What do you think?
Rate this book
Quantum Terra: A Nick Shuman Legal Thriller
What would you do if you woke-up one morning to find your world had changed but no one noticed but you? People who were alive were now dead and some who were dead were now alive. Landmarks and buildings that were there before were gone; or something different stood there now. Important documents, past events and other ‘history’ had changed too. You’d heard of the possibility of alternate realities, but now you may actually be in one…What would you think? What would you do?
In “Quantum Terra,” the second installment of the Nick Shuman legal thriller series, the young but already world-weary attorney is tasked with defending a lawsuit that has stopped his latest client from completing a foreclosure on an expensive piece of acreage in rural Southern California. Fatima Carruthers, beautiful and enigmatic, is the official liaison for Nick Shuman’s new charge, a shadowy secret society called ‘The Foundation for the Study of Electro-Magnetic Energy.’ But they aren’t studying power lines or generators.
The problem is the chunk of real estate ‘The Foundation’ is foreclosing on has some very special qualities known only to them and the property’s owner, ‘The Society of Metaphysical Acolytes,’ an equally murky outfit of questionable and ancient origins. ‘The Society’ is ‘The Foundation’s’ predecessor and now nemesis. The property that they both covet contains within its boundaries a point of energy so powerful it can change reality. But only those who affect the change notice it. The rest of the world is disturbingly ignorant.
However, it is ‘The Foundation’ that holds the mortgage on ‘The Society’s’ unique land. And it is ‘The Foundation’ that is desperately trying to wrest control of ‘The Society’s’ potent property by foreclosing on its delinquent loan. ‘The Society’ is even more desperate to hold on to it.
Nick Shuman finds himself in the middle of a battle where the cudgel of quantum mechanics trumps legal maneuvers or conventional weapons---although the guns and violence are never far behind. When court records and rulings start to change or disappear along with people and past events, he starts to lose his grip on reality. Only his mysterious client and the peculiar property itself seem to hold the answers. Or do they? The bewildered and confused Shuman discovers there was another attorney before him. His journey to find his predecessor and to find out what he knows takes him down a long, winding labyrinth with no escape.
Shuman’s world spirals completely out of control when his ill-advised affair with his alluring client leads to the murder of his opposing counsel. He is now a defendant in a media-crazed murder case. But is any of it real? As he tries to devise a way back to the world he knew, all of Nick Shuman’s assumptions about life, death and reality are turned upside down and inside out. He embarks on an existential sojourn to the core of the Universe, the center of his soul and then back again. Quantum mechanics becomes his vehicle.
In “Quantum Terra,” the second installment of the Nick Shuman legal thriller series, the young but already world-weary attorney is tasked with defending a lawsuit that has stopped his latest client from completing a foreclosure on an expensive piece of acreage in rural Southern California. Fatima Carruthers, beautiful and enigmatic, is the official liaison for Nick Shuman’s new charge, a shadowy secret society called ‘The Foundation for the Study of Electro-Magnetic Energy.’ But they aren’t studying power lines or generators.
The problem is the chunk of real estate ‘The Foundation’ is foreclosing on has some very special qualities known only to them and the property’s owner, ‘The Society of Metaphysical Acolytes,’ an equally murky outfit of questionable and ancient origins. ‘The Society’ is ‘The Foundation’s’ predecessor and now nemesis. The property that they both covet contains within its boundaries a point of energy so powerful it can change reality. But only those who affect the change notice it. The rest of the world is disturbingly ignorant.
However, it is ‘The Foundation’ that holds the mortgage on ‘The Society’s’ unique land. And it is ‘The Foundation’ that is desperately trying to wrest control of ‘The Society’s’ potent property by foreclosing on its delinquent loan. ‘The Society’ is even more desperate to hold on to it.
Nick Shuman finds himself in the middle of a battle where the cudgel of quantum mechanics trumps legal maneuvers or conventional weapons---although the guns and violence are never far behind. When court records and rulings start to change or disappear along with people and past events, he starts to lose his grip on reality. Only his mysterious client and the peculiar property itself seem to hold the answers. Or do they? The bewildered and confused Shuman discovers there was another attorney before him. His journey to find his predecessor and to find out what he knows takes him down a long, winding labyrinth with no escape.
