A01=Rob Swigart
Author_Rob Swigart
Category=FV
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eq_historical-fiction
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Product details
- ISBN 9780759108790
- Weight: 422g
- Dimensions: 159 x 227mm
- Publication Date: 20 May 2005
- Publisher: AltaMira Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
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Professor Van Weathers has just revolutionized the teaching of Maya archaeology. His lifelike computer simulation XibalbO Gate places his students in the world of the Late Classic Maya, where political strife, overpopulation, warfare, and social disorganization are in evidence in the soon-to-collapse civilization. Weathers' real life is also under strain— his wife is disenchanted, his son a cynic, his students disinterested, his excavation project blocked by a mysterious Latin American holding company. No wonder he loses himself in the world of King Knot Eye of Xultunich for days on end. But the real world problems magnify-a murder, an illness, an explosion— while he tries to negotiate a treaty with a neighboring city, marry the king's daughter, and engage in a bloodletting ceremony to right a world out of balance. Can he solve the rapidly-merging problems of his virtual world and the modern one while the Nine Lords of XibalbO, rulers of the Maya underworld, are on the loose? This novel/textbook by noted writer and futurist Rob Swigart offers both an accurate reconstruction of Maya life for introductory archaeology students and an entertaining read for those interested in the Maya world.
Rob Swigart is a research affiliate at the Institute for the Future in Menlo Park, CA, and author of eight novels. He develops scenarios and vignettes for Fortune 500 companies. Published novels include Little America, The Time Trip (both from Houghton Mifflin) and The Book of Revelations (Dutton). An interactive novel, Portal, was published by Activision in 1986 on computer disk, and two years later in 'hard copy' by St. Martins Press. He co-authored, with Robert Johansen, Upsizing the Individual in the Downsized Organization (Addison-Wesley), a book about the changing role of the individual in the new global business climate. His CD-ROM of short fiction, Down Time, is available from Eastgate.com, as is Directions, an electronic poem. An interactive fiction titled About Time resides at www.wordcircuits.com. He is secretary of the board of the Electronic Literature Organization (eliterature.org). He has had a lifelong passion for archaeology and is interested in using narrative to tell the stories of the past as found in the archaeological record.
