After brain trauma, a woman experiences personality changes and extraordinary dreams in this SF novel.

Every day is much the same for 24-year-old Astral “Astra” Woods, and she likes it that way. She shuttles between her day job as a photographer and evening stints teaching karate, eats simple, nutritious meals, and enjoys the security of her San Francisco apartment. That’s important; three years ago, she survived an attack that led her to learn self-defense. She also developed a small, supportive circle of friends who helped assuage her loneliness after her parents died. So, when walking home after dark one evening, Astra hesitates at first when she hears a woman screaming in an alley. But help won’t arrive in time, so Astra leaps in, disabling three attackers. But the fourth slams Astra against a brick wall, knocking her out. Coming to in a hospital bed, Astra feels like a different person; she’s more suspicious, angrier, less circumspect, and even craves spicier, meatier foods. The biggest change is her dreams: elaborate adventures that take her through doors into outer space and to other planets, settings that feel completely real, no matter how bizarre. Coincidentally—or is it?—the woman she saved, Dr. Elara Fox, is a researcher at the LWR brain-trauma lab, and she offers to study and treat Astra there. Leo Belmonte, another brain-injury patient, is having similar dreams, although his take him only to places on Earth. He’s eager to accept Elara’s help, but Astra doesn’t trust her. Despite worries about being used, however, Astra agrees to experimental procedures that allow her and Leo to share neuro travels. The truth, when she discovers it, goes far beyond the conspiracy she feared. Astra and her allies must quickly put together a team capable of saving the entire human race.

In her debut novel, Chi tells a twisty, compelling story. The novel’s more fantastical elements, like out-of-body travel to alien planets or seeing auras, unfold with clarity, verve, and a wealth of detail that helps the reader suspend disbelief. Similarly, the idea of neuro travel gets a plausible underpinning in science, such as the notion that unexplored areas of the brain could be tapped for special abilities. Settings also come alive, with attention to qualities of layout, design, and materials, such as the luxe LWR lobby, its ceiling “layered with bronze and tin metal panels, and glass artwork [that] dropped from the ceiling on thin lines of wire.” Astra’s newly prickly personality and the unknowns of LWR’s true agenda supply conflict that feels natural to the story rather than serving as convenient plot obstacles. The central mystery develops slowly, and the momentum through the first half of the book subsequently suffers. As secrets start unraveling, though, the payoff is worth it, with an ending that satisfies while also, perhaps, leaving room for the tale to continue.

An involving, exciting, and thought-provoking work of speculative fiction by a promising author.