Rejoice

By: Steven Erikson

Narrated by: Laurence Bouvard

From the best-selling author of the epic Malazan Book of the Fallen comes a story of mankind's first contact and a warning about our future.

An alien AI has been sent to the solar system as representative of three advanced species. Its mission is to save the Earth's ecosystem - and the biggest threat to that is humanity. But we are also part of the system, so the AI must make a choice. Should it save mankind or wipe it out? Are we worth it? The AI is all-powerful and might as well be a god. So it sets up some conditions. Violence is now impossible. Large-scale destruction of natural resources is impossible. Food and water will be provided for those who really, truly need them. You can't even bully someone on the Internet anymore.

The old way of doing things is gone. But a certain thin-skinned US president, among others, is still wedded to late-stage capitalism. Can we adapt? Can we prove ourselves worthy? And are we prepared to give up free will for a world without violence? And above it all, on a hidden spaceship, one woman watches. A science fiction writer, she was abducted from the middle of the street in broad daylight. She is the only person the AI will talk to. And she must make a decision.

©2018 Steven Erikson (P)2018 Orion Publishing Group

Not at good as his fantasy books

The basic premise is interesting enough, and passages were both engaging and exciting. But often the story was the victim of long winded philosophical discussions that added little to the story itself. Some of the persons of interest were just that, interesting, others were little more than cliches. It does pick up the pace in the last third.

Amazing story , science very well researched.

Funny and complex but I loved the whole social, financial, political and spiritual journey about the way we live right now in all its absurdity. Eye opener and makes you think.

I get very upset and disappointed when after all the taxe money spent, government efforts and education on why you should not SMOKE... Why Hollywood and book authors feels the need to make their main characters "smokers", heavy smokers and glorifying how cool and soothing it is.... shame if they are being paid to do so. Shows lack of social ethic and respect for readers in my opinion.

So much time spent in story describing cigarettes and the need or pleasure of smoking at key moments of the story for no apparent reason or necessity to tell the story, it made me put it down many times...