Constance

Constance #1

by Matthew FitzSimmons

A breakthrough in human cloning becomes one woman’s waking nightmare in a mind-bending thriller by the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of the Gibson Vaughn series.

In the near future, advances in medicine and quantum computing make human cloning a reality. For the wealthy, cheating death is the ultimate luxury. To anticloning militants, it’s an abomination against nature. For young Constance “Con” D’Arcy, who was gifted her own clone by her late aunt, it’s terrifying.

After a routine monthly upload of her consciousness—stored for that inevitable transition—something goes wrong. When Con wakes up in the clinic, it’s eighteen months later. Her recent memories are missing. Her original, she’s told, is dead. If that’s true, what does that make her?

The secrets of Con’s disorienting new life are buried deep. So are those of how and why she died. To uncover the truth, Con is retracing the last days she can recall, crossing paths with a detective who’s just as curious. On the run, she needs someone she can trust. Because only one thing has become clear: Con is being marked for murder—all over again.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Thriller, Mystery, Dystopia, Fantasy, Mystery Thriller

351 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2021

About the author

Matthew FitzSimmons is the author of the bestselling Gibson Vaughn and Constance Series. His latest, The Slate, will be released in October, 2024. Born in Illinois and raised in London, England, he makes his home in Washington DC.

Reviews

[Regina · Rating 3 out of 5]

My brain hurts.

Since I only read a handful of science fiction books each year, I’m admittedly out of practice when it comes to keeping up with mind-bending stories in that genre. I thought I was up to the challenge of taking on one about human cloning in the not-too-distant future, but I sure got a mental workout!

The weird thing is, Constance is actually more of a mystery dressed up in sci-fi trimmings. Author Matthew FitzSimmons explains in the Acknowledgments how the plot for the novel unfolded: “Wouldn’t it be cool if someone had to investigate their own death? How could someone living be in a position to solve their own murder? What if the hero were a clone of the murdered person with all their memories except those of the murder itself?”

So that’s the central concept - Constance “Con” D’Arcy wakes up as a clone and tries to figure out what series of events led up to the death of her “original.” It’s a little cat & mouse, a tad whodunnit, and a lot twisty-turny.

Even if the sum of its parts was ultimately too convoluted for this reader, I did enjoy the character diversity and ethical questions posed in the novel. This was a buddy read with fellow Goodreads reviewer Holly, and I think we agreed we wouldn’t want to be cloned! We both also picked up some strong Blake Crouch vibes, so if you like his brand of fiction you might enjoy this book a titch more than I did.

Constance is an Amazon Prime First Reads selection for August 2021, which likely means it will be part of the Kindle Unlimited collection upon its September 1st release date. A follow up book is already slated for September 2022.

Blog: https://www.confettibookshelf.com/

[LIsa Noell "Rocking the chutzpah!" · Rating 4 out of 5]

My thanks to Thomas and Mercer, Matthew FitzSimmons and Netgalley.
Days go bye. You live them. Nothing ever changes, until it does. That's all just a day in life.
One day you wake up and discover that you're missing months of your life. Turns out that you, yes you are dead. But?
I would also have hunted down my killer..
Hey, I may be dead, but imma gonna find you!
That's putting my beliefs aside, this ending was righteous. I felt like it packed a wallop.

[Holly B · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thought provoking and mind-binding, took me on a head spinning ride...

If you want to clone yourself and prolong your life, you need to have a hefty bank account. Only the rich can afford to have a clone on hand. Unless your Constance “Con” D’Arcy, she was luck enough to be "gifted a clone" by her aunt.

Then it happens......

Con wakes up, something is very, very wrong.

The dominoes start to fall, crash and burn.

So many ethical questions pop up concerning the "clone" question. Do they have rights? souls? Can a clone solve the murder of her original? Is immorality really an advance?

A fun buddy read with Regina! Chosen from Amazon Prime First reads July selection. This one gave me vibes of Recursion by Blake Crouch with the far-out science scenario, the brain "work-out" on my part, and the opening of pandora's box type of discussions. The second half was just too over the top for me and will keep me from reading the next in the series.

Recommend to those who like mind-bending, science filled, over the top twists that may stretch your brain like it did mine.

Amazon First Reads July 2021

[Susan Justice · Rating 2 out of 5]

If you can get past the BS…

The story is there. It’s a great story, but it paints a very low opinion of men, especially white men, as if we need to know the race of every single character no matter how small the part. Cars run on only batteries which are mined horribly for the environment, and charged just the same as they are today, hint - it isn’t magic. So while the story is there the overbearing agendas and politics are also there - which is a huge turn off for anyone wanting to read for fun. It tends to be over the top with the slip ins of everything from race to false climate talking points. It came free with Amazon First reads - August - can’t say I am surprised, all the choices tend to lean this way lately. Can’t we just have a good story anymore?

