Who: A Novel of the Near Future
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About this ebook
Have they changed their minds? Or have their minds been changed?
Death is no longer the end. Those who prepare, and can afford it, may have their memories and personalities digitally preserved. The digitally stored population can interact with the world of the living, remaining part of their loved ones’ lives. They can even vote.
But digital information has its vulnerabilities.
After the young and vital Thea dies and is stored, her devoted husband Max starts to wonder about changes in her preoccupations and politics. Are they simply the result of the new company she keeps? Or has she been altered without her knowledge and against her will?
And if Thea is no longer herself, what can they do?
Karen A. Wyle
Karen A. Wyle was born a Connecticut Yankee, but eventually settled in Bloomington, Indiana, home of Indiana University. She now considers herself a Hoosier. Wyle's childhood ambition was to be the youngest ever published novelist. While writing her first novel at age ten, she was mortified to learn that some British upstart had beaten her to the goal at age nine. After attempting poetry and short stories, she put aside her authorial ambitions and ended up in law school. There, to her surprise, she learned how to write with ease and in quantity. This ability served her well when, after decades of life experience, she returned to writing fiction. Wyle is an appellate attorney, photographer, political junkie, and mother of two wildly creative daughters. (It was, in fact, her elder daughter who led her back to writing novels, by participating in National Novel Writing Month in 2009. In 2010, Wyle joined her in that pursuit.) Wyle’s voice is the product of almost five decades of reading both literary and genre fiction. It is no doubt also influenced, although she hopes not fatally tainted, by her years of law practice. Her personal history has led her to focus on often-intertwined themes of family, communication, the impossibility of controlling events, and the persistence of unfinished business. In 2015, Wyle brought together her careers as a lawyer and an author to produce a fairly massive reference work, Closest to the Fire: A Writer’s Guide to Law and Lawyers. While initially intended to entice her fellow writers into exploring the many dramatic possibilities awaiting in the legal landscape, it can also be a useful resource for law students, students in general, or anyone who would like to know more about the surrounding legal environment. In addition to Who, Wyle’s novels consist of the Twin-Bred science fiction series, now at three books (Twin-Bred, Reach, and Leaders); two other near-future SF novels, Division and Playback Effect; and one mixed-genre novel, Wander Home, which could be called anything from women’s fiction to afterlife fantasy to family drama. Both Division and Playback Effect have earned Five Stars seals from Readers’ Favorite, and Awesome Indies has awarded Playback Effect its Seal of Excellence.
Read more from Karen A. Wyle
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Reviews for Who
2 ratings1 review
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Author Karen Wyle has the knack of taking present-day technology to a not-so-farfetched future and asking those difficult questions that make it all real. In Who, she invites us into a world where selves can be digitally preserved after death. But will a digital nose still run when we cry? Do digital wrinkles increase or decrease with age? And will the digital self be true to the real? All of which leads to those central, most important questions, of life as well as fiction; how well do we truly know anyone—ourselves or anyone else? And what is self?Add politics, perfectly tuned to seem real without offending readers, whatever their persuasion; add art, with music, shape and form to enthrall and absorb; add two people who truly love each other, families who really can overcome disagreement, and a lawyer with vision and purpose; add “Digital Life Denies Life Eternal” messages on protesters’ banners; and add an enticing story that moves swiftly through art and science, religion and politics, relationships and law, love, loss and more—Who is smoothly written, hauntingly imagined, entertaining and thought-provoking, and a really great read.Disclosure: I was given a copy and I offer my honest review.
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Who - Karen A. Wyle
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