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1[[quoteright:307:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/51rbqnxymul_sx307_bo1204203200.jpg]]
2
3''Halting State'' is a 2008 PostCyberpunk novel by Creator/CharlesStross.
4
5Sue, a police officer in Edinburgh, responds to a call about a theft at a software company, only to learn that ''what'' was stolen is a bit out of her area of expertise: several hundred thousand Euros worth of virtual valuables from MassivelyMultiplayerOnlineRoleplayingGame. To make things more interesting, one of the company's main programmers, a reclusive work-from-home type, is missing without a trace, and nobody in the office can recall having ever seen him.
6
7Elaine is a Forensic Accountant, who specializes in digging through other peoples' books to look for evidence of fraud or other financial negligence. She is also a [[FanOfThePast reenactor]] and a sword-fighting enthusiast. Her company sends her to Edinburgh to try and find out if one of their clients was up to some shady business leading up to the robbery.
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9Jack is incredibly hungover, recently laid-off from his programming job, [[WhatDidIDoLastNight and handcuffed to a signpost somewhere in the Netherlands]], with a Dutch cop standing in front of him expecting a [[ICanExplain good explanation]] for how he got there. Upon returning home to Scotland, Jack signs up with a temp agency to find more work. He is surprised to see that he is almost immediately hired as a consultant with Elaine's company to help investigate what happened in Edinburgh.
10
11All three of these people are going to quickly realize they might be in over their heads as the online bank robbery proves to be much more than it seems. InAWorld where EverythingIsOnline ([[NotHyperbole really]]), even the cops and the criminals, these three characters will have to think on their feet once something manages to compromise the network and use it against them.
12
13A sequel, ''{{Literature/Rule 34}}'', is available now.
14
15----
16
17!!This book provides examples of:
18
19* FourOneNineScam: [[spoiler: An email which at first appears to be this (and in fact is dismissed as such by the spam filter) may actually be 100% truthful, revealing where the villain stashed his stolen money. [[FridgeBrilliance He might have even chosen the Nigeria Petroleum Bank precisely for its memetic role in this kind of scams]].]]
20* AlternateRealityGame: Elaine subscribes to a game called [=SPOOKS=], where the players get to live action role play as espionage agents performing various tasks. Jack used to play, but cancelled his subscription. [[spoiler: Turns out, it wasn't a game after all.]]
21* ArcWords: Potemkin Villages.
22* AugmentedReality: The main reason to wear [[GogglesDoSomethingUnusual glasses]] in this setting. They give travel directions, restaurant reviews, and even serve as a user interface for various video games. Of course, [[InterfaceScrew they can be messed with]] by someone with the right motivation and tools.
23* BecomingTheMask: [[spoiler: Jack and Elaine discovered that [=SPOOKS=] was a secret recruiting and training tool, and that they have been trained in all the spycraft skills they need.]]
24* BigBrotherIsWatching: Cameras everywhere, networked together. Somewhat subverted, in that facial recognition software is stated as being too CPU-intensive to actually be useful or anything to be concerned about. The cameras are only really useful for investigating crimes after the fact, or in concert with other technologies, like the phones that can track your location anywhere they can get a signal.
25** Also subverted, in that the ''police'' are being watched by Big Brother even more closely than anyone else: The cops are required to have cameras on their person running at all times to avoid being falsely accused of PoliceBrutality (and of course, to prevent cops from ''actually'' committing PoliceBrutality.) They also make great records of crime scene investigations and witness interviews and what not.
26* BrickJoke: The chair from Jack's introduction, and [[UnreliableNarrator Jack's inability to remember the circumstances around it.]]
27* UsefulNotes/BritishCoppers: One of the main characters, Sue, is a uniformed Scottish constable working in Edinburgh. She ends up spending much of the book attached to Detective Inspector Liz Kavanaugh, a plainclothes cop.
28* TheCallKnowsWhereYouLive: [[spoiler: Jack and Elaine did not end up involved in the plot purely by chance.]]
29* TheCavalry: Sue and her partner link up with Jack and Elaine towards the end, having been ordered to track them down and protect them from the bad guys. [[spoiler: They are distracted by a flashmob set up by the villain, allowing him to get past them to try and go after Jack and Elaine, but return once he has been subdued.]]
30* ChekhovsGun: [[spoiler: The broadsword that Elaine finds she has bought on a whim[[note]]Or did she?[[/note]] while on a alcohol-fueled tourist tour of Edinburgh on her first day after arriving in Scotland. The [=SPOOKS=] game as well.]]
