From the Publisher
[Interface] is an engrossing page-turner . . . an often entertaining and energetic dystopian yarn with plenty of intricate action.” —Kirkus
“Captivating from page one, you’ll be drawn into the web of this intriguing and thought-provoking novel that imagines a scary (and maybe all too real) new world.” —Steve Berry, author of The Omega Factor
“Save a spot on your shelf between Yuval Noah Harari’s Sapiens and Jennifer Egan’s The Candy House. Scott Britz-Cunningham’s Interface is the human devolution we’ve been worried about.” —Scott Hylbert, author of Task Lyst
“An intriguing mix of a good mystery and a twenty-first-century view of an Orwellian future. Interface is an entertaining, fast-paced detective story that provides a credible scientific and clinical version of what might be possible in the not-so-distant future.” —John Donoghue, PhD, Wriston Professor of Neuroscience and Engineering at Brown University’s Carney Institute for Brain Science
Kirkus Reviews
2022-11-02
In Britz-Cunningham’s SF novel, implant technology lets people surf the web with their minds but also forms the basis of a plot that could kill millions.
In the near future, an all-encompassing Interface wirelessly connects everyone to the internet with brain implants. It lets people visit websites by thinking about them; conduct conversations with thoughts; record video of everything they see; and form a collective “Meta-Mind” to vote on referenda or serve as jurors in criminal cases. The downside is that the government wants to use the Interface to set up a totalitarian “thought readjustment” program and has made not getting an implant a capital offense; the law is enforced by the all-powerful Federal Anti-Terrorist Authority. Battling these injustices is Taiki Graf, the cyberneurologist who invented the Interface but now opposes it as an affront to individual freedom. He’s found a way to get the implants to cause infections that make people slaughter everyone they come across; he hopes this will quickly convince people to remove them. He squares off against his half brother, Egon Graf, FATA’s ruthless director; caught between them is Yara Avril, a New York City police captain who’s the ex-lover of both brothers. Assisted by journalist Jericho Jones, Yara tries to track down Taiki before he can let loose the brain plague. Britz-Cunningham’s vision of a tyrannical hive mind is detailed but not very captivating; the Interface merely seems like an update of present-day internet and smartphone tech. Fortunately, the novel features nifty terrorist plotting and police procedural elements and characters that are sharply drawn and magnetic, if sometimes a bit hammy (“I can have you flayed alive and have molten lead poured into your bowels,” fulminates Egon). The prose is also punchy and colorful throughout: “With a quick machinelike motion, the Moose yanked the Bowie knife from the parrot man’s hand and buried it in his eye. The parrot man waved his left hand, feebly, as if batting off a fly, then fell to the ground in silence.” The result is an engrossing page-turner.
An often entertaining and energetic dystopian yarn with plenty of intricate action.
