Starred review from December 1, 2024
DEBUT During a dystopian climate apocalypse in a near-future Los Angeles, Orr Vue is visited by the police. Orr is in his sixties and in failing health. He has a memory augment protruding from his skull that is a remnant from his time in the military piloting combat drones. It now functions to help him collect and vet information, which has become the modern currency of this future world. After being questioned about the murder of the uber-wealthy Thomas Mahoney, Orr is then contacted by his widow to find the killer. Mahoney had recently joined a religious sect in which members' memories are constantly wiped. As Orr proceeds to investigate, he finds out many surprising facts, including that he himself has memories of which he is not completely aware; his memories are then returned, to spectacular effect. VERDICT O'Brien's (George Washington Is Cash Money) fiction debut is a highly intriguing vision of the near future that examines the role of memory in a functional aspect, which also underscores the utility of forgetting: "Funes the Memorious" by Jorge Luis Borges meets Total Recall by Philip K. Dick, with a wry narration that balances the grim reality.--Henry Bankhead
Copyright 2024 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
December 16, 2024
Humorist O’Brien (Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes) spins the wheel on cyberpunk shenanigans in this clever sci-fi murder mystery. In a flooded future Los Angeles where information is literally currency (“Two Rumors and a Scandal was a month and a half’s rent”), geriatric combat drone operator Orr Vue stumbles onto a valuable Rumor involving the death of a powerful tech-bro at a monastery where memories are removed. Dogged by both the police and the dead man’s daughter, Orr is pulled into the investigation by his long-lost love, the murder victim’s protégé. But memories can be deceiving, especially when they have been off-loaded into hidden storage units. O’Brien cleverly plays with the concept of monetizing recordable and erasable memories, including the palimpsest traces left behind. Readers must rely on Orr’s erratic recall to see how the clues play out, but his heart can navigate the course even when his mind draws a blank. This is good fun. Agent: Jessica Felleman, Jennifer Lyons Literary.
Starred review from January 1, 2025
Ross McDonald meets William Gibson in this superb cyberpunk mystery set in a Los Angeles that is becoming like Venice due to rising oceans. Orr Vue is a fact-checker for InfoDrip. A veteran of a civil war, he was issued an early version of kortiko, a direct, hardwired-to-the-brain interface with the internet. It has its pros and cons but helps him scrape by verifying information in a world where data is currency. When Thomas Mahoney, CEO of InfoDrip, dies, Vue is a convenient contact for the cops. He reluctantly enters a contract to gather information on the case that no one else in the police department wants to handle. Because any tidbit about the case of an ultrawealthy victim is highly prized, Orr is suddenly very popular among the drivers of the various styles of Uberesque transportation he needs to get around. He is also sought out by Mahoney's wife as well as disreputable customers from the seedier sides of town. It's a great mystery that involves a cult that will relieve its members of all their memories to be free of the system and also allows for bodies to change identities. The noir narrative is cyberpunk perfect.
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January 15, 2025
Even in a future world where both landscapes and personal identities are way too fluid, murders still happen, and their solutions must be found. No matter what (or who) is damaged along the way. Never mind the exact year. All you need to know is that sometime in the future, coastal cities like Los Angeles are all but halfway submerged in water and there has been so much war in the interim that it's hard to know who won or lost. Still, people adapt to change as they always have and Orr Vue, a grizzled, sardonic retired soldier and professional "fact checker" for a powerful data-collecting company called InfoDrip, insists on living as quiet a SoCal life as super-stressed socio-environmental circumstances permit. Somehow, there's always LAPD around, and they pick up Orr for questioning about the murder of his employer, Thomas Mahoney. Orr's not a suspect, but Auggie Wolf, his fellow war vet and one-time lover, is being held for interrogation. Even though the cops are sure they have their man, they allow Orr to dig further into the case using his facility with piercing through foggy deceptions with factoids--and with wielding surplus military drones. Also interested in using Orr's detecting skills is Mahoney's daughter, Marianna, enigmatic and, of course, beautiful, though the old soldier isn't satisfied with using that mere adjective: "[She] had a body that hit my eyes harder than tear gas, lit up my nervous system like a dozen Tasers, made my heart pound harder than a panic attack, and took my breath away like a week of water-boarding...I wanted to tell her secrets until I ran out of them, and then make some up just to keep on talking." That sentence should give you some idea of how O'Brien keeps your head in the action with antic, lyrical wit and vivid--if sometimes bewildering--action scenes as Orr's search for Mahoney's killer becomes more brutally complex. It all works out in extremely weird, perversely satisfying ways. This used to be labeled "cyberpunk." Some believe it'll be called "real life," sooner or later.
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