31** ChekhovsSkill: [[spoiler: Elaine's swordfighting skill, and the fact that Jack used to be a game programmer who created various black-hat network tools for his former employers.]]
32* CoolShades: Everybody wears computerized glasses that connect to their cell phones to provide them with a wide variety of information, ranging from video game interfaces to visualiations of bus routes, reviews of businesses that the wearer is looing at, and even tactical information for police officers during raids. [[spoiler: Towards the end of the book, the glasses become a liability when the cops' computer network is compromised, but a few of the younger cops continue wearing their deactivated glasses out of habit.]]
33* CorruptCorporateExecutive: Suspicion quickly homes in on the top echelons of Hayek Associates, since they're the most probable leakers. [[spoiler:It turns to be a particularly greedy executive who had hedged 26 million pounds ''against'' his own company, much to Jack and Elaine's confusion--after all, what executive would bet against a Potemkin company backed by the British security services that he was paid to manage? Turned out, Hackman didn't know that British intel was using the company as a front; he just saw a profitable place to betray.]]
34* DarkSecret: Jack is [[spoiler: a registered sex offender, due to a poorly written law that classified both him and his girlfriend in high school as being pedophiles because they were underage and making out with each other.]]
35** [[spoiler: More importantly, his entire surviving family died years before in a car accident and he has been living in denial with the help of an online service that simulates them still being alive and interacting with him.]]
36* DeadAllAlong: [[spoiler: Jack's "kidnapped" niece. His sister and her daughters were killed in a traffic accident years before, and he had been living in denial with the help of an AlternateRealityGame tailored to people like him.]]
37* EverythingIsOnline: Your computer, your cell phone, the taxi cab, the police, your glasses, and [[spoiler: your spies. [[ParanoiaFuel And the other side's spies.]]]] The characters end up having to go through pains to go off the grid and avoid being tracked or listened in on.
38* ExtendedDisarming: Jack, when told to leave his electronic devices outside a secret meeting.
39* FanOfThePast: Elaine, who practices swordfighting in her free time.
40* ForeignQueasine: In one scene, Jack, Elaine, and a third character go to a restaurant that serves an "Authentic Scottish Breakfast". Note that Edinburgh native Jack digs in with gusto, while Londoner Elaine manages to go through the entire meal having only eaten a few bites of her mostly-fried greasy food.
41* ForensicAccounting: Elaine's specialty, being sent in by the insurance company to ensure that the reported robbery isn't just one of their customers trying to cover up some [[WhiteCollarCrime shady financial practices]].
42* GenreBlind: All three main characters, to varying degrees, though they all start catching up quick. Sue's narration explicitly indicates that she is furiously taking notes and actively doing research on many of the things she is unfamiliar with, particularly the technology side of things.
43* {{Greed}}: [[spoiler:Had one of Red Team's members not gotten greedy and tried to line his own pockets, no one would have even noticed the Chinese infiltration.]]
44* GogglesDoSomethingUnusual: The glasses that everyone wears are equipped for AugmentedReality. [[spoiler: The police are forced to operate without theirs when they realize their network has been compromised and they can no longer trust any of the information their glasses present them with.]]
45* TheHandler: [[spoiler:Barry Michaels, who helped to run SPOOKS, and who recruits both Elaine and Jack to help hunt down the leak.]]
46* IHaveYourWife: Jack receives a series of messages that eventually reveal that his niece has been kidnapped, but that nothing will happen to her if he walks away from the investigation. [[spoiler: It doesn't quite work as planned, see DeadAllAlong.]]
47* IKnowMortalKombat: [[spoiler: Jack and Elaine unwittingly became trained espionage agents, due to playing an AlternateRealityGame covertly developed by the Secret Service specifically for this.]]
48* InterfaceScrew: The fancy AugmentedReality glasses worn by everybody turn out to be susceptible to various electronic attacks, rendering them useless.
49* JumpedAtTheCall: Elaine, once she fully understands what is going on, partially on the grounds that she's a target anyways so she might as well draw a full-time paycheck for it. Jack is far more hesitant, but is talked into it by Elaine.
50* TheMenInBlack: [[InvokedTrope Invoked]] by Kemal's Europol team, and then subverted when they turn out to be going off half-cocked, raiding [[spoiler: a secret server farm run by the British Secret Service, which would have been avoided if they had [[PoorCommunicationKills bothered to call ahead]] before swooping in.]]
