The Invisible
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
In the corrupt city-state of New Babylon, a detective navigates political intrigue and a deadly new drug.
City Commissioner Georg Ratner is tasked with fighting the spread of Synth, a hallucinogenic drug, during a heated election. When an old colleague is murdered while seeking Ratner's help, he is drawn into a web of political conspiracy. Supported by his partner Laura and the Egyptian goddess Nut, Ratner must uncover the truth behind the Synth and the murder, even if it means risking everything.
Will Ratner expose the dark secrets of New Babylon before it's too late? This neo-noir thriller explores themes of power, corruption, and alternate realities, perfect for fans of dystopian fiction and hard-boiled detectives.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The gritty eighth novel in Doubinsky's City-States series (after 2018's Missing Signal) presents an intriguing mystery but underwhelms with a shallowly explored near-future Earth and a less-than-memorable hero. New Babylon is awash in a potent drug called Synth and City Commissioner Georg Ratner, a former cop, is looking into the source of the drug's sudden popularity. Then Ratner's old partner on the force is murdered. Ratner's investigations into both the drug and the death are told in short, staccato bursts. Each section is titled after a tarot card, followed by a strange, associative string of descriptors with seemingly little bearing on each other or the larger plot: "The High Priestess: Love is in the air. The desire of gardening. Feeling superstitious. The possibility of understanding something not yet asked. A blowjob. Something divine." This formal conceit is distracting at best and confounding at worst. And, while Doubinsky teases some striking changes that have occurred in his imagined future, he does little to develop them for those first entering the world of the series with this installment. Readers will be left unsatisfied.
