation, wants to rebuild SF just as they rebuilt Tokyo after the big earthquake — going to completely redo the city and change it. Everything will be changed. p. 275. Millions would object if they knew. This is why this data is so valuable.

Chev. has laced his coke with dancer. He goes nuts and they are able to escape.

Scooter and Skinner - Niger was killed. Funeral for him.

Chap. 31:

C and R in the van going to social. Go to Sublet's mom's house in Paradise, CA - Christian community. Sublet helps them hook up with Lowell and his CD's. Reidel needs their help.

They make a deal with the CD's.

Century City LA with Sublet. Karen Henderson, attorney with Cops in Trouble.

Freddy, Warbaby, and two KGB cops come to hit them. LAPD intercept them because the CD's have hacked into Dearthstar and told them to.

Reidel meets with Wellington Ma — producer of CIT — has the glasses, wants to turn the whole thing into a TV show — Ma and his attorneys will protect R.

CF MAX HEADROOM - MEDIA

END — news of the SF thing stops the project from happening. Everyone lives happily ever after.

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