All That We See or Seem
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4.1 • 15 Ratings
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy Award–winning author Ken Liu's first sci-fi thriller, his most commercial, accessible, and action-packed outing yet.
Julia Z, a young woman who gained notoriety at 14 as the "orphan hacker," is trying to live a life of digital obscurity in a Boston suburb.
But when a lawyer named Piers, whose famous artist wife, Elli, has been kidnapped by dangerous criminals barges into her life, Julia decides to put the solitary life she has painstakingly recreated at risk as she can’t walk away from helping Piers and Elli, nor step away from the challenge of this digital puzzle. Elli is an onierofex, a dream artist, who can weave the dreams of an audience together through a shared virtual landscape, live, in a concert-like experience by tapping into each attendee’s waking dream and providing an emotionally resonant and narrative experience. While attendees’ dreams are anonymous, Julia discovers that Elli was also providing a one-on-one dream experience for the head of an international criminal enterprise, and he’s demanding his dreams in return for Elli.
Unraveling the real and unreal will lead Julia on an adventure that will take her across the country and deep into the shadows of her psyche. This is the first in a near-future science fiction thriller series.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This dazzling near-future mystery from Hugo winner Liu (Speaking Bones) sparkles with suspense, intensity, and effortless worldbuilding. Julia Z, a famous hacker and bounty hunter in her mid-20s, is contacted by lawyer Piers Negri to help track down his missing wife, dream guide Elli Krantz, who induces vivid dreams for paying audiences. When Julia declines, strange men appear outside her building in suburban New England, and she flees. Then a master criminal known as the Prince tells Piers and Julia that he has Elli, demanding Piers find and return something unspecified that Elli stole from the Prince if he wants her back. Victor, the Prince's right-hand man, is tasked with keeping track of Piers and Julia, who try to stay one step ahead of him as they work to find and free Elli. The trail of clues is long, dangerous, and littered with red herrings, sending Julia to a secret slave factory and revealing that certain members of the book's core cast are more entangled than they appear. Liu has a rare ability to flesh out sci-fi concepts—like Elli's dream art and Julia's talent for AI communication—with just a few words, and his pacing is pitch-perfect. This is another marvel from a perennially innovative author.