[Christi M · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Constance, Matthew FitzSimmons not only delivers a wonderful sci-fi thriller that includes thought-provoking and complicated characters, but also sheds a light on all the complexities that cloning and memory downloading would bring to society.

We're first introduced to Constance 'Con' around Christmas as we watch her go throughout her day. We learn of a tragic accident that killed her fellow band members, but also left her love brain-dead and in a coma. Later, we get some insight into the falling out that Con's family has with her aunt Abigail.

At the end of the day, Con goes into the spa-like facility to do her regular memory download. But instead of waking up hours later, Con finds herself waking up 18 months later in a clone's body - meaning the original Con is dead. However, there's a lot to be suspicious of when it turns out the download process didn't follow proper protocol and now there's more questions than answers, especially since 18 months worth of memories are missing. Now Con wants answers, but also needs to find a way to stay alive as well as get some of life basic's necessities - like food and shelter.

The beauty of the story is that this fun thriller is set only a few years from now so that you don't feel it is too out of reach. This near-future setting allows us to easily understand all the different reactions, beliefs, and politics surrounding cloning and memory downloading. From varying friends reactions, to different state laws and protections, to outside influences such as groups that would protest and campaign against cloning, there is a lot for Con to take in and understand. Things often look different when you're on the other side of an issue. Does a clone have the same rights as the original? Do they get custody of children? Are they entitled to the same bank account as the original? How far is too far? What makes you 'you'? Then, there are boardroom politics within the company that owns the cloning process.

The overall story was very well done and I enjoyed reading it. It's always a little more fun when you don't know who to trust and this story definitely has this. I also appreciate any science fiction story that is easy to understand and this did an outstanding job of doing that, especially given the subject matter. Definitely recommend.

["Avonna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Check out all my reviews at: https://www.avonnalovesgenres.com

CONSTANCE (Constance #1) by Matthew FitzSimmons is an exciting and thought provoking dystopian sci-fi mystery thriller that is the first of a two-book series. In the near future, if you have the millions to spare, human cloning is a reality.

Constance “Con” D’Arcy is a talented musician, who survives a horrible traffic accident which kills almost every member of the band she plays in. The accident moves her to accepting the gift of her own clone from her aunt who is the co-founder and brilliant mind behind the Palingenesis clinic.

After a routine monthly upload of her consciousness which should only take hours, Con wakes up months later in the body of her clone. She is told her original is dead, but the transition that should have happened with memories from her last upload has left her with no memory of the last 18 months.

Con is determined to find out what happened to her original and discover what has happened in the last 18 months. She cannot trust anyone who is offering to help because they all have ulterior motives and agendas. Caught between the wealthy and powerful Vernon Gaddis and Dr. Brooke Fenton fighting over what is hidden in Con’s brain and the Children of Adam who want the death of all clones, Con can trust in only herself.

This is an amazing story! I could not put it down. Constance “Con” is a protagonist that is memorable. She at times is a little too curious for her own good, but she is also fearless and resilient. She must face discrimination and bigotry as a clone at the same time she deals with the ethics of being a clone herself. Mr. FitzSimmons takes the reader through ethical and philosophical questions on cloning intertwined in the story and dialogue of his various characters. Also, and no small part of the story is an intricate crime mystery that has so many twists and surprises I could not stop turning the pages. Throw in some great rock band references and I was hooked. This book does not end with a cliffhanger, but there is an open question at the end of the story and the promise of a second book to come. I cannot wait!

I highly recommend this dystopian sci-fi mystery!

[Anissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was in the mood for some speculative fiction and this story, in the nearish future, of a clone investigating her original's murder, was a pretty good read. When I had to put it down, I thought about it and looked forward to getting back to it so that is always a good sign. In a world where SCOTUS is tasked with deciding on clone personhood and state's rights have once again bifurcated the Union, the parallels to real history were appropriately, uncomfortable but added a higher stake to the characters' plights.

I thought the characters were well drawn and even when the narrative slowed down midway through the story and some of the threads were predictable, I was still pulling for Constance to solve the mystery and come out on the other side with a good ending. I admit all the things with the band were less interesting to me and I didn't think so much was needed to understand Constance and who she is when the story opens (the whole Zhi thread was belaboured and predictable). I wished there were more with Gaddis and Peter because they were such interesting characters. Overall, I thought the world these characters exist in was interesting and would love to see more of it so yes, I'll read the next book.

This book also had something that I don't think I've run across before, character colour was written in. It felt awkward at first in the reading and oddly, took me out of the story. I am biracial and I know that often readers can assume characters to all be white until it's mentioned otherwise but that's not how I read and imagine. Also, I suppose the bluntness of just stating colour made it feel more like watching a movie or show because it became one of the first things you knew about a character. I don't know if, as a narrative device, I liked it or didn't but I do like being presented with new things to think about when I read and this feature gave me that. More to ponder to decide on another day.

