Publisher Description
The Consortium is All. But Recorder Can No Longer Obey.
Recorder has no family, no friends, and no name. Donated to the Consortium before birth, her sole purpose is to maintain and verify the records. A neural implant and drone ensure compliance, punishing for displays of bias.
Suddenly cut off from controlling technology, Recorder tastes what it means to be human. But if the Consortium discovers her feelings, everyone she knows will be in danger.
With no name, no resources, and only an infinitesimal possibility of escape, Recorder's time is running out.
"McCrumb achieves a fascinating coming-of-age story in a convincing far-future technical milieu containing credible characters with consistent and powerful motivations. Readers looking for hard science fiction with heart should snap this up." - Publishers Weekly
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
McCrumb's stirring debut and Children of the Consortium trilogy launch features an unusual, nameless heroine, who was gifted to a totalitarian far-future government in utero to become one of its "recorders," mentally implanted, drone-controlled thought police who, deprived of all human emotion, observe, report, and assess the activities of all other citizens. Her first assignment after completing training is a space station rescue mission that goes horribly wrong: most of the station's occupants are already dead, and the drone that controls the heroine is destroyed by a giant cockroach, leaving her vulnerable to forbidden emotions. She begins to feel for the civilian members of the rescue crew, who gradually befriend her despite her off-putting chilliness, among them a young man who comes to care for her deeply. She also uncovers a mystery involving murder and sabotage, which her developing human morality forces her to solve, even at the risk of her own destruction. McCrumb achieves a fascinating coming-of-age story in a convincing far-future technical milieu containing credible characters with consistent and powerful motivations. Readers looking for hard science fiction with heart should snap this up.
