Publisher: Ballantine Books
Published Date: July 12, 2022
Genre: Sci-Fi, Thriller
Rating: ★★★☆☆
REVIEW
This is the third sci-fi thriller standalone that I've read from Crouch, with the other two being Dark Matter and Recursion. Both of those I rated five stars, with the latter being my favorite of the two. I had a feeling I would either love this book as well or just feel meh about it. I am disappointed to say that it fell more towards being just a middle of the road book.
SYNOPSIS
"'You are the next step in human evolution.'
At first, Logan Ramsay isn’t sure if anything’s different. He just feels a little . . . sharper. Better able to concentrate. Better at multitasking. Reading a bit faster, memorizing better, needing less sleep.
But before long, he can’t deny it: Something’s happening to his brain. To his body. He’s starting to see the world, and those around him—even those he loves most—in whole new ways.
The truth is, Logan’s genome has been hacked. And there’s a reason he’s been targeted for this upgrade. A reason that goes back decades to the darkest part of his past, and a horrific family legacy.
Worse still, what’s happening to him is just the first step in a much larger plan, one that will inflict the same changes on humanity at large—at a terrifying cost.
Because of his new abilities, Logan’s the one person in the world capable of stopping what’s been set in motion. But to have a chance at winning this war, he’ll have to become something other than himself. Maybe even something other than human.
And even as he’s fighting, he can’t help wondering: what if humanity’s only hope for a future really does lie in engineering our own evolution?"
MY THOUGHTS
Both of his other books felt refreshing. They were both fast paced and mysterious. With both of those, I couldn't figure out how it would end. Particularly with Recursion, I loved how we explored time travel in what felt like a completely new way. I felt like both the thriller aspect just didn't hit as hard. I thought the sci-fi element was there. And it was very poignant as gene editing is a real thing and there have been many ethical debates over what should and should not be allowed.
In this world, gene editing has been taking to new level, where you bioweapons have been created to target specific genes to hack. People also illegally edit their genetics in order to bring out certain traits. Logan has been "upgraded" against his wishes and has become something of a super human. That is pretty much where the sci-fi feel stops. The world is teasing at dystopian in the fact that the food people eat is fake and things like that, but Crouch didn't lean into that at all, instead choosing to focus on this cat-and-mouse chase between Logan and his sister.
Kara has also been upgraded and wants to go in a different direction than him. She wants to give the upgrade to everyone and see who survives in order to make a better humanity while Logan doesn't want to. It didn't really get "thrilling" until near the end and I thought the pacing throughout was very slow and repetitive.
Sadly, I don't feel like this lived up to his other two sci-fi thrillers. I didn't hate it by any means, but I had a hard time connecting to Logan. Perhaps that was because of the upgrade that he felt emotionless and apart from the world, while in the other two books I was easily able to get inside the main characters minds.
I did really enjoy the epilogue, however. It gave a great perspective on humanity as it stands now. We do very much have a compassion and empathy problem, especially in this country. Maybe if people decided to come together instead of tearing each other down, we could actually make a better place to live.
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