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Interface: Systemic - Book 3
THE CONCLUSION OF THE SYSTEMIC SERIES
Three hundred years after the fall of the System, two rival cultures are still sifting through the ruins, trying to rebuild their societies.
Scab is spreading from the outskirts toward the technophobic city of Seal Tooth. Rather than send aid, the Host votes to seal the borders and leave the people in the outlying towns to their fate. Avalina, a young doctor, can’t accept that. She and Kavi, the city’s only expert on heretical tech, break quarantine and ride east across the sagelands toward the mysterious town of Prower, hoping to discover forbidden technology and a cure.
But Prower, too, is in crisis. The bio-amplified Forest that cares for its people is dying. A resurrection archaeologist is racing to replace the Forest’s gifts with the ancient machines he has recently unearthed.
To save their societies and repair the three-hundred-year rift between them, they must either give themselves to the Forest to heal it, revive the maternalistic AI that nearly destroyed humanity, or attempt something the world has never seen…and may not survive.
“A new kind of AI story — both dystopian and utopian, big picture, and very human.” — Ramez Naam, author of The Nexus Series
“A very human look at a traumatized society restructuring itself around entrenched traditions, tribalism, and faith.” — Ashley Nathan Feniello
Three hundred years after the fall of the System, two rival cultures are still sifting through the ruins, trying to rebuild their societies.
Scab is spreading from the outskirts toward the technophobic city of Seal Tooth. Rather than send aid, the Host votes to seal the borders and leave the people in the outlying towns to their fate. Avalina, a young doctor, can’t accept that. She and Kavi, the city’s only expert on heretical tech, break quarantine and ride east across the sagelands toward the mysterious town of Prower, hoping to discover forbidden technology and a cure.
But Prower, too, is in crisis. The bio-amplified Forest that cares for its people is dying. A resurrection archaeologist is racing to replace the Forest’s gifts with the ancient machines he has recently unearthed.
To save their societies and repair the three-hundred-year rift between them, they must either give themselves to the Forest to heal it, revive the maternalistic AI that nearly destroyed humanity, or attempt something the world has never seen…and may not survive.
“A new kind of AI story — both dystopian and utopian, big picture, and very human.” — Ramez Naam, author of The Nexus Series
“A very human look at a traumatized society restructuring itself around entrenched traditions, tribalism, and faith.” — Ashley Nathan Feniello
572 pages, Paperback
Published September 1, 2026
About the author
Chris Lodwig
3 books10 followersChris Lodwig writes speculative fiction about how technology becomes tradition, tradition becomes faith, and individual choices shape civilizations across centuries.
His Systemic Series—Systemic (2020), Host (2023), and Interface (2026)—follows a world transformed by superintelligent AI from apparent utopia, to collapse, to the cultures that rise from its remains.
After thirty years building technology platforms, Chris writes about technology not as magic but as infrastructure: designed by people, trusted by institutions, and capable of consequences no one planned. He holds degrees in Comparative History of Ideas and Communications from the University of Washington and co-hosts the No “I” in Writing podcast. He has played in bands, built camps at Burning Man, thrown art parties, and surreptitiously installed monoliths in parks. He lives in Seattle with his wife and dog.
His Systemic Series—Systemic (2020), Host (2023), and Interface (2026)—follows a world transformed by superintelligent AI from apparent utopia, to collapse, to the cultures that rise from its remains.
After thirty years building technology platforms, Chris writes about technology not as magic but as infrastructure: designed by people, trusted by institutions, and capable of consequences no one planned. He holds degrees in Comparative History of Ideas and Communications from the University of Washington and co-hosts the No “I” in Writing podcast. He has played in bands, built camps at Burning Man, thrown art parties, and surreptitiously installed monoliths in parks. He lives in Seattle with his wife and dog.
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