I got more than I expected going in and that gets points from me. I also got to highlight some memorable lines and that's always to the good. I read this via Kindle Unlimited. Recommended.

[Mogsy · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 of 5 stars at The BiblioSanctum https://bibliosanctum.com/2021/09/07/...

Strap in and brace yourself for some cloning fun and shenanigans in Constance by Matthew FitzSimmons, a sci-fi thriller that is guaranteed to warp your mind. Set in the near future, this story follows protagonist Constance D’Arcy, or simply Con to her friends, a musician who was involved a tragic accident that claimed the lives of her fellow bandmates and left her lover in a coma. Having suffered grievous injuries herself, the whole ordeal has left Con depressed and withdrawn.

Death has also been on her mind a lot lately, and not only because of what happened to her band. For you see, Con’s aunt is Abigail Stickling, the late genius behind Palingenesis, the world’s first and largest manufacturer of clones. The company offers a service to clients that, should they die, would allow for the downloading and transfer of their consciousness along with all memories into a engineered clone—a backup system, essentially, for just in case. Naturally, the cost for such a service is so high that only the world’s richest and most elite could afford it, but Con’s clone was a gift from her aunt before her suicide. Abigail might have been a pioneering scientist and a brilliant mind, but she also struggled for years with depression and ironically couldn’t have a clone of her own due to a genetic disease.

After some initial reluctance, Con had decided to keep her clone, though the process would require her to make regular trips to Palingenesis to have her memories uploaded to the system. If she dies, the company will automatically activate her clone and transfer the latest backup, so it’s a good idea to keep it as fresh as possible. So imagine our protagonist’s surprise when, after a routine memory upload, she wakes up at Palingenesis not in her original body but in that of her clone—which she can surmise because it is free of her tattoos or any of the physical scars sustained from her accident. Not only is she hit with the horrible realization that this means that the real Con, her old self, must have died, but she is shocked to find out that her last memory upload was actually a whopping year and a half ago, far longer than the recommended maximum of three months. Such a long lag would cause all kinds of problems including mental instability, and Palingenesis, already mired in scandal and bad publicity, would be ruined if this damning evidence of their lapse in protocol is ever discovered. As the company moves to eliminate her, Con finds herself alone in a desperate fight for survival while also trying to piece together her life from the past 18 months.

High-concept and cerebral, Constance is a heady combination of dystopian sci-fi, mystery suspense, and action thriller, perfect for those who enjoy the frenetic energy and driving pace of movies like The Island or books by Blake Crouch. That said, similar to a lot of these types of stories, what’s happening on the page is definitely more important than the whys and hows behind the scenes. In other words, you go in knowing full well the plot is going to be crazily over-the-top and a little ridiculous, so don’t ask too many questions or expect satisfactory explanations for any of the technology or sci-fi aspects of the novel and you should be just fine. On the flip side, I also believe these same characteristics can make a book more accessible to a wider audience. The story simply strikes me as having a lot of that mass appeal and can be enjoyed by both seasoned sci-fi fans as well as readers who might only have limited experience with the genre.

And to be fair, it isn’t all just popcorny fluff. While it’s true that the world-building and character development is pretty standard as far as mystery thrillers go, I do give Constance mega bonus points for tackling a number of ethical and philosophical issues in an engaging, thought-provoking way. Navigating a world that is still generally hostile towards clones, Con’s journey explores what it means to be human as well as the implications of cloning technology on both personal and societal levels, not to mention the number it would do on our legal system. The plot also touches upon the vast disparities between socio-economic classes, as most dystopian stories often do, as well as speculation around the politics and morality of cloning and treating human consciousness and memories like data.

All in all, I had a great time with this book. A high-octane thriller it might be, but Constance also features a complex plot that requires a fair bit of focus as things can get somewhat convoluted, especially towards the end. Blink and you might miss something important! Because of that, you might need to be in a certain mood or right frame of mind to appreciate the mystery and all its twists and turns, but if you’re willing to take that leap, the full experience is well worth it.

[M · Rating 3 out of 5]

Convoluted murder mystery with sci-fi elements. Not enough science.

3.5 stars

I recommend the Amazon synopsis if you haven’t yet read it. This book opens with an ambling intro to protagonist Constance “Con” D’Arcy, who lives in an easily believable future, with human cloning tech. Much later, Con awakens in a cloned body, which means her real body is dead. She has amnesia with no memories of the past eighteen months. So if you know mystery tropes, she’s off to investigate her missing eighteen months . . . and her own murder. Yes, there are other cunningly presented murder mystery tropes. It’s sci-fi, but there’s not much science, so it’s a breeze-read.

