The Restoration Game

'...a video game espionage novel where MacLeod deftly mixes Eastern European intrigue with underground gamer culture to create a terrific political thriller. MacLeod is one of io9's chief muses, and his work is a big reason I fell in love with science fiction again after many years away from it' - IO9'This is a writer at the peak of his powers.' - SFXThere is no such place as Krassnia. Lucy Stone should know - she was born there.
In that tiny, troubled region of the former Soviet Union, revolution is brewing. Its organisers need a safe place to meet, and where better than the virtual spaces of an online game? Lucy, who works for a start-up games company in Edinburgh, has a project that almost seems made for the job: its original inspiration came from The Krassniad - an epic tale, based on Krassnian folklore, concocted by Lucy's mother who studied there in the 1980s.
As Lucy digs up details about her birthplace to slot into the game, she finds her interest in the open secrets of her family's past - and the darker secrets of Krassnia's - has not gone unnoticed. When a Russian - Georgian border war breaks out, Lucy has to move fast - and return to Krassnia herself, to the heart of the mountain that holds Krassnia's darkest and oldest secret. But nothing Lucy has discovered can possibly prepare her for the crucial role she is destined to play in The Restoration Game .