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Summary
Summary
"This crackling road trip through the apocalypse offers thrills all the way to its explosive, satisfying finale." -- Publishers Weekly
"Relentless, terrifying, and affecting, this book left me feeling like I'd been strapped to the front of the car like Mad Max in Fury Road--not realizing that it was taking me to an emotional ending that would leave me gutted. I've been a huge fan of Skillingstead's work for years, but in The Chaos Function he's outdone himself!" -- Daryl Gregory, award-winning author of Spoonbenders
For readers of the best-selling novels Sleeping Giants and Dark Matter, an intense, high-stakes thriller with a science-fiction twist that asks: If technology enabled you to save the life of someone you love, would you do so even if it might doom millions?
Olivia Nikitas, a hardened journalist whose specialty is war zones, has been reporting from the front lines of the civil war in Aleppo, Syria. When Brian, an aid worker she reluctantly fell in love with, dies while following her into danger, she'll do anything to bring him back. In a makeshift death chamber beneath an ancient, sacred site, a strange technology is revealed to Olivia: the power to remake the future by changing the past.
Following her heart and not her head, Olivia brings Brian back, accidentally shifting the world to the brink of nuclear and biological disaster. Now she must stay steps ahead of the guardians of this technology, who will kill her to reclaim it, in order to save not just herself and her love, but the whole world.
Author Notes
Jack Skillingstead's Harbinger was nominated for a Locus Award for best first novel. His second, Life on the Preservation , was a finalist for the Philip K. Dick Award. He has published more than forty short stories to critical acclaim and was short-listed for the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award. His writing has been translated internationally.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
One woman holds the key to stopping a worldwide catastrophe in Skillingstead's harrowing scifi thriller. In 2029, freelance journalist Olivia Nikitas is in postwar Aleppo, hot on the trail of a new story. She takes shelter with her lover, Brian Anker, during an attack and discovers a hideously wounded man who tries to tell her something. When Brian is killed, Olivia feels a strange shift and then discovers that Brian is now impossibly alive, though still gravely injured. After she and Brian return to Seattle, Olivia is kidnapped by the Society, who claim they have the ability to change the course of the future for the better by manipulating probability streams, and that Olivia is now the first female Shepherd, able to shift the streams. By inadvertently saving Brian, she doomed the world to imminent collapse from an epidemic and nuclear annihilation. Pursued by the Society, Olivia hopes to find a way to save both the world and the only man she's ever loved. With lean prose, Skillingstead (Life on the Preservation) paints a realistic and terrifying portrait of society's swift unraveling in the face of disaster, and Olivia's emotional vulnerability mirrors the chaos inherent in the world around them. This crackling road trip through the apocalypse offers thrills all the way to its explosive, satisfying finale. (Mar.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
A reporter is given the ability to alter time, but her attempts to save lives create increasingly dire alternate histories in Skillingstead's (Life on the Preservation, 2013, etc.) latest offering.Olivia Nikitas' life is covering the news, especially war zones. Cynical and skeptical, she doesn't expect to fall in love with aid worker Brian Ankerand she certainly doesn't expect to gain superhuman powers. But in war-ravaged Syria, Olivia stumbles across a dying old man named Jacob and becomes the unknowing inheritor of his power as a "Shepherd": the power to change timelines. Instinctively, Olivia uses this power to save Brian's life, triggering a ripple effect that alters the world. Unaware of this, Olivia returns to America with Brian, but their ever-after is quickly broken...first by a weaponized smallpox outbreak and then by Olivia's abduction. Held captive by Jacob's "Society," a disbelieving Olivia first learns about the Society's mission to avert major crisis pointsand learns that by saving Brian, she has triggered one. To stop the pandemic, Olivia has to intentionally choose the original timeline: the one where Brian died. One hitch? Most of the Society wants to kill her to produce a more conventional (and male) Shepherd. With the help of Dee and Alvaro, two sympathetic Society members, Olivia escapes and reunites with Brian, but the pandemic is worsening, and Olivia tries to alter time to fix it. In her desperation to avoid losing Brian, Olivia makes things worse in successively darker timelines. Olivia struggles to save the world without sacrificing the man she lovesand learns the dark secret behind the Society's probability machine.The horrifying but mundane end(s) of the world are rendered with powerful bleaknessmaking moments of human tenderness and kindness shine all the brighter. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
In the near future, veteran war correspondent Olivia Nikitas' life is thrown into chaos when she unwittingly encounters a strange artifact deep beneath the old city of Aleppo, Syria. Her memories of that day contradict each other. Then, when she returns to Seattle, she is kidnapped by a secret society tasked with protecting the futuristic technology linked to the artifact. Olivia discovers her actions may have led to a global pandemic and a nuclear war, and she is plagued by thoughts that her choices may have saved a few but cost the lives of millions. Skillingstead (Harbinger, 2009) deftly balances frenetic pacing and characters' philosophical debates on parallel futures, the butterfly effect, and probability choices in a dramatic and suspenseful story supported by an intelligent, witty, and reluctant hero. His exploration of themes related to the manipulation of time will attract fans of Philip K. Dick, and the novel will also appeal to readers who enjoyed Michael Crichton's sf thrillers and viewers of Amazon's The Man in the High Castle.--Craig Clark Copyright 2019 Booklist
Library Journal Review
Set in a not too distant war zone, investigative journalist Olivia Nikitis has the power to change the past and reshape the future. But her choice to save the man she loves creates an increasing spiral of worldwide catastrophe, as altering that past results in the release of a weaponized smallpox epidemic that will destroy the world-unless Olivia resets the future again. And again. Until she gets it right, and discovers that it was all wrong all along. Olivia is a compelling, flawed character who is trying to save both her love and the world and is forced to make a terrible choice. The multiple apocalypses she creates feel all too plausible, as does the pain of her dilemma. VERDICT Skillingstead's (Harbinger) sf thriller revolves around chaos theory, the power of choice, and the price of love. Highly recommended for readers of dystopian stories, time-travel scenarios, and endings that cause them to rethink the entire book.-Marlene Harris, Reading Reality, LLC, Duluth, GA © Copyright 2019. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.