Off to Be the Wizard Book Review: A Programmer Finds a File That Controls Reality and Does Exactly What You'd Do

Rating: ★★★★★

"Off to Be the Wizard" Book Review:

Off to Be the Wizard asks one of the best questions in comedy sci-fi: what if a computer programmer discovered that reality is a simulation, found the source code, and immediately used it to give himself wizard powers in medieval England? Martin Banks is that programmer, and he is exactly as irresponsible as that premise suggests.

Martin discovers a file — just a plain text file, hidden on a server — that contains entries for every object and person in reality. Change a number, change reality. He gives himself more money. He makes himself taller. He nearly breaks everything. When the authorities come knocking, he does the only rational thing: he teleports himself to medieval England, where he poses as a wizard.

Except he's not the first programmer to discover the file. Medieval England is already populated with other hackers who found the same exploit, set themselves up as Merlin-style wizards, and have been living there for years. They've built a whole society around it — wizard training, wizard politics, wizard jurisdictions. Martin has to earn his place among them while someone in their ranks is using the file for genuinely dangerous purposes.

Scott Meyer's humor is dry, nerdy, and relentlessly clever. The magic system — which is literally just command-line scripting — is both hilarious and internally consistent. The medieval villagers' reactions to the wizards are priceless. The relationship between Martin and his mentor Phillip, a fellow time-displaced programmer, carries the emotional weight of the story without ever getting heavy.

Luke Daniels narrates, and he is a perfect match for this material. His comic timing is impeccable, and he differentiates the large cast of nerd-wizards with enough character to keep them straight without making them cartoons.

Four stars. The most fun I've had with a premise since Hitchhiker's Guide.

<h2> If You Liked Off to Be the Wizard, Try:

• The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams — The gold standard for comedy science fiction. If you haven't read it, start here.

• Ready Player One by Ernest Cline — Another love letter to nerd culture wrapped in a clever premise. Different tone, same demographic.

• NPCs by Drew Hayes — Tabletop RPG characters discover their players have died and have to complete the quest themselves. Same meta-humor, different game.

From Luke Stoffel's Bookshelf

If you enjoyed this book review, check out How to Win a Million Dollars — a story about someone who also discovered the cheat codes to a system everyone else was playing straight, sharing Off to Be the Wizard's discovery that hacking reality is easier than dealing with the consequences.

Learn More: How to Win One Million Dollars and Shit Glitter

How to Win One Million Dollars and Shit Glitter by Luke Stoffel