Circle Tide

Rebecca K. Rowe

Average Rating 9/10 (1 Review)

A tale of two unlikely companions cast together in a mystery, and a mission to save the planet. Noah of Domus Aqua, an environmentalist and the son of extreme wealth, is a fugitive suspected in the high profile murder of his long-time friend and mentor Senator Mari Ortega.

Promising his dying friend that he'll deliver a highly confidential datasphere to a trusted government official, Noah plunges himself into the Underground, a gritty subterranean world of knife-wielding monks, a crew of oddball hackers and a smart intelligence bent on his destruction, as he avoids virtual detection and his arrest.

Enter Rika Musashi Grant, a street-smart data thief. Heavily in debt from getting mind enhancements that fail, Rika is given one more chance to prove herself and right past wrongs - by stealing Noah's datasphere.

Joined by circumstance and mutual disdain, the two quickly realize they must join forces to survive. Set against a backdrop of Los Angeles in 2051, the unlikely duo must travel from the deepest catacombs to the most exclusive rooftop gardens; from LA's over-crowded refugee camps through to the virtual world of Novus Orbis, as they seek to find the clues they need to prove their innocence, find a killer, and stop the eco-disaster known as Circle Tide from destroying the planet!

About the Author:
Rebecca K. Rowe is a fiction author and free-lance writer living and working in North Carolina. Her novel, Circle Tide, debuted in August 2011 at the 69th World Science Fiction Convention (WorldCon). Her first speculative fiction novel, Forbidden Cargo, received critical acclaim from newspapers such as The Washington Post and The Denver Post. Rebecca also writes science non-fiction, poetry, and short stories, inspired by her overseas travels and her more frequent armchair explorations at the keyboard. With a Master’s in Mass Communications/Journalism from the University of Denver and a Master’s in International Relations from the University of Southern California, her fiction reflects a hard social science dimension. She is the associate editor of the Speculative Literature Foundation Newsletter, as well as a member of the Denver Woman’s Press Club. Her first novel was a finalist in the Colorado Book Awards.

'With Circle Tide, Rebecca Rowe has further developed her impressive capacity to entertain and provoke us with visions of a frightening and enticing future where technology has changed what it means to be human. Her sympathetic and engaging characters help us to imagine what it will be like to live in this fast approaching world where the distinctions between reality and simulation, and between organism and machine, will melt away, leaving us with new opportunities for both human fulfillment and disorientation.'

Review by Paul Lappen (251112) Rating (9/10)

Review by Paul Lappen
Rating 9/10
Set in Los Angeles in the mid-22nd century, this novel is about two unlikely people on a mission to save the world.

Noah is a rebellious member of high society. His mother runs a Domus, which is something like a family-owned multi-national corporation (but a lot bigger). She is not afraid to roll over people to get what she wants, and is a very dislikeable person. Noah promises that he will deliver a datasphere to the right person. Meantime, an ecological disease called Circle Tide is ravaging the city, a disease that is fast-acting and deadly. Noah is faced with knife-wielding monks and a smart intelligence that wants him dead.

Rika is a Data gatherer (or data thief) whose expensive, and not-paid-for, neural improvements are failing. Her last chance to prove herself, and get out of debt, is to stop Circle Tide (simple, no?). But she has to steal Noah's datasphere.

The pair travel from the top of society to the bottom, accused of crimes they did not commit. They seek clues to catch a murderer, and keep mankind from being destroyed by Circle Tide.

Here is an excellent piece of society-building. It has enough going on (virtual worlds where memories are stored, for instance) to satisfy anyone. This may not be a very fast read, but it is very much worth the reader's time.
Paul Lappen (25th November 2012)