A vividly drawn and twisty sci-fi adventure weighed down by infelicities in the writing.
In Kirstein’s sci-fi novel, a couple freshly escaped from a futuristic authoritarian city-state find themselves thrown back into a war between freedom and control.
The second book in the author’s New Haven series finds James and Sybil having successfully escaped the iron grip of their authoritarian town—where public executions and 24/7 monitoring are the norm—to reach New America, a nation that promises some semblance of freedom. But despite their resolve to start a new and peaceful life together, the couple is abruptly swept back into the thick of things when they join a rebellion called Le’ Force, which has one simple mission: to take down New Haven’s brutal leader, Valentine, and tear apart his regime from the inside. With mounting evidence indicating that the rebellion has been infiltrated by a spy and multiple shocking murders, James comes to realize that the mission will not be an easy one. The group seems to finally catch a break when they receive help from a fellow ragtag militia—until the sudden appearance of someone from New Haven’s past (who is able to infiltrate bodies at will) threatens everything they’ve been working toward. As the body count rises, James must make a choice that will change everything. The shocking deaths come fast and early in this bleak tale—this is a novel that will keep readers guessing. Kirstein ambitiously tackles deep dystopian themes (oppressive societies, personal sacrifice, what it means to be human) while advancing an action-centric plot. Unfortunately, occasional typos and stilted dialogue strip away some of the impact of the dramatic moments. From James treating his wife like a child (he constantly calls her “love” and, at one point, rocks her while saying “That’s a girl”) to over-the-top action movie dialogue (“‘Whooo!’ he screams, shaking his head vigorously like he’s making a cocktail of his brain”), this stiffness ultimately distracts from an otherwise inventive dystopian thriller.
A vividly drawn and twisty sci-fi adventure weighed down by infelicities in the writing.Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2026
ISBN: 9798279453948
Page Count: 147
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Jan. 13, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Equal parts biting social commentary and page-turning thriller, a disturbing glimpse into humankind’s possible future.
The first installment of Liu’s Julia Z saga is an SF thriller set in a near-future “post-truth age” where the use of AI and the inundation of digital disinformation and data pollution have blurred the lines between delusion and reality.
Julia—whose immigrant mother, a divisive political activist, was murdered during a border protest—has lived on her own since she was 14. A brilliant hacker now 23, she’s been trying to live in online anonymity, acutely aware of the multitude of ways she can be identified and tracked. Living in a Boston suburb and struggling to make ends meet, she inadvertently becomes entangled with a lawyer named Piers Neri and his search for his artist wife, Elli Krantz—famous for her experimental work in vivid dreaming—who may or may not have been kidnapped. A prime suspect in his wife’s disappearance, Piers goes on the run with the help of Julia—and together, they begin putting together pieces of a mind-bogglingly intricate puzzle that links Elli to a powerful criminal with a global reach. As Julia digs deeper into the appeal of vivid dreaming and the criminal’s ruthless endeavors, she discovers the sham that is the American Dream: “America was corrupt and steeped in sin. The powerful had rigged the game for themselves and turned the country into a panopticon to imprison the rest of us. Anytime one of the powerless—it didn’t matter the color of your skin, the language you spoke, the place you were born in—was on the verge of climbing out, they would be ruthlessly tossed back into the pit.” And amid the backdrop of dealing with unresolved childhood trauma and the need to find her place in the world, she finds something unexpected—herself.
Equal parts biting social commentary and page-turning thriller, a disturbing glimpse into humankind’s possible future.Pub Date: Oct. 14, 2025
ISBN: 9781668083178
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Saga/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 10, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2025
IMAX-scale bleeding-edge techno-horror from a writer with a freshly sharpened scalpel and time on his hands.
The world as we know it ended in Wanderers, Wendig’s 2019 bestseller. Now what?
A sequel to a pandemic novel written during an actual pandemic sounds pretty intense, and this one doesn’t disappoint, heightened by its author’s deft narrative skills, killer cliffhangers, and a not inconsiderable amount of bloodletting. To recap: A plague called White Mask decimated humanity, with a relative handful saved by a powerful AI called Black Swan that herded this hypnotized flock to Ouray, Colorado. Among the survivors are Benji Ray, a scientist formerly with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Shana Stewart, who is pregnant and the reluctant custodian of the evolving AI (via nanobots, natch); Sheriff Marcy Reyes; and pastor Matthew Bird. In Middle America, President Ed Creel, a murdering, bigoted, bullying Trump clone, raises his own army of scumbags to fight what remains of the culture wars. When Black Swan kidnaps Shana’s child, she and Benji set off on another cross-country quest to find a way to save him. On their way to CDC headquarters, they pick up hilariously foulmouthed rock god Pete Corley, back from delivering Willie Nelson’s guitar to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. This novel is an overflowing font of treasures peppered with more than a few pointed barbs for any Christofacists or Nazis who might have wandered in by accident. Where Wanderers was about flight in the face of menace, this is an old-fashioned quest with a small band of noble heroes trying to save the world while a would-be tyrant gathers his forces. All those big beats, not least a cataclysmic showdown in Atlanta, are tempered by the book’s more intimate struggles, from Shana’s primal instinct to recover her boy to the grief Pete buries beneath levity to Matthew Bird’s near-constant grapple with guilt. It’s a lot to take in, but Pete’s ribald, bombastic humor as well as funny interstitials and epigraphs temper the horror within.
IMAX-scale bleeding-edge techno-horror from a writer with a freshly sharpened scalpel and time on his hands.Pub Date: Nov. 15, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-15877-7
Page Count: 816
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2022
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