This mystery was solidly 4 stars until the last quarter of the book, when the story became unbelievable. By then, the story had slowly morphed into a tangle of twists—with too many red herrings, subplots, sub-subplots, and sometimes a kitchen sink. In the fourth quarter, science pushed past believable to the unrealistic—and the fantastical. I’m sure author FitzSimmons will expound on the science in the next book, because whilst overreaching, he did create entrée to book #2 in this series. So, TBC in September 2022.

[Esti Santos · Rating 2 out of 5]

Lo dejo. No me ha convencido. 😏

[Jen · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars
Constance is a strange book, a mix of intriguing ethical questions to ponder and some over-the-top events that take it from future possibility to B movie horror.

Constance has not recovered from the accident that put her boyfriend into a permanent vegetative state and left her with severe damage to one of her knees.

Con's Aunt Abigail, with whom Constance has had only one brief encounter as a child, is a brilliant scientist whose work has made cloning a possibility.

When Abigail's work is successful and her company Paragenesis is worth millions, Abigail gives her family the opportunity to have a clone--sort of giving them all her middle finger because she knows they won't accept. Con, who also left her dysfunctional home, accepts the opportunity for a clone --mostly for the same reason, to thumb her nose at her family. But after a scheduled update or "refresh" to put Con's most recent memories into the clone, something goes wrong.

Slow beginning, then suddenly intense and fast-paced, when Con's clone is activated. When Con2 is activated, she is missing memories of the last 18 months and has no idea what happened to her "original."

On the run, Con2's compulsion to find out what happened during the 18 missing months, while trying to evade those who have been sent to recover her, leads her into dangerous situations. Unable to trust those who tell her they are trying to help her, Con2 pursues her quest to fill in the memory blanks and to find out how and why her "original" died. There are plenty of twists.

I raced through this one. The middle is satisfying and suspenseful, but the conclusion feels like the author lost track of his purpose or self-control and let his over-heated imagination have free rein. :)

Quotes:

"No hint that, deep in the bowels of the building, the laws of nature were being systematically rewritten." (about the Paragenesis building and labs where the cloning takes place)

"Humans are very good at inventing solutions and very, very bad at anticipating consequences."

"In this country, power doesn't derive from defeating a threat; true power comes from the fear of the threat. And maintaining power requires a continuing threat."

Science Fiction. Sept. 1, 2021. Print length: 352 pages.

[Sonja Arlow · Rating 3 out of 5]

I know attaching the word “nice” to a book probably won’t make it win any prizes but there is something to say about an easy middle of the road reading experience.

I REALLY liked the first half where the focus was on how cloning impacts the real world, how laws have not kept up with technology (does it ever?) and if you kill a clone, you won’t be charged with murder but rather property damage. How in this near future, only the rich can buy a slice of immortality because let’s face it clones are expensive.

But if it is your aunt that developed the technology for successful cloning you get one as a gift.
Constance have not spoken to her aunt in a decade, yet she dutifully goes for her monthly consciousness download to keep her clone “fresh”. But when she wakes up from her latest upload, 18 months have passed, and her original body is dead.

Now it’s a race against time to solve her own murder and say one step ahead from everyone, including the head and co-founder of the cloning conglomerate Palingenesis, that seem to be out to get her.

She cant trust anyone, not even herself.

There were one or two things I would have done differently but all in all it was a nice piece of escapism.

[Brian · Rating 2 out of 5]

In the near future, due to advances in medicine and technology cloning has become a reality. For those with the money to do so, cheating death becomes the ultimate luxury. For Constance D’Arcy, who is given a clone by her aunt this becomes the ultimate nightmare.

On the one hand this isn’t a bad Sci-Fi thriller. The idea is a good one and the story itself isn’t bad. Matthew Fitzsimmons explores the perils and pitfalls, both morally and ethically of cloning quite well. On the downside though I felt the story lacked pace. Also the characters aren’t developed enough for me and lacked interest. This meant I had difficulty at times to have sympathy or empathy for them, especially Constance. Also I didn’t quite understand why the ethnicity of every character had to be mentioned, unless Fitzsimmons was trying to explore the wider subject of diversity, which if he was I failed to see, which is a shame as that would have been a good avenue to go down. Maybe it needed developing more.

Despite my criticisms it isn’t, as I have said, a bad thriller, that is right up until the last 50 pages or so. Then it dissolves into pure farce. It’s a mess really, like something from an old mad scientist ‘B’ movie. Constance is a missed opportunity. It could’ve been a great sci-fi thriller with a bit more pace, a little more time spent on developing the characters and a better ending.

[Shaun Hutchinson]

Well, I wanted to read it, but it's published by Amazon. Since Amazon won't sell the ebook version anywhere but Amazon and I refuse to buy anything on the Kindle platform, I guess I won't be reading it.