51* NeverBringAGunToAKnifeFight: Jack chases after a suspected bad guy while both are playing the same AugmentedReality fantasy role-playing game. They get into a fight, where Jack's character (a [[ShotgunsAreJustBetter blunderbuss-wielding]] [[BearsAreBadNews bipedal bear]]) unloads with a virtual BFG. Much to his surprise, his opponent, playing a far weaker character, opts to go for a weak dagger attack instead. [[spoiler: Which turns out to have been a ''real'' dagger attack. Jack doesn't realize it right away because the knife got embedded in a folding keyboard he had in his pocket.]]
52* NoodleIncident: As Jack is showing Elaine around in the online world:
53-->'''Jack''': That's Hell. Don't worry about it, it's just a little joke that got out of hand."
54* NotMyDriver: Many of the taxis in this day and age are remote-controlled, and Jack and Elaine are kidnapped by a hijacked cab. They have to figure out how to escape before the cab can get them out into the country and find a convenient bridge to drive off of. It turns out that there have been a recent rash of deaths caused this way.
55* OohMeAccentsSlipping: InUniverse, several of the Scottish cops slip into thicker accents if they are stressed.
56* PaidForFamily: A virtual version is invoked in [[spoiler:Jack's sister and niece who have been dead for years]].
57* PocketProtector: [[spoiler: Jack's]] life is saved by one of ''many'' pieces of tech gadgetry he habitually carries around with him.
58* PoliceAreUseless: Sue can't help but notice that she is entirely unqualified to deal with the sort of problems the plot forces upon her. She is dragged along for the ride because she was the cop on the scene, and spends the entire book trying to catch up. The Scottish police officers get to see this trope on a different scale when a team from [=EuroPol=] swoop in unannounced, make a huge mess, and then leave, further escalating the situation without doing much to help. That said, the police investigation does eventually allow for Sue to be on the scene when the BigBad is revealed [[spoiler: and to help when Jack is shot]]. Most of the shortcomings that Sue suffers in dealing with the plot is simply a lack of training.
59* {{Pun}}: Jack's online avatar is a shotgun-wielding bear. He states that he believes in the [[UsefulNotes/AmericanGunPolitics Right To Keep And Arm Bears]]. [[LamePunReaction He then waits for the obligatory groan]].
60* TheReveal: [[spoiler: Jack's niece hasn't been kidnapped. He knows this because she's been dead for years, but he's been paying a company to simulate his sister and nieces still being alive and interacting with him so he could live in denial.]]
61* ShoutOut: Jack uses his Augumented Reality glasses to enliven a bus ride with "a wee dip into [[Literature/{{Discworld}} Ankh-Morpork]]". In addition to being a Creator/TerryPratchett shout out, it may also be a nod at ''Literature/RainbowsEnd'' by Creator/VernorVinge, which also features an AR based on the Disc.
62* SocialEngineering: Sue is very good at this, using her status as a cop to make people nervous and see what information she can get out of them. However, she is hoping to find someone who will go on the defensive and be uncooperative with her, such a person being most likely to be in on the crime. To her ongoing chagrin, she keeps finding people who will bend over backward to help her in any way they can, providing her with lots of useless information.
63%%zce* SpyFiction: Stale Scottish beer.
64* UnreliableNarrator: Lampshaded. Later in the book, Jack can't remember if the chair was on fire or not at the beginning of the story.
65* UnwittingPawn: DiscussedTrope: Most of the footwork in espionage work is done by "Useful Idiots", people performing specific tasks (delivering a package, installing a piece of networking hardware, etc.) without any larger context for them to realize the signficance of their actions. [[spoiler: Both Jack and Elaine fit this category, with the intelligence services grooming them for potential official employment.]]
66* ViolentGlaswegian: Never seen, but much of Sue's thoughts concern an increasingly neglected case of one such fellow that she really needs to do the paperwork on once she finishes dealing with this case.
67* WeWillUseWikiWordsInTheFuture: The computer network that all of the cops are connected to is called [=CopSpace=], functioning in pretty much the exact same way as many of the {{Alternate Reality Game}}s that the various civilians play.
68* WhatAreRecords: Late in the story, the fact that nobody keeps paper around becomes an issue for the cops [[spoiler: when they are forced to go entirely off the net because their entire system has been compromised and they can no longer use any of their computers or official phones.]]
69* WhiteCollarCrime: Much of the work that Jack used to do was along these lines, developing "[[InsistentTerminology Stress Testing]]" tools to crash the servers of competing companies to motivate customers to use their products instead. [[spoiler: Ultimately, it ends up being the motivation for the villain to unwittingly ally himself with Team Red, and by extension, the Guoanbu.]]

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