Judgment

by Fergus Bannon

THE X-FILES MEETS 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY It started with a few isolated a mob shootout in Las Vegas, a firefight in the Central American jungles - one apparently unconnected event after the other, hinting at a worldwide conspiracy of unprecedented proportions. Then come the revelations of the misdeeds of the great and good, video of events that can't possibly exist. Something, somewhere, somehow is tapping into our darkest secrets - and revealing them to the whole world. Is it an invasion? Or something far stranger? The more CIA computer expert Bob Leith investigates, the more he comes to realise that he's dealing with something inhuman--and inhumanly intelligent. And it needs someone to speak to the human race on its behalf... Before long, Leith's understanding of the nature of reality and of what it means to be human will be challenged to the very core in a dazzling novel of intrigue, espionage and mind-bending science fiction. EXCERPT De Meer was staring unblinking at some point very far away. She hadn't moved since they'd entered the apartment. 'Is she dead?' The woman put one hand to the neck, feeling for the carotid pulse. 'Cold as ice. Must have been dead for hours.' She withdrew her hand, coming out of her crouch and swivelling round in one smooth movement to aim her gun at Durrell. 'Time for some answers,' she said gravely. 'Not him,' the other man flicked his gun at Leith. 'Him.' 'Why?' 'He doesn't fit. I don't think he's even seen a wet job before, never mind done one. He's shit scared and it shows. Not like Boulder Dam over there,' he said, indicating Durrell with a nod of his head. She aimed the gun at Durrell's chest but looked across at Leith. 'Start talking or I blow your friend away.' De Meer moved. Her head tilted to one side, then her neck turned slowly, or so it seemed at first. Then Leith saw that the whole right side of her face was peeling off and separating. The smooth skin was revealed as some kind of tightly woven fabric. He twitched in shock as her eye and cheek exploded silently out into hand-sized puffballs. The gossamer spheres boiled out as they swept across the side of her head, growing at the expense of scalp and hair, revealing a matt black space beneath. Sweeping into view from the other side came another puffball, a second planet orbiting the ravaged face. Ice coursed through his body as he saw that each coned down into coarse threads of flesh being stripped from her unwinding face. The threads split into finer and finer filaments, which sustained the blossoming puffballs. It was like two tornados circling round and round, unravelling the woman's head. Then de Meer's head was gone and her torso started to disappear fast, the puffballs spinning faster and faster, making the air in the room turbulent, and causing the candle flames to flicker. Only the legs were left now and the puffballs were each a meter across. They were spinning so fast that he could no longer focus on them. Just as the shoes and feet were consumed he saw that the two threads were joined. Then the puffballs flew apart, exploding out in a lightning-fast unfolding until one huge square of material blanked out half the room. Leith just had time to see the surface alive with myriad waving cilia, then the square was gone. The room seemed suddenly empty.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction

288 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 1, 2009

About the author

Fergus Bannon writes fast paced thrillers which take a jaded and heretical view of what we think we know of science and technology.
Following graduation, he ran away to sea, his merchant shipping line taking him to some of the choicer trouble spots around the world. Rich though the seafaring life was, it could also be rather dangerous. After having a run-in with a death squad in South America (the basis of a key scene in his book 'Heretic'), and then nearly getting his throat slit in Jamaica, he began to harbour doubts about his long term prospects. A hurricane in the Atlantic, and a major fire on board ship in the Pacific, only reinforced this view.
Nursing an ambition to live until the age of forty, he therefore came ashore and eventually became a professor of physics. Fergus Bannon is a pen name for his fiction, but he has also published a non-fiction book called 'Science for Heretics' under his actual name of Barrie Condon.

Reviews

[Neil · Rating 5 out of 5]

An enthralling story that begins in gripping thriller mode and then takes you into the realms of the sort of science fiction that makes you pause with astonishment. An electrifying debut novel.

[dr douglas small · Rating 5 out of 5]

Imaginative eco/spy/tech thriller

Fergus Bannon slowly creates a narrative piece by incremental piece that eventually make believable, a hypothesis one would never have bought on page one.
Very fertile imagination.

[Nick Lloyd · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great characters. Good pace. Very interesting concepts.

Sure, I only gave it 3 Stars but it is definitely worth a read.

Plotting/Flow/Action
I actually loved the first half, but didn't connect so well with the second half.

Minor Grumbles... (none related to plot/characters/story)
I imagine that the author has a gritty/real-world experience of life, but for me the graphic violence was unnecessarily gory. This is, after-all, a fairly cerebral philosophical look at life (with a nice dose of science). I probably understand that the author was underlining the horror of the attacks... it felt too much.
... and one more thing (maybe I'm a prude) but the sex scene at around 20% through the book ... really? a Thought-Provoking SciFi Thriller that suddenly veers into protrusions/rigidity ... it felt very out of place.

hey ho!

that's just me

as I said - read it - it's a good book

[Michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

I finally finished the book - it took much longer than it should have - kept falling asleep after one page. In some ways the pacing and narrative style really created 3 different books in one, and not necessarily done well. Either way it was incredibly derivative (Star Trek, Dune, generic thriller, etc) though I did somewhat enjoy the 'judgement'/punishment aspect. I hate to give a negative review, but I wouldn't rush to put this at the top your to-read list, just get to it when you can. I suspect many of you picked this up, as I did, from b&n or amazon as one of their 'free' offerings. Given the price, it was readable.

[Jeffrey Newman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Started out good but got confusing towards the end. In some ways,it got too technical or too intellectual at then, more so than it was during the first half of the story.