Review Synthetic Dreams by Kim Knox
Vynessa Somerton was just a girl when she learned about true evil. An encounter with the tyrannical Corporation scarred her body and exiled her to the crime-ridden S-District. Now an adult, Vyn creates glamours, worn by those who visit a virtual playground to live synthetic dreams. She’s tried to stay unnoticed by the Corporation, but her latest invention has brought their agents to her door.
Paul Cross works for the Corporation, but he’s been plotting their downfall since they took his brother and replaced him with an imposter. Paul has a plan to get his brother back, but he’s going to need Vyn and her invention to carry it out.
Vyn agrees to help Paul, but their alliance shatters the barriers she’s put up to protect herself, tempting her to give in to desire. Just as Vyn starts to trust Paul and believe he wants her, scars and all, the Corporation prepares for its final move. Can Vyn trust Paul completely, or has he been using her all along?
This was very very similar to Surrogates, where the real humans are plugged into an alternate world, that allows them to change their appearance and their physicality while still legally have to maintaining some semblance of what they originally were, but there was also SO Much more in this book about technology different alien races, different technological races, and the way the Corporation which is part technological behemoth, ala apple, and part governmental oppressor, very USSR makes iPhones, the story became so complex and so overwhelming that it was, the technological portions was so overwhelming it was so complex and detailed and the story so short that I ended up trying to understand the corporation and the technology more than trying to read the book for its merits.
I only wish that the book had been longer so that the technology and the society and corporation could be explained, because they were so overwhelming and so engrossing, its just way too much. The technological side of this is way too massive for this short novella.
Overall Rating: C-
