Influx by Daniel Suarez

I've finished another book. It was Influx by Daniel Suarez. It was pretty good. The author is back in form after a disappointing Kill Decision. It's not quite as good as the Daemon, but a fast paced and satisfying read.

The author tackles the question of why there has been so little innovation since the moon landing in 1969. Suarez angle is that there has been plenty of innovation, it's just almost all been suppressed. There is a super secretive Bureau of Technology Control (BTC) that has been controlling the introduction of fantastic innovations such as cold fusion, cure for cancer, human cloning, strong AI, quantum computers. Their justification is that these innovations would be so disruptive that they would cause more harm than good.

The book is about an inventor Jon Grady who invents a device to deflect the force of gravity. a gravity mirror. so the familiar notion of "down" can be inverted within some area and objects will "fall up". Working in a startup, this invention is seized by the BTC and they blow up Grady's lab under the cover of an extremist anti-techology group the winnowers.

Grady is invited to join the BTC as a researcher to continue to work on his gravity mirror for BTC use only. Jon declines and the BTC sends him to a prison known as Hibernity along with other dissenting inventors.

From there lots of things happen and it's a fast paced read as Jon joins some dissenters in BTC to attempt to release the Hibernity prisoners and make their fantastic discoveries public and bring down the BTC. All the while in the crisis the BTC leadership becomes increasingly heavy handed and militant to protect the inventions they have seized.

I could see this being made into a movie. The book was written in a way that would be adaptable to a movie treatment. Such as the golem monster and some fantastic scenes at the climax that would translate very smoothly to a big special effects film.

All in all a good effort by Suarez. I'll continue to watch for this author's titles.