Word to Dreams

The author, Michael F Stewart, has done it again. He's brought the world of hacking, tweeting, etc to us fully wrapped in another perfect edition to the Assured Destruction series. What makes his novels work so well? This man has his finger right on the pulse of today's techno empire and knows just how to manipulate it to make a good story scream with genius.

With Zombies, thankfully, has nothing to do with the Dawn of the Dead zombies. It's more of a state of mind, and the use of the word in current slang terminology. When I first saw the word zombies, I admit there was some dread involved, because I was concerned that the world of Assured Destruction had been turned up on end and wouldn't be the same that I had grown to be quite fond of. It was turned on end, but not in a post-apocalyptic way, but with Jan focusing a bit more and starting to get the answers she's been working towards for awhile.

In this book, we get answers on the men in Jan's life; Peter and her father. We learn the identity of the infamous hacker Sw1ftM3rcy, and it's a doozy! We learn just how deep things have gone before and how deep they are still today. I found myself rooting for Janus even more than ever before and realizing just how much she's matured through the situations she's been in. She's finding her way in life, after a few more delays, and there's a light at the end of the tunnel for her.

This book is a YA techno thriller, but is perfect for any age and will have the computer geek in every reader singing to the Google lords. Readers will be wanting their own chop-chop to play with, I mean, who doesn't like to completely destroy something when it's supposed to be done like that? It's like putting a kid in a candy store and giving them the run of the place.

The series has come to an end, but it will always hold a special niche in my reading world. An enjoyable read that took the reader into a world that they have only heard about, into a knowledge bank of techno mumbo jumbo, but the author explains everything in such a way that you don't realize until after the fact, that he's done so and in a non-duh type of way.