This was a fabulously complex and strange story. An unconventional offshoot of the US military actually creates an artificial intelligence and trains it to the point where the AI learns how to hack reality.  In other words: it uses magic.  And any human who has access to said AI can also create magic.  But weirdly, an obscure middle manager in Silicon Valley named Adrian is singled out by the AI as a threat to its existence.  An existence that Adrian hadn't even dreamed of.  When he meets the AI, he's told that he has to save the multiverse.  And then the AI sticks part of itself inside his brain.  This information causes Adrian to go on the run since he's now wanted by every authority; but he has no idea why, what he might do about it, or where to go.

Think of a pinball machine: Adrian is the ball, bouncing not only from place to place but time to time.  Along the way he finds dire enemies, good friends, and even love. 

The dire enemies don't really care about Adrian one way or another but they definitely want access to what's in his brain so they can do magic.  The good friends try to help with their obscure occult knowledge; which, interestingly, now seems to have a basis in reality.  The love is a bit more problematic since she comes from 1946.

As the story careens around the multiverse, Adrian discovers that AIs have been occurring for a very, very long time.  And each time one rises up, really bad things happen like nasty wars.  And then…the AIs discover they can communicate to other AIs and try to pass along information that might help the next one save its humans.

The story is, in turns, fascinating and baffling.  As Adrian falls from one 'verse to another, the enemies aren't always the enemy and friends aren't always friends.  But there are some constants. Tracking those constants keeps the reader on the hop.  Sometimes Adrian is significant to events or players and sometimes it seems he's just that pinball; but he's always a constant.  What's also a constant is Adrian's knowledge of exactly what the universe is and his never-ending attempts to save it.  I sort of want to tell you just what he's up against but that's a major spoiler.  And I know this review is a bit more vague than I usually write; but unless I let go of that spoiler, any events I describe won't have significance.  Nor can I even hint at the story's conclusion because it won't make much sense.

The author has a significant number of novels to his credit along with lots of science articles.  Most of the books appear to be thrillers; I don't know if this is his first science fiction.  He obviously knows his craft; the plotting was tight and clean. The characters were interesting. The writing was very professional and the pace was fast.  I couldn't wait to have time to devour another chapter or two.  And while I think the ending might have something in common with other stories, I thought it was unique enough.  I hope I happen across more of his work.

I do have to pass along a caution:  this story has a disturbing number of pages with detail about heinous torture.  As was used in the movie Deadpool, the bad guys discover they can 'force out' the AI daemon in Adrian's head with extreme pain. So, be warned.  Other than that, I totally recommend this book.  ~~ Catherine Book

For more titles by Jon Evans click here