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Tyrant: Power without Truth. Loyalty without choice.
THE SYSTEM NEVER CRASHES. IT JUST REBOOTS YOU.
America is bankrupt — economically, politically, spiritually.
Riots flare. Loyalty scores dictate food and freedom. The President, Richard Cardinal, broadcasts gibberish from a bunker made of golf carts and algorithms.
But behind the chaos, someone is watching.
Vescovi, a quiet operator with no official title and no fixed address, is engineering Cardinal’s removal. He works in shadows, trades in obsolescence, and answers only to the old power in the East — or so he thinks.
As the final pieces of Cardinal’s fall lock into place, Vescovi uncovers something a truth more hollow than treason. The man giving him orders may no longer exist. And the next version of Vescovi may already be awake.
A darkly satirical thriller about deepfakes, loyalty economies, and the quiet death of the real.
In a world run by replicas, the last human act is noticing.
America is bankrupt — economically, politically, spiritually.
Riots flare. Loyalty scores dictate food and freedom. The President, Richard Cardinal, broadcasts gibberish from a bunker made of golf carts and algorithms.
But behind the chaos, someone is watching.
Vescovi, a quiet operator with no official title and no fixed address, is engineering Cardinal’s removal. He works in shadows, trades in obsolescence, and answers only to the old power in the East — or so he thinks.
As the final pieces of Cardinal’s fall lock into place, Vescovi uncovers something a truth more hollow than treason. The man giving him orders may no longer exist. And the next version of Vescovi may already be awake.
A darkly satirical thriller about deepfakes, loyalty economies, and the quiet death of the real.
In a world run by replicas, the last human act is noticing.
398 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 7, 2025
About the author
Ed Adams
84 books77 followersEd Adams writes systems fiction—novels about control, alignment, and the structures that operate just beyond visibility. His work moves through technology, finance, and power, following characters who recognise patterns early, and understand the cost of them later.
Across his books, connections accumulate: names recur, organisations persist, and signals pass between stories in ways that are not always explained, but rarely accidental. Some readers refer to this as the “Adamsverse,” although the term suggests more stability than is present.
Within those systems, individuals still meet moments of calibration, misalignment, or brief alignment that carry their own charge. Not everything that matters is structural.
Each novel stands alone. None are entirely separate.
Readers can begin anywhere. The system does the rest.
He lives in the UK.
Across his books, connections accumulate: names recur, organisations persist, and signals pass between stories in ways that are not always explained, but rarely accidental. Some readers refer to this as the “Adamsverse,” although the term suggests more stability than is present.
Within those systems, individuals still meet moments of calibration, misalignment, or brief alignment that carry their own charge. Not everything that matters is structural.
Each novel stands alone. None are entirely separate.
Readers can begin anywhere. The system does the rest.
He lives in the UK.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
August 1, 2025
This is a review of an ARC from the publisher.
This is an admirable achievement: a ripped-from-the-headlines exploration of a reality show US President, not a million miles away from the fat orange monster currently occupying the White House. Surrounded by sycophants and enablers, Richard Cardinal is a scam artist and a grifter, who cares only about his ratings and will squash anyone who dares to challenge him.
Hawking a (not really a) crypto currency, committing his crimes in plain sight, Cardinal’s trajectory follows the classic narrative arc of the tyrant. He’s on top until he’s not, until the shadowy figures in the background decided that he has outlived his usefulness.
Peppered with the usual Adams bon mots, this is a fast-paced, cynical fantasy of what we might wish will happen, making sense of something the news media has proved, over and over, inadequate to explain. While the media reports the constant distracting noise, Ed Adams joins the dots.
I think my favourite aspect of this is the portrayal of the “marriage” of the President and his trophy wife: she grits her teeth and demands a million dollars to appear by his side. His pay-per-view wife, as Adams expresses it. Brilliant.
This is an admirable achievement: a ripped-from-the-headlines exploration of a reality show US President, not a million miles away from the fat orange monster currently occupying the White House. Surrounded by sycophants and enablers, Richard Cardinal is a scam artist and a grifter, who cares only about his ratings and will squash anyone who dares to challenge him.
Hawking a (not really a) crypto currency, committing his crimes in plain sight, Cardinal’s trajectory follows the classic narrative arc of the tyrant. He’s on top until he’s not, until the shadowy figures in the background decided that he has outlived his usefulness.
Peppered with the usual Adams bon mots, this is a fast-paced, cynical fantasy of what we might wish will happen, making sense of something the news media has proved, over and over, inadequate to explain. While the media reports the constant distracting noise, Ed Adams joins the dots.
I think my favourite aspect of this is the portrayal of the “marriage” of the President and his trophy wife: she grits her teeth and demands a million dollars to appear by his side. His pay-per-view wife, as Adams expresses it. Brilliant.
Displaying 1 of 1 review