[Lidia · Rating 4 out of 5]

¿Estarías dispuesto a tener una réplica de ti mismo que te diese la oportunidad de seguir viviendo una vez has fallecido?

La ciencia y la tecnología avanzan a pasos agigantados logrando avances que cambian nuestras vidas. En 2038, la clonación de seres humanos ya no es ciencia ficción, forma parte de la sociedad, aunque eso sí, de la élite, no todo el mundo puede permitirse un clon con un valor de 25 o 30 millones de dólares.

Constance D’Arcy no nada en la abundancia, pero, su tía, madre de la clonación humana, ha regalado uno a cada miembro de la familia. Todos los meses, Con tiene que acudir la clínica Palingénesis para realizar una recarga de su consciencia, un proceso indoloro en el que el trato es impecable.

Pero, a pesar de las medidas de seguridad y protocolos que intervienen en el proceso, siempre existe una pequeña posibilidad de que haya algún fallo. En una de sus recargas habituales Constance se despierta dieciocho meses después sin saber qué ha sucedido, la clínica le asegura que su original ha fallecido y ahora es su propia copia. Pero… ¿Qué le ha sucedido a su original? Y lo que es más inquietante ¿Por qué le falta el recuerdo de dieciocho meses de su vida?

Normalmente no suelo leer libros de ciencia ficción, no es un género que me apasione, pero cuando leí el argumento de esta novela de thriller-ciencia ficción me generó mucha curiosidad porque trata un avance tecnológico muy importante en un futuro bastante cercano. Y no me equivoqué, ha sido una lectura muy original e inquietante que en algunos momentos me ha puesto los pelos como escarpias.

En esta historia conocemos a Constance, una chica que no está pasando por un buen momento y que prácticamente, se encuentra sola en la vida, no tiene relación con su madre y su abuela ya no está. Es un personaje con el que he empatizado mucho y sin duda ha sido mi favorito. Además, aparecen otros personajes bastante misteriosos de los que el autor nos hace desconfiar desde primera hora.

La trama es ágil y adictiva, mientras leía el libro tenía la sensación de estar viendo una película y la verdad, considero que podría tener mucho éxito en la gran pantalla.  

Me ha encantado como el autor plantea cuestiones éticas y morales sobre la clonación humana y como ha plasmado las diferentes reacciones de la sociedad ante un avance científico de este calibre creando incluso una organización anticlónica llamada “Los hijos de Adán”, un nombre muy acertado y original.

Si quieres estar unas horas entretenido con un thriller a contrarreloj, esta es tu historia.

[Kara Babcock · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ever read a book where the middle is the best part? Weird, I know. Usually we criticize a book for having a middle third that drags before the action picks up towards the end. But in the case of Constance, this was my experience: the first and final thirds of this book were fine but somewhat unremarkable; the middle third, on the other hand, was a fascinating exploration of the human condition. Overall these combine into a science-fiction thriller that is, if not very original in its tropes, quite a good execution thereof.

Matthew FitzSimmons boldly imagines a world not much more than a decade away from our own. It’s 2038, going on 2039. Constance—Con to her friends—is a struggling musician holding a candle for her former bandmate, who is in a coma after their van crashed over a year ago. Unlike most people in her situation, Con has a clone on ice at your standard evil megacorp Pangenesis, because her estranged aunt is the inventor of the consciousness scanning and storage technology that makes human cloning possible. So, every month, Con gets her mind scanned at a swank facility before returning to her dingy life. Until one day, when she wakes up after the scan to find out she is her clone—and that her previous self died a year and a half prior, and she has been decanted long after what is considered the “safe” amount of time to pass to awaken a clone.

And then Con needs to solve her own murder.

It’s this last part that really got me, as I suspect it will get you. Who wouldn’t want to read a mystery like this? Fortunately, FitzSimmons delivers a tantalizing set of clues and circumstances to keep us guessing. Some elements of the plot are predictable, alas. This is what I meant about the final third fizzling somewhat for me. It wasn’t exactly hard to guess who would be revealed as the Big Bad after the final twist. Likewise, Con’s reaction and resolution to this confrontation is predictable as well, which takes away some of my enjoyment of the ending. I don’t want to be too harsh: FitzSimmons ably ties up the loose ends and gives us a satisfactory conclusion, making this quite a nice, tidy standalone novel. I liked it. But if you were hoping for something that breaks the thriller formula more than that initial premise, you’re going to be disappointed on that score.

Where Constance does shine, in my opinion, is the part of the book in which Con must unravel not only the mystery of her murder but the mystery of herself. It’s a commentary on how much and how little we change as humans: Con is the same person she was before, except she is missing the most recent eighteen months of her memory. In those eighteen months, she somehow fell in love, married, moved to a different state, and who else knows what? Imagine waking up with that kind of amnesia—not a complete loss of episodic memory, but just enough that you felt out of sync with everything around you. Con frequently expresses bemusement at how much her life changed in less than two years, yet isn’t that so often the case? It’s just coming up on two years now that I realized I was trans, and in that time, I have come out, changed my name, and done innumerable other things that have altered my life (for the better), and in the same amount of time, we have all struggled with the dramatic changes wrought by a pandemic. Can you imagine someone who slipped into a coma just before the pandemic waking up today? Ouch.

So it’s very satisfying to watch Con deal with her discomfort, which spans several levels. First, of course, is her discomfort with being a clone. Is she really even a person? Is she really her? Other people’s reactions and beliefs notwithstanding, Con herself has a certain amount of internalized prejudice. Second is her bewilderment over getting married to a pro athlete. When she discovers why she was making secret trips (which the police viewed as an affair), things fall into place. There are some beautiful scenes of acceptance amidst grief during this rediscovery, by the way, and it was probably here that FitzSimmons’s writing shines the most brightly.

Many of the tropes around cloning as used in this book are far from original. The fingerprints of other science fiction are visible all over these ideas. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing—I appreciate it when writers acknowledge and embrace such tropes. But if you are looking for a breathtaking new perspective on the issues of identity and individuality that beset human cloning, you will not find that here.

Constance started as a book with a premise that made me want to read it, and that is always a promising sign. Sometimes such books prove to be a huge letdown—thankfully, that isn’t the case here. It never quite exceeds its potential, mind you, but it was a pleasant way to spend part of a weekend.

Originally posted on Kara.Reviews, where you can easily browse all my reviews and subscribe to my newsletter.

[Mackey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rarely do I have the pleasure of reading pure Sci-Fi since most Sci-Fi written today involves space fiction or fantasy but Constance was a rare treat of pure hard core science fiction set in the not-so near but near enough future so that, thankfully, it did not require world building (I hate world building, sorry.)

At its heart is the story of cloning. The rich elite get to keep themselves going forever, basically, with a few unfortunate catches. Your clone has to come back as an exact replica as yourself and the age that you were when you died. Of course, you have all new body parts but not a new shell. Bummer. Who wants this body!? But your brain and emotions and memories in tact. Again I asked, who wants THIS body!? Okay, okay... brains and memories are good but, seriously, if I'm going to pay for a clone I want a new body, okay!? And, well, that's what a lot of people want in the book as well.

FitzSimmons has a great premise throughout with the mystery that he has developed - why Constance has been cloned in the first place - but he also goes deeper into the realm of ethics regarding cloning and about how people, especially in a religious country would respond to clones (not good, obviously!) and what rights would these clones have with new bodies but the same brain and memories but, supposedly, no soul. And then there is the question of a soul. Do we have one? Do clones? I thought the moral implications throughout the book were fascinating.

If you like hard core sci-fi and if you are the type to read a little deeper into a storyline that what is on the surface then I think you will find that Constance is very intriguing book and one that I highly recommend.

[Вени · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5*

[The Girl with the Sagittarius Tattoo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very, very interesting. Constance is mystery writer Matthew FitzSimmons' take on Science Fiction, following a clone's investigation into her original's murder.

In the not-terribly-distant future, human cloning has been perfected. The way it works is that the mega-wealthy who can afford them must provide an upload of their memories and experiences every 30 days or so. Upon the event of death, the clone will be activated and receive the last download that was provided. Substantially, this means that a person's consciousness - more or less, that which makes a "person" - can go on living indefinitely.

What could go wrong? Or more accurately, how could people with bad intentions use this technology for evil?

Constance D'Arcy is a severely depressed former musician. Three years before, her band's van drove off the road, killing two members instantly and causing severe brain injury to a third. Con herself nearly lost her leg at the knee. In a strange twist of fate, it was her eccentric aunt who invented the science behind cloning and as gifts, gave all the members of her family the option of a clone. Out of the blue, Constance's clone is activated upon notification of her original's death. Two immediate problems: 1) the original's last upload was 18 months ago (way out of recommended operational guidelines), and 2) all anybody knows for sure is that the original Con is missing. Clone Con goes in search of her original and some answers. Those answers lead to more questions, and a whole big conspiracy.

America deals with clones' rights the same way it's dealing with anti-vaccination rights in the real world: not well. Moral, religious and social implications as to the "humanness" of clones are skillfully woven throughout this novel and gave me plenty to think about each time I put the book down. Although there were some plot threads that led nowhere and some improbabilities I just couldn't overlook, I thought this was pretty terrific for an author who doesn't write in this genre. Worth the read for sure.

[Jaksen · Rating 3 out of 5]

A DNF. Read enough to give it three stars.

I was very hopeful about this book, great premise - a clone awakens when her 'original' dies, but there's more to it than that. Conspiracy. Lies. Betrayal. An entire network of anti-clone extremists who can hunt and kill clones at will. (Well in some states, not in others.) There's comparisons to today's politics and scenarios that scream close to home, and yet...

It gets so confusing with who did what to whom and why and who's betraying who and using who and I just kind of gave up. Simply said: I could not follow the story about halfway through. I kept reading, though, hoping I'd suddenly turn a corner and say, okay now I get it! I never did.

One might think it's my advancing age? Nope. Recently read some tome-heavy books with dozens of characters and intertwined storylines, no problemo. Reading also about Winston Churchill and the many, many, many real-life people who did important work in weaponry and defense during WWII. Had no problem with that as well.

So three stars for book being well-written, and an exciting, unique premise. Two off for confusing the heck out of me so much my mind just drifted and I couldn't keep focus on what I was reading.

(I tried several times, even in a quiet house where usually it's filled with sound. Didn't help.)

Three, C-, stars.

[Aristotle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cloning?
I thought the Galactic Republic outlawed it?
When the Senate hears this they will demand answers!
Not to mention what the Jedi Council will say!

This was an episode of the TV series Orphan Black.
It raises issues about the moral and ethical implications of human cloning and its effect on identity.

A readable book but not the smoothest ride.

"Pieces are being moved around the board, and I'm not even sure what game it is we're playing." -Butler

And that's one of the problems I had with this book. I didn't know who was the King, Queen, or Pawn and I wasn't sure what game we were playing.
Con was a likable enough character. Her former band drama didn't add much to the story. The supporting cast was too large and for the most part forgettable. A better editor could have helped.
Try the Gibson Vaughn series

[Dominic Piacentini · Rating 2 out of 5]

A fun premise, though likely better suited to a 45-minute Black Mirror episode (preferably written by someone besides Matthew FitzSimmons). The imagery was a bit all over the place. (I'm still not entirely sure what "alpine hair" or "country club jowls" are.) And I would, at times, find myself re-reading sentences that seemed intent on repeating themselves (i.e "The less attention she attracted, the less attention she attracted" or "It was strange, really, how good she felt and how strange it felt to feel good."
That being said, "Hello everyone. I am the other shoe" is a bit of dramatic dialogue I intend to remember and reuse when the moment is right. If I could give this 2.5 stars, I would.

[Andreas Tornberg · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating sci-fi thriller that started really great but it didn’t hold up the entire way. It’s well written and the characters are developed in a good way but unfortunately I lost interest in the final act of the story.

Thanks to the author, Thomas & Mercer and NetGalley for the copy.

[Emiliya Bozhilova · Rating 2 out of 5]

Добра идея с клонинги в бъдещето, осигуряващи вид безсмъртие на крайно богатите си оригинали след смъртта им, и представляващи любопитна юридическа главоблъсканица. Личност ли е клонингът, и то същата личност като оригинала?

С развитието на сюжета обаче интересът ми значително спадна и изобщо не ме интересуваше какво се случва с Констанс. Някак си действието се оказа точно типично бестселъровско и твърде разфокусирано. Би излязъл приличен сериал.

[Sara · Rating 3 out of 5]

This novel was incredibly thought-provoking and a glimpse into our future with a sobering moral: when technology allows us to cheat death, should we take that chance?

Overall, I enjoyed the first three-quarters of this story. It was an adventure in philosophy. It opened my eyes to the possibilities of cloning and the moral dilemmas we will face in our lifetime.

However, it started to fall apart at the end, and there was far too much of the "bad guy monologues and explains entire conspiracy" trope.

[Benni · Rating 4 out of 5]

Got the book through Amazon's First Reads program, and I'm a sucker for stories about clones, so I started it and couldn't stop until it ended. Very engrossing!

The ending was a little open-ended, but coming on here and seeing that this is going to be a series...that makes sense. Look forward to the next book.

[Claudia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun and quick sci Fi thriller. Was a little disappointed in the end but loved the ride to get there. Enjoyed the moral discussions and mystery even if guessed.

Constance is from the future, not some crazy far off time but advanced enough that chances have happened. And one of the biggest is that we now clone people and upload their consciousness into their brand new body. When Constance wakes up after the procedure to upload her mind, it turns out that it's months later and her original is probably murdered somewhere. She's the clone and has no idea who might have wanted to kill her.

I really enjoyed the ideas presented here. I think the pushback against clones would absolutely happen almost exactly the way it would here. It was such an interesting thing to see people's emotional reactions to meeting a copy of someone they loved. Are you just your memories? Really interesting philosophy and law analysis and questions brought up!

