BLACKQUEST 40

A software engineer suspects the company overseeing mandatory corporate training harbors a nefarious agenda in this techno-thriller.

From the beginning, Deb Bollinger refuses to take part in Blackquest 40, the training exercise for Codewise Solutions in San Francisco. She’s far too busy, having just launched her app, Carebnb, which she designed to help homeless individuals locate the nearest available “host bed.” It’s a personal project for Deb, as she spent a homeless childhood with her mother, who eventually developed schizophrenia. But Deb isn’t able to verify Carebnb’s functionality when Elite Development, which is running Blackquest 40, blocks data and cellphone traffic. She quickly learns how serious Elite is about ensuring that everyone stays for the entirety of the exercise’s 40-hour duration. When Deb tries leaving the building, an Elite employee physically prevents her from departing. Deb is convinced her mentor, Codewise CEO Susan Wright, the person who hired her, will oppose Elite’s paramilitary techniques. Unfortunately, Susan is currently out of the country on business. On site is Carter Kotanchek, CFO and company co-founder (with Susan and Paul Gribbe), who believes Elite’s certification of Codewise will drum up much-needed revenue. But Deb has other plans: She looks for a way to bypass Elite’s cyberobstructions. But with few friends at Codewise, she’s largely on her own. Surprisingly, she finds indications that Elite is not only deceitful, but also considerably more dangerous than she initially surmised. Rather than searching for escape, Deb opts for sticking around to foil whatever sinister scheme Elite is cooking up. Many readers will spot resemblances between this book and the popular 1988 action film Die Hard. Deb, for one, is a loner in a building filled with workers who are essentially hostages, and she stealthily crawls around HVAC ducts. But Bond’s (The Winner Maker, 2018) twisty tale ultimately takes on a life of its own, especially as Deb gets closer to learning what exactly Elite is after. The novel is jampacked with coding jargon, most of which will make little or no sense to novices. Nevertheless, the tale is coherent, as it’s clear, for example, that Elite wants Codewise employees to build software on a very strict deadline. Coupled with the author’s intelligent prose is his visual storytelling: Elite employees wear yellow shirts, providing Deb (and readers) with a bright and simple way to identify villains. As a protagonist, Deb is resourceful and physically capable (in defiance of her “hundred-odd pounds”), though her loner status seems self-imposed. But she’s the first to acknowledge her flaws, and she reluctantly warms up to someone who becomes an unlikely ally. At the same time, Deb’s first-person narration is brisk, gleefully snarky, and filled with indelible metaphors. “The relief that sweeps through me is water through a burning home,” she muses, while later observing that a particular “noise is tin cans off the back of a Just Married car.” There are several plot turns throughout the tale; readers will likely guess one well before it happens, but others are less predictable.

A clever, spirited story with a brainy, nimble heroine at the helm.