Derek Taylor is an operative of the National Security Agency who has assumed the identity of a friend who was murdered, apparently during a liaison with Taylor's girlfriend. His background involves activity with a terrorist organization, and plot twists abound. A rogue AI program, SLVIA, is missing from an NSA laboratory, and Taylor has it. SLVIA warns Taylor that an AI program developed by the Chinese may break "the fifth seal of end-time prophecy." A defective AI program, released by people whose access to information is at the highest level, is added to the chaos. The end of the world may be coming unless Taylor and the woman sent to investigate him for his terrorist activities can fix all the problems in time. The two have something of an antipathy to working together. SLVIA is vulnerable, as well, but there is no choice. The sense of dead ends that introduce beginnings is common throughout the narrative.

There are many strengths in the development of the story. For all of its drama, the situations line up in real time and places. The characters display emotion as well as logic, trauma, and a certain type of patriotism as they work against personal danger and, ultimately, global annihilation. The agencies and departments referenced, such as the CIA, the US Congress, National Security Agency, and Artificial Intelligence Task Force, are genuine, and aspects of the story relate to some actual data. The themes of dystopia, illustrated by deception and chaos, are introduced in the book's first pages. A nerve-wracking thriller, the book is well researched and presented with brilliance.

RECOMMENDED by the US Review

Return to USR Home