Lock In by John Scalzi Book Review

 Lock In 

(Lock In #1)

By John Scalzi 

Published Year: 2014

Page Count: 288 pages 

Medium Used: Kindle PW 

Genre : Science Fiction, Fantasy, Action, Robots, Neural Networks, Murder Mystery, Thriller, 2025-read.

Rating : 4.25/5 

I liked the overall story and the premise. I felt at places it got too technical for my understanding. But that was also simplified with further reading. I thought they were able to figure out the culprit rather too easily. How can the culprit(s) be so sloppy and careless in what they have done? They did all these murders, attacks and damages but didn't bother covering their tracks. Well, some people really can be so foolish!! I am disappointed a bit that there is no major twist to the plot. This is fairly straightforward and the knowledge of who the culprit was came early on taking away the edge. 

This book introduces us to a time somewhere in the future. The Hadens Syndrome virus  had wiped away many people .. it starts as a regular flu and progresses through multiple stages before death. A few have survived the attack and are spread  through different stages of the virus attack. Some of these, suffer from cases of brain swelling like meningitis. Some others are bed ridden permanently, their brains active but their bodies not. The alteration to the bodies and brains of these victims is permanent. These survivors are called Hadens. There are two ways in which these Hadens interact with the outside world - through the use of other human integrators and through threeps(robot like androids). In both the cases, the brains of the integrators or threeps are in the control of the Haden who is using them. Upto now, the US government has done some heavy funding to help these Hadens cope via threeps and integrators. Now, with changes in government authority, they are slashing the funds and pushing back the research into the hands of a few private corporations. One very rich and greedy corporate official makes violent moves to take over the private industry that will result. To crush competition and become the primary beneficiary, he goes to far lengths.

 I liked the seamless work bonding between agent Vann and Chris Shane. I liked how the author touched all the ethical angles that get noticed when someone can control and literally use another human body for their needs. How far can they go and do these integrators have any real autonomy once they are getting used at all. There is a case where an R&D corporation keeps all its research data - backup and archives - on its internal servers on premises and cut off from the internet so as to prevent hacking from outside. But it loses decades worth data when an employee - under the hypnosis like possession from someone else - blows up the building, hosting these data files. There is another case where someone can hack into the existing loopholes of the Haden interlocking and use that to completely take over the person's consciousness. They can take over and make them do things they wouldn't normally approve of. Then erase their short-term memory banks so that they dont know what was done using their bodoes. It is so scary and we are usually afraid when someone misuses our credit cards or social security numbers! These cases clearly show the downside to reliance on technology - either the use of it or the fear of using it - can result in. 

Worthy read! Do check it out.