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An atmospheric tale of corruption and abduction set on Mars, from the author of the award-winning science fiction novelAltered Carbon,now an exciting new series from Netflix. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BYTHE GUARDIAN Hakan Veil is an ex-corporate enforcer equipped with military-grade body tech thats made him a human killing machine. His former employers have abandoned him on a turbulent Mars where Earth-based overlords battle for profits and power amid a homegrown independence movement. But hes had enough of the red planet, and all he wants is a ticket back home - which is just what hes offered by the Earth Oversight organization, in exchange for being the bodyguard for an EO investigator. Its a beyond-easy gig for a heavy hitter like Veil . . . until it isnt. When Veils charge starts looking into the mysterious disappearance of a lottery winner, it stirs up a hornets nest of intrigue and murder. And the deeper Veil is drawn into the game, the more long-buried secrets claw their way to the Martian surface. Now its the expert assassin poised against powerful enemies hellbent on taking him down - by any means necessary. Praise forThin Air "Kick-ass . . . Mixed in with the thriller-esque action and cyberpunk backdrop is a hard-boiled noir story complete with a twisting and turning plot that keeps readers on their toes." - Los Angeles Times "Richard K. Morgan wants to destroy your Mars fantasies. . . . Its a grim vision, but one that Morgan finds far more plausible than the cheerful visions of plucky Mars colonists common in sci-fi." - Wired "A robotically enhanced Jack Reacher [in a] dazzlingly intricate game of political double- and triple-cross, spiced with tastily kinetic battle sequences." - The Guardian "If you ever imagined that the core esthetics and themes of cyberpunk - lowlifes and high tech; corporate dominance; future noir; post-human evolution and cyborg adaptations; hardscrabble urban environments - were played out,Thin Airwill set you straight, and kick your butt in the process. . . . Both kinematic and cinematic, [Thin Airis] limned by Morgan with balletic precision and smashmouth grace." - Paul Di Filippo,Locus Read more Continue reading Read less REVIEW "Kick-ass . . . Mixed in with the thriller-esque action and cyberpunk backdrop is a hard-boiled noir story (think Philip Marlowe or Sam Spade) complete with a twisting and turning plot that keeps readers on their toes." - Los Angeles Times "If you ever imagined that the core esthetics and themes of cyberpunk - lowlifes and high tech; corporate dominance; future noir; post-human evolution and cyborg adaptations; hardscrabble urban environments - were played out,Thin Airwill set you straight, and kick your butt in the process. . . . Both kinematic and cinematic, [Thin Air is] limned by Morgan with balletic precision and smashmouth grace." - Paul Di Filippo, Locus "Morgan really makes this version of Mars come to life. . . . As realistic and vibrant as anything Ive read in the genre." - Tordotcom "A robotically enhanced Jack Reacher [in] a dazzlingly intricate game of political double- and triple-cross, spiced with tastily kinetic battle sequences." - The Guardian "Author Richard K. Morgan wants to destroy your Mars fantasies. . . . Its a grim vision, but one that Morgan finds far more plausible than the cheerful visions of plucky Mars colonists common in sci-fi." - WIRED "Scintillating, imaginative . . . This is science-fiction as neo-noir thriller, with gunfights, multiple shadowy agendas, and blood on the floor." - Sci-fi and Fantasy Reviews ABOUT THE AUTHOR Richard K. Morgan is the acclaimed author of The Dark Defiles, The Cold Commands, The Steel Remains, Thirteen, which won the Arthur C. Clarke Award, Woken Furies, Market Forces, winner of the John W. Campbell Award, Broken Angels, and Altered Carbon, a New York Times Notable Book and winner of the Philip K. Dick Award. He lives in England. EXCERPT. REPRINTED BY PERMISSION. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. One It was early evening when I hit the Mariner Strip, and up in the Lamina they were trying again for rain. With limited success, Id say. Got this thin, cold stop-start drizzle weeping down out of a paprika sky. I didnt have the detail on it; Id been too busy. Some newly written subroutine was what Id heard, something consulted in from the edgy end of the industry, coded and cooked and cut loose somewhere up there amid the vast shifting gossamer layers that keep the Valley warm. Must have had some solid marketing muscle behind it, too, because the streets were crowded for a midweek night. When the rain kicked in, it felt like the whole city jammed up to watch. Everywhere you turned - people stopping to crane their necks and gawk. I spared the sky a sour glance of my own, didnt stop. Shoulder on instead, keep the pace through stalled knots of rubberneckers and eco-geeks talking shit. Anyone looking to actually get wet behind this shit would likely be waiting a while. In the pushy seduction of the marketing, people tend to forget - nothing falls fast on Mars. And new code or not, this attempt at downpour wasnt going to be breaking any basic laws of physics. Mostly, the promised rain just floated and blew around overhead, scornful of the halfhearted gravity, tinged in the dying light to a blood-red spray. Pretty to look at, sure. But some of us had places to be. The Strip loomed around me - five-story Settlement-era facades in scarred antique nanocrete, repair protocols long exhausted. These days the inert surfaces are lathered by decades of storm wind and grit into something that looks more like flat expanses of coral at low tide than anything youd call human-made. Back in the day, the COLIN engineers were all about huddling down - they ran the build either side of a broad channel dug out between the exposed foundations, mirror-image struc
About the Author
Richard K. Morgan is the acclaimed author of The Dark Defiles, The Cold Commands, The Steel Remains, Black Man (published in the US as Thirteen) , Woken Furies, Market Forces, Broken Angels, and Altered Carbon, a New York Times Notable Book that won the Philip K. Dick Award in 2003.The movie rights to Altered Carbon were optioned by Joel Silver and Warner Bros on publication, and the book remained in feature film development until 2015. It is now being turned into a 10 episode Netflix series by Skydance Media. Market Forces, was also optioned to Warner Bros, before it was even published, and it won the John W. Campbell Award in 2005. Black Man won the Arthur C .Clarke Award in 2007 and is currently under movie option to Straight Up films. The Steel Remains won the Gaylactic Spectrum award in 2010, and its sequel, The Cold Commands, was listed in both Kirkus Reviews' and NPR's best Science Fiction / Fantasy books of the Year. The concluding volume, The Dark Defiles, is out now!Richard is a fluent Spanish speaker and has lived and worked in Madrid, Istanbul, Ankara, London and Glasgow, as well as travelling extensively in the Americas, Africa and Australia. He now lives back in Norfolk in the UK with his Spanish wife Virginia and son Daniel, about five miles away from where he grew up. A bit odd, that, but he's dealing with it.Photo by Roberta F. [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) ], via Wikimedia Commons.
