THREE GRAMS OF ELSEWHERE

In this speculative novel set in a postwar future, a retired detective/government operative comes out of retirement to solve the murders of several people who, like him, possess remarkable mental powers.

Giesler, the author of The Nothing Within (2019), sets this tale of futuristic intrigue at the end of the 21st century and the beginning of the 22nd. The United States no longer exists after a violent second civil war that resulted in a “mosaic” of independent regions, now uneasily at peace. Harmony “Bibi” Cain lives in a Wisconsin retirement community in a minination called the Northstar States of America. His mild, retro lifestyle of bicycling and reading printed books (including Octavia E. Butler’s 1993 novel, Parable of the Sower) obscures the fact that he once had a tumultuous career as a detective and, before that, was involved in government mind-based weapons projects. Bibi’s brain structure granted him a sort of psychic insight and empathy with other living things; this, in turn, led to him being part of a project to exploit the human pons adexterum—a mysterious, three-gram part of the brain that, it turns out, can command advanced drones called “motes.” Thanks to Bibi’s particular skills, the Northstar held its own in battle during the Mosaic War. But now, in 2099, he wants to withdraw from the noises in his head; he takes an illegal narcotic called kali to find solace. Meanwhile, the Northstar government is using the project’s technology to join billions of people around the world in online “lynks.” A deadly attack by motes and other drones targets those who happen to share Bibi’s rare powers; the flying automatons can remove neural matter with fiendish efficiency. Is Bibi next on the hit list? As tensions heighten across borders, Bibi reunites with old colleagues, rivals, and lovers to look into what’s going on.

The novel has elements of a trendy cyberpunk action yarn: man-machine interfaces, femmes fatales, techno-assassins, betrayals, rogue AIs, and so on. However, Giesler’s aims appear to be more ambitious than providing a simple genre exercise. He devotes many pages to the thoughtful hero’s introspection and ruminations, and action takes a back seat to descriptions of the ethical, mental, and psychological effects of hyperdeveloped empathy: “Whoever I’m around, however they’re feeling, I’m always experiencing them. I have no choice but to deal with them all the time.” Moreover, Giesler relates the narrative in an intricate, semifragmented fashion, moving back and forth chronologically. Some parts consist of transcribed interviews of a documentarian trying to uncover the truth about an apparently deceased Bibi; others are narrated by Bibi himself, who appears to be having an intimate conversation with an unspecified lynked individual; and still others are excerpts from in-universe published texts. The open ending may frustrate expectations of readers who might desire more conclusive, action-oriented material, à la The Matrix, and less philosophical pondering about the pons and God. But many SF fans will appreciate an older-than-usual main character with romantic partners who are roughly the same age.

A brainy near-future SF novel of exploited neurons and expanding consciousness.