Shuman’s world spirals completely out of control when his ill-advised affair with his alluring client leads to the murder of his opposing counsel. He is now a defendant in a media-crazed murder case. But is any of it real? As he tries to devise a way back to the world he knew, all of Nick Shuman’s assumptions about life, death and reality are turned upside down and inside out. He embarks on an existential sojourn to the core of the Universe, the center of his soul and then back again. Quantum mechanics becomes his vehicle.
421 pages, Paperback
Published September 7, 2020
6 people are currently reading
9 people want to read
About the author
Kirk Marty
3 books2 followersKirk Marty is the pen name of Kirk Grossman, an attorney and dedicated Dodger fan in Ventura, California.
"The way I see it, I've been a professional writer for as long as I've been an attorney---which is a long time now. I've cranked out literally hundreds of thousands of pages of legal mumbo-jumbo. Writing legalese provides great instruction on the wrong way to create fiction, although some attorneys seem to confuse the two. Still, it is the type of writing that requires great precision and focus, qualities needed for good fiction as well."
Kirk's first book, "The Longest Walk," is a baseball fantasy novel and winner of two book awards.
His second book, "Adverse Possession," is a legal thriller (and owner of one book award), featuring attorney Nick Shuman.
The next installment in the Nick Shuman legal thriller series will be published later this year. Watch out for "Quantum Terra," by Kirk Marty. Not only a legal thriller but a science-fiction, high concept, speculative novel as well. A new genre...
"The way I see it, I've been a professional writer for as long as I've been an attorney---which is a long time now. I've cranked out literally hundreds of thousands of pages of legal mumbo-jumbo. Writing legalese provides great instruction on the wrong way to create fiction, although some attorneys seem to confuse the two. Still, it is the type of writing that requires great precision and focus, qualities needed for good fiction as well."
Kirk's first book, "The Longest Walk," is a baseball fantasy novel and winner of two book awards.
His second book, "Adverse Possession," is a legal thriller (and owner of one book award), featuring attorney Nick Shuman.
The next installment in the Nick Shuman legal thriller series will be published later this year. Watch out for "Quantum Terra," by Kirk Marty. Not only a legal thriller but a science-fiction, high concept, speculative novel as well. A new genre...
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
January 24, 2021
Good read. Very interesting concept. A real page turner.
August 12, 2023
Fantastic, thriller non like you have ever read!
If you read read any thing about physics and conscience, this is a murder mystery with alternate universe characters. Wild!
If you read read any thing about physics and conscience, this is a murder mystery with alternate universe characters. Wild!
August 4, 2025
This was a very creative book but a little slow at times. I do like how the author talks about depression and how the character has to overcome that.
September 17, 2024
What do you get when you combine a legal thriller with quantum mechanics and alternate dimensions? Quantum Terra, that's what! As a fellow author in the sci-fi legal thriller genre, I can say on good authority that there aren’t a lot of novels in this space. Quantum Terra is clear evidence of just what a shame this is!
I don't want to give too much away, but the story opens with an attorney working on a seemingly-routine real estate case. Things seem pretty straightforward until previously-filed documents are suddenly different, and decisions at past hearings suddenly, inexplicably, change, and no one remembers these changes except for our heroic barrister, who must do his utmost to make sense of the situation before it kills him.
It's as refreshing as it is exciting to see a legal thriller that actually captures the realities of how the legal system really operates, rather than some Hollywood approximation. Take a legal suspense story and throw in a healthy dose of the magic of quantum mechanics (an unlikely combination of ingredients, but a recipe which Kirk Marty executes so very deftly), and this book will attract both fans of sci-fi stories, and legal drama aficionado. It is my hope that Quantum Terra will inspire others to write new works in this exciting, expanding genre. I can't wait to read more from this author.
You need to read this book!
I don't want to give too much away, but the story opens with an attorney working on a seemingly-routine real estate case. Things seem pretty straightforward until previously-filed documents are suddenly different, and decisions at past hearings suddenly, inexplicably, change, and no one remembers these changes except for our heroic barrister, who must do his utmost to make sense of the situation before it kills him.
It's as refreshing as it is exciting to see a legal thriller that actually captures the realities of how the legal system really operates, rather than some Hollywood approximation. Take a legal suspense story and throw in a healthy dose of the magic of quantum mechanics (an unlikely combination of ingredients, but a recipe which Kirk Marty executes so very deftly), and this book will attract both fans of sci-fi stories, and legal drama aficionado. It is my hope that Quantum Terra will inspire others to write new works in this exciting, expanding genre. I can't wait to read more from this author.
You need to read this book!
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews