Preview of Virtual Light Summary:

The world of Virtual Light is the California of the near future — 2005.

Now the state is divided into NoCal and SoCal in what appears to be a post-cataclysmic world of the haves and the have-nots. Earthquakes and political upheaval have devastated not only California but Japan, and although some remnants of government remain, the world is controlled by powerful corporations for whom misconduct, fraud, and greed are the status quo.

Gibson pursues the concept of community in much more detail here than in previous novels. The devastation brought about by the earthquakes has, for some, forced increased separation and solitude. Wealthy inhabitants of SoCal live in bunkers protected by the security service IntenSecure or in barricaded enclaves. Late in the novel, Gibson satirizes the separatist quality of community when he describes the religious enclave of Paradise, a gated community that conducts an examination of conscience on any...