Nevada; the near future; a family about to implode.
In a world run by computers, hackers have power – and awkward, home-schooled Colt is among the best. But when Colt secretly submits his mother Naomi's breakthrough research to a biotech conference, and it is immediately shut down, mother and son are forced to go on the run. Now Colt is coding for his life.
As the military, and Colt's father, hunt them through a Las Vegas of self-driving cars and surveillance drones, Naomi has to decide how far she will go to protect her child. Can she kill a man? Can she destroy the world?
And Colt is finally forced to leave the comfort of virtual reality, and face his greatest terror: love.
The world is evolving; humans need to evolve too . . .
For readers of William Gibson, Ready Player One, and Naomi Alderman's The Power, Connect is a page-turning novel of ideas that thrillingly explores what connection – both human and otherwise – might be in a digital age. Julian Gough is the author of three previous comic novels and was formerly the lead singer of the underground literary band Toasted Heretic. In 2007 Julian won the BBC National Short Story Award and was shortlisted for the Everyman Bollinger Wodehouse Prize in 2008 and 2012. In 2011 he wrote the ending to Minecraft: Time magazine's computer game of the year.
Praise for Julian Gough:
'Julian Gough is a wonderful writer' Sebastian Barry
'An outstanding talent' Observer
'Intelligent . . . and thoroughly entertaining' New York Times (Juno & Juliet)
'Extremely original and surprising' Sunday Independent (Jude)
'Gough makes it look easy, with an instinctive sense of timing, and a razor sharp and subversive intellect' Sunday Tribune (Jude)
