Synopsis:
John Wick meets Blade Runner in this fast-paced cyberpunk thriller by the #1 NYT bestselling author of The Will of the Many.
My job, when you think about it, isn’t so different from a lot of people’s. I have to deal with a ton of boring planning. Inconvenient hours. Some pretty awkward face-to-face interactions. And like most of us, I’m really only clocking in to try and crawl out from beneath my debts.
The more old-fashioned crowd do still get hung up on the ‘killing people’ part, I guess, but that’s a them problem: it’s been perfectly legal to take out lifers for ages. Besides, once ultrawealthy morons realised they had a way to live forever—limited resources be damned—there was only ever going to be one genuinely practical deterrent. So someone’s got to do it.
And luckily, my genetic compatibilities make me really, really good at it.
Still. This next job… I don’t know. It’s something I haven’t had to deal with in years. Kind of the opposite of my regular duties. Strange, that it got thrown my way.
I’m sure it’ll all go totally fine though.
Review:
Fast-paced, action-packed, and far different from Islington’s usual epic fantasy. For fans of cyberpunk who love a good page-turner.
In summary, the story focuses on Azure, a bioengineered assassin who, of course, has a blurry past. This presents as your typical cyberpunk story, where a character with little knowledge of his past must puzzle through a one-last-job style plot to survive. It was reminiscent of Altered Carbon and the like, with the setting having the same futuristic-but-broken style of its peers.
Though, hidden beneath what appears to be another one of the same old, lies a novel with wit and intrigue. And more than a bit of the world-building elements, charm, and intricacy that you can find in the writing you’ve no doubt come to love in Islington’s epic fantasy work.
It’s Islington’s writing that really comes to the fore here; the liquid-like prose that flows through the pages is perfect for the genre and does neither try to be complex nor overly florid. I always like it when an author tells the story in a solid, great way with a simple and effective approach to writing. Not a single sentence felt out of place: it was written incredibly well.
It’s also just about as tightly plotted as it gets: a falling-tension masterclass where you get a little bit of a breather before you’re thrust into action once more. As a relatively small book at some 240 pages, you do not get much room for the day-to-day or the depth of character that you might like, but the rising and falling cadence delivers you swiftly to the end in a dramatic and rather satisfying way. This led it to feel a little formulaic; it’s a fun book, but you will not get the same from it that you would from The Will of the Many. And there might not be the many nights thinking about this (at least not for me in comparison to his other works) but you’ll most certainly remember how fun it was to read.
I wanted to give this an 10/10, but from the point of view of originality and doing something new, it does not give you that experience. However, it’s a really solid read that I’ll certainly pick up again and again when I want something quick, light, and action-packed to come back to.
For anyone who loves futuristic, cyberpunk action, a likeable main character, and a tight plot, this is a book you should pre-order ASAP!
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