You could have been a goddess, and instead you chose to be a slave.

Vol lives in a dystopian world. She works as a Player in a Game Tower - a place where tourists (called Marks by the Players) come to play virtual reality games, gamble in casinos, and watch holodramas (some of which are recordings of previously played games).

Vol's job isn't exactly glamourous, but it pays. Not well, but in a world like this, you do what you have to.

Vol's life turns a little topsy turvy when a man she runs into in an elevator treats her in an overly familiar manner and all around freaks her out. She starts having black outs and dreams that are memories she can't quite grasp.

And whatever is going on follows her into the games.

Vol is struggling to figure out what the hell is going on with her, suspecting this strange man - Catan - of stalking her and messing with her, because with the information she has, that's what makes sense. Except Catan thinks that she is messing with him and Vol thinks she's going mad.

It might have been better if she was.

The Regent wanted Coliseum games a la Rome, but with a twist:

He learned about an ancient civilization that pitted soldiers against soldiers, other animals, and death traps meant to inflict agonizing pain upon failure. All for the entertainment of an audience of thousands. We already had the Gaming Coliseum. Someone came up with the brilliant idea of designing a new race - one with the intellect and rights of animals - for military men to fight and slaughter in the arenas.

But it wasn't that easy. It never is when you play with people's lives, is it? The Regents plan backfired.

It worked, but too well. Once set into action, the race was difficult to stop. They almost never lost.

And the Regent destroyed the country he had commissioned to build this new race. Easier to silence a man with a bomb than a bribe.

But they didn't all die.

Volera has been haunting herself the entire book. Building games of her memories without knowing it, her personality fractured because of what she is: A Voluntary Eradicator. A killing machine.

Nobody took into account that the ultimate killing machines would have little use for a conscience. But they did, because they had been cloned - and their genetic template had been taken from - humans.

The killing fractured the new race's personalities, forcing them to create a self that could handle the destruction, the pain, the cold-blooded murder.

Volera's mind has been manipulated. Her memories toyed with. And now that she knows, can she pick up the pieces? I don't know yet, I have to wait for the second book! NENIA!!

My only problem with this book is that the last chapter is pretty much entirely an info dump. It's an interesting info dump, but it's very heavy on the telling. It works pretty well, but I wish there'd been a little less...well, info dump. Hehe.

Over all, this was a brilliant story. I was kept guessing, my theories roiling in my brain as I read, hoping I was right, wondering what other information was going to get thrown at us next.

The world is well crafted - both the real and the virtual.

And I really cannot wait for the second book!

Life is the ultimate game, and its rules were made to be broken.