Rabbits (Review)
Posted: Fri Feb 18, 2022 3:34 am
There is a game you've never heard of. It's discussed among the players in the dusty parts of the dark web. It's been played 10 times, or "cycles" since 1959. A cycle begins with the appearance of the phrase "the door is open." It ends when the winner's screename appears in the circle of winners. Anyone can play. None of the players know the rules. None of the players knows how to win. None of the players knows for sure when they are playing and when they are not. But the first step in each cycle is to find a way "in" to the game. Players have to watch for and notice coincidences. The right coincidences will lead them to an anomaly. The anomaly will point to the way to get in. Or not. The players call the game "Rabbits."
Rabbits is Terry Miles' roller coaster ride through the clandestine world of obsessed Rabbits players. It's in the the same universe as his podcast of the same title, but tells a new story about new players. K, like all players is obsessed with the game. He has a talent for finding coincidences. And losing time. He and his fellow players are scrutinizing every detail of everything for the sign that the 11th cycle has begun, when the guy rumored to have won the 6th cycle shows up at his door. He tells K that something is wrong with the game and he needs K's help to fix it before the 11th cycle starts or else they're all screwed. Then he disappears. And bad things start to happen,
Miles is a prairie boy from Moose Jaw who migrated to the Pacific Northwest. He writes, produces and directs films. He plays music. And he makes some of my favorite fiction podcasts. They are all tied to the Public Radio Alliance, a fictional public radio station in Seattle. He voices Nic Silver, producer at the PRA, who also hosts some of the shows. My favorite is Tanis, Nic Silver's investigation into what he thinks might be the world's last great mystery -- the myth of Tanis. In the first episode he asks: What is Tanis? And, well, it's complicated. Five seasons complicated, with one to come. It's some kind of earth-adjacent place that people can access from the forest near Olympia, Washington. Or something. And lots of shadowy figures are very interested in it. There are cults, isolation tanks, conspiracies, cryptic government agencies, conspiracy theories, and a cabin in a place called the Calm. The story and characters are weird and wonderful and secretive and menacing. The protagonists, Nic and his hacker friend Meerkatnip, are like people I'd like to BS with in a bar for a couple of days. The pace is relaxing, and I've used lots of episodes as bedtime stories to fall asleep to.
The others are Rabbits (Carly's friend disappears, leading her down the Rabbit hole), The Last Movie (Nic and MK investigate a movie rumored to drive everyone who views it insane), and Faerie (An investigation into a secret department of the EPA that protects a very secret endangered species). There is also The Black Tapes, which is billed as the only "fictional" podcast in the bunch. It could have been the best of them all, but main character up and moved to Sweden or something as the multi-season plot was building up steam for the climax, and they cobbled together and ending that is the suckiest ending ever to destroy a great story. It was painful. Scratch your eyes out painful. So, do not, under any circumstances, listen to The Black Tapes. You'd be better off watching The Last Movie. You've been warned.
Oh, yeah. Rabbits, the book. I'd give it two thumbs up, but rabbits don't have thumbs.
But now, just as I was about to say something about Synchronicity, my phone began playing Synchronicity II, which means I must be off to the Police Station, looking for a young girl holding a copy of that book by Nabokov.
Rabbits is Terry Miles' roller coaster ride through the clandestine world of obsessed Rabbits players. It's in the the same universe as his podcast of the same title, but tells a new story about new players. K, like all players is obsessed with the game. He has a talent for finding coincidences. And losing time. He and his fellow players are scrutinizing every detail of everything for the sign that the 11th cycle has begun, when the guy rumored to have won the 6th cycle shows up at his door. He tells K that something is wrong with the game and he needs K's help to fix it before the 11th cycle starts or else they're all screwed. Then he disappears. And bad things start to happen,
Miles is a prairie boy from Moose Jaw who migrated to the Pacific Northwest. He writes, produces and directs films. He plays music. And he makes some of my favorite fiction podcasts. They are all tied to the Public Radio Alliance, a fictional public radio station in Seattle. He voices Nic Silver, producer at the PRA, who also hosts some of the shows. My favorite is Tanis, Nic Silver's investigation into what he thinks might be the world's last great mystery -- the myth of Tanis. In the first episode he asks: What is Tanis? And, well, it's complicated. Five seasons complicated, with one to come. It's some kind of earth-adjacent place that people can access from the forest near Olympia, Washington. Or something. And lots of shadowy figures are very interested in it. There are cults, isolation tanks, conspiracies, cryptic government agencies, conspiracy theories, and a cabin in a place called the Calm. The story and characters are weird and wonderful and secretive and menacing. The protagonists, Nic and his hacker friend Meerkatnip, are like people I'd like to BS with in a bar for a couple of days. The pace is relaxing, and I've used lots of episodes as bedtime stories to fall asleep to.
The others are Rabbits (Carly's friend disappears, leading her down the Rabbit hole), The Last Movie (Nic and MK investigate a movie rumored to drive everyone who views it insane), and Faerie (An investigation into a secret department of the EPA that protects a very secret endangered species). There is also The Black Tapes, which is billed as the only "fictional" podcast in the bunch. It could have been the best of them all, but main character up and moved to Sweden or something as the multi-season plot was building up steam for the climax, and they cobbled together and ending that is the suckiest ending ever to destroy a great story. It was painful. Scratch your eyes out painful. So, do not, under any circumstances, listen to The Black Tapes. You'd be better off watching The Last Movie. You've been warned.
Oh, yeah. Rabbits, the book. I'd give it two thumbs up, but rabbits don't have thumbs.
But now, just as I was about to say something about Synchronicity, my phone began playing Synchronicity II, which means I must be off to the Police Station, looking for a young girl holding a copy of that book by Nabokov.