The Merge
A Novel
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2.7 • 7 Ratings
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
A thrilling and ominously prophetic debut set in a world when Earth and its resources have been pushed to breaking point, giving rise to a revolutionary—and highly controversial—procedure in which two people’s consciousness can be combined to exist in one body.
How far would you go to never say goodbye?
Laurie is sixty-five and living with Alzheimer’s. Her daughter Amelia, a once fiery and strong-willed activist, can’t bear to see her mother’s mind fade. Faced with the reality of losing her forever, Amelia signs them up to take part in the world’s first experimental merging process for Alzheimer’s patients, in which Laurie’s ailing mind will be transferred into Amelia’s healthy body and their consciousness will be blended as one.
Soon Amelia and Laurie join the opaque and mysterious group of other merge participants: teenage Lucas, who plans to merge with his terminally ill brother Noah; Ben, who will merge with his pregnant fiancée Annie; and Jay, whose merging partner is his addict daughter Lara. As they prepare to move to The Village, a luxurious rehabilitation center for those who have merged, they quickly begin to question whether everything is really as it seems.
An exhilarating, immersive debut from an astonishing new voice, The Merge is a personal story of love, family, and sacrifice, as well as a thought-provoking examination of the limits of control, resistance, and freedom in our modern world.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Walker debuts with a frightening glimpse into a near-future London ravaged by climate change, where the government, in an effort to conserve resources, has launched a new procedure called the Merge, in which the minds of two people are joined in one body known as a Combine. Those who refuse are hit with a heavy tax and made into social pariahs. Amelia Anderson, a 23-year-old videographer, stridently opposes the Merge, but when her painter mother, Laurie, is diagnosed with Alzheimer's, they sign up to be the first Combine involving someone with dementia. Amelia secretly plans to abandon the Merge at the last minute, keeping her intentions even from Laurie, and she films the preparations for a planned documentary. Somehow, though, their merging is completed, and they wake up at a heavily controlled treatment center where the surgeon greets them as Laura-Amelia. From here, the novel is narrated in the first-person plural, as Laura-Amelia tries to figure out what happened. It's an impressive swerve, and Walker effectively blends climate dystopia and body horror, especially in the novel's chilling final twist. Readers of The Great Transition by Nick Fuller Googins will enjoy this.
Customer Reviews
A waste of my time…
Omg, I tried to like this book. Then I read more just to get to the end. The ending is horrible. It’s like a timer went off and the author just put a period on the last sentence. Did I miss something?