The story moved at a great pace with Constance running non stop from clue to clue and possible betrayal to possible betrayal. While I could see where we would end up pretty early in the story, the how was still a question and who along. So there was plenty to speculate on throughout.

Constance is a great and sympathetic main character. Fitzsimmons created relationships quickly that you can care about easily The side characters are mostly suspects but do their job well.

The ending was a little too anti and overly climatic which is impressive to pull off but I was not quite satisfied either way.

Overall, an enjoyable sci Fi thriller. Check it out.

[Genevieve Grace · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a sort of murder mystery mixed with cloning sci-fi.

Set just far enough in the future that things aren't exactly the same -- but close enough to easily imagine -- Constance D'Arcy is a depressed, disaffected musician dealing with grief and what seems like PTSD. Her aunt just happens to be the multimillionaire founder of a cloning company.

One day, Constance wakes up as her own clone. Her original was brutally murdered, and she needs to find out what happened.

Honestly, the idea of a clone investigating her own murder sounds RIGHT up my alley. I love that kind of sci-fi, and I also love murder mysteries. There is a problem here, however, and I'm not sure what it is.

Could it be Constance's vaguely downbeat, ruminating personality? The fact that I never seemed to be able to really invest in her character? Constance's stubborn insistence on moping her way into danger with as little thought as possible? There were at least five times where she showed up somewhere and seemed to not know why exactly she was there. She'd meant to go there. Planned to go there. For what reason? We just don't know. She felt compelled.

Sadly, I did not feel compelled. Not nearly as much as I wanted to, and should have.

The mystery itself is still interesting, but it gets buried under my lack of interest in Constance as a person, and the who-am-I-what-am-I moral dilemma that takes up all of her thoughts.

Sci-fi like this is absolutely required to confront that moral dilemma, and spending a lot of effort on the topic I think was fine. In my opinion, though, this book didn't pull it off. Ideally, you should end a story like this feeling sort of disconnected from reality and questioning some of your own assumptions. By the end, all I was feeling was a little annoyed at Constance's frequent solemn flashbacks and reveries.

The climax, at least, is free of this kind of slogging. As soon as we begin to wind up the story, it winds up quickly and with a bang, more like a thriller series than either the murder mystery or philosophical sci-fi the rest of the book is trying to be. I enjoyed it as a welcome relief.

Overall, this book was nothing outstanding, but it does do a solid job telling a genre-bending story and serves up an interesting plot.

[D.M. Pulley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was lucky enough to get a sneak preview of this thrill ride of a story and loved it! A great concept novel, well executed, that truly lives up to the promise of the premise. Well done!

[lauraღ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most of life is lived to be forgotten. That was the way of things, cruel though it felt when it was your life that would be lost.

3.5 stars. Another book that seems to solidify the fact that maybe action thrillers are the only types of thrillers that I can consistently enjoy. Although, to be fair, I haven't loved every single book in that sub-genre that I've ever read. And also to be fair, I would classify this more as science fiction, and really, the parts of the book that I really enjoyed and that really made me think and that provided the questions that kept driving me forward were the science fiction parts of it.  

It's set in the near future, and Constance is a young woman who was gifted a clone by her genius aunt. After doing a routine consciousness upload, she wakes up 18 months later to find that her original was killed, and she is the new Con. Or the old Con? I really do love science fiction stories about cloning, the ethics of cloning, what it means to be a person, reclaiming of identity, all those things. It's similar to how I feel about artificial intelligence; I just love seeing a person who was made rather than born grapple with their identity. Con is a really great character. Even though some of the decisions that she makes as she tries to figure out what happened to her original aren't always the most logical or the smartest, I did kind of understand her drive to keep moving forward and to keep figuring things out at any cost. We get enough setup around her background and what happened to her in the years before she received the clone that helps us to understand the type of person she is and why she would make certain decisions. I loved the part of her backstory that had to deal with her being an almost rockstar with her rock band; it's not the type of background that I expected to see outside of a book about music, and it provided a bunch of interesting titbits. I guess the thriller aspects and the mystery around what's going on isn't the most sophisticated. There were some surprises along the way, and some characters that we interact with that I didn't expect to, but in the end it was pretty clear who was ultimately responsible. I didn't mind that though, because the journey to getting there was really entertaining. There were a lot of heartfelt moments that got to me a lot more than I might have expected, and I just had a fun time with this.  

Listened to the audiobook as read by January LaVoy, and it was really great. She did such an amazing job with all of the voices for the supporting cast. At some points I almost wondered if this book had more than one narrator, because she was just so good at adapting and changing her voice for the different characters. I'm really glad I gave this a try; this is the kind of near future science fiction that my brain delights in chewing on. I'll definitely continue the series. 

If you lived your life to be remembered when you were gone, you were wasting your time.