A riveting tale with globe-circling, cloak-and-cyber skulduggery and strong Bible code underpinnings.
A computer security expert learns from an amazing secret ally that biblical end times prophecies are coming true as Chinese, Russian, and American sins edge the world toward war.
Debut author Morris spins a global conspiracy cyberthriller with threads drawn from both well-worn sources (the book of Revelation) and breaking news out of Washington, D.C. In 1995, hacker prodigy Cary Nolan, having meddled with the sinister secret-society affairs of New World Order elite Andre Strauss, is targeted for death. Strauss mistakenly kills not only Nolan’s lover, Bianca Troon, but also his best friend and computer partner, Derek Taylor, while Taylor and Bianca are in post-coital bliss together. Shattered, Nolan switches identities with Taylor and, 26 years later, perpetuates the ruse as a maverick tech-security contractor to the National Security Agency. Know that this is an alt-2021 in which a controversial, reckless, Russia-manipulated, power-mad president—Donald Trump is never mentioned but there’s no doubt who the “stable genius” is—has been reelected. He lusts for a third term amid a post-pandemic recession and international chaos. As events unfurl against a devastating Chinese computer-virus attack (and Strauss’ machinations), Taylor/Nolan is investigated by beautiful Navy Lt. Jennifer Scott for his ties to rogue hackers. He goes on the run with the attractive enemy. Among the secrets he keeps from Jenn: His partner in the hacker underground is not human but a top-secret, escaped, sentient software program called SLVIA. SLVIA lately has been bombarding Taylor/Nolan with Scripture, reasoning that the Bible end times verses compute as accurate and are coming to pass as allegories of geopolitical upheaval and corruption. Verily, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than to count all the Bible prophecy/apocalypse novels out there. But Morris’ specimen stands out for not being conservative-megachurch recruiting material (instead blasting the alt-right Trump GOP and QAnon believers something fierce) and for coordinating a grandly indulgent, globe-trotting narrative in the Dan Brown/Iris Johansen style. The novel brims with wild characters, exotic settings, a skillful embroidering of CNN headlines, and mind-blowing concepts, into which the religious stuff fits snugly. Readers may heed the spiritual messages (if any) or just go along for the ride. It does seem a little unfair to poor Trump, though. Without his insane reign, this story wouldn’t feel half as terrifyingly plausible.
A riveting tale with globe-circling, cloak-and-cyber skulduggery and strong Bible code underpinnings.Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-73572-860-5
Page Count: 434
Publisher: Bowker Identifier Services
Review Posted Online: April 2, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
A pulpy throwback that shines a light on abuses even magic can’t erase.
Hung out to dry by the elders who betrayed them, a squad of pregnant teens fights back with old magic.
Hendrix has a flair for applying inventive hooks to horror, and this book has a good one, chock-full with shades of V.C. Andrews, The Handmaid’s Tale, and Foxfire, to name a few. Our narrator, Neva Craven, is 15 and pregnant, a fate worse than death in the American South circa 1970. She’s taken by force to Wellwood House in Florida, a secretive home for unwed mothers where she’s given the name Fern. She’ll have the baby secretly and give it up for adoption, whether she likes it or not. Under the thumb of the house’s cruel mistress, Miss Wellwood, and complicit Dr. Vincent, Neva forges cautious alliance with her fellow captives—a new friend, Zinnia; budding revolutionary Rose; and young Holly, raped and impregnated by the very family minister slated to adopt her child. All seems lost until the arrival of a mysterious bookmobile and its librarian, Miss Parcae, who gives the girls an actual book of spells titled How To Be a Groovy Witch. There’s glee in seeing the powerless granted some well-deserved payback, but Hendrix never forgets his sweet spot, lacing the story with body horror and unspeakable cruelties that threaten to overwhelm every little victory. In truth, it’s not the paranormal elements that make this blast from the past so terrifying—although one character evolves into a suitably scary antagonist near the end—but the unspeakable, everyday atrocities leveled at children like these. As the girls lose their babies one by one, they soon devote themselves to secreting away Holly and her child. They get some help late in the game but for the most part they’re on their own, trapped between forces of darkness and society’s merciless judgement.
A pulpy throwback that shines a light on abuses even magic can’t erase.Pub Date: Jan. 14, 2025
ISBN: 9780593548981
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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