2054

Elliot Ackerman

£18.99

Available on back-order

It is twenty years after the catastrophic war between the US and China that brought down the old American political order. A new party has emerged in the US, one that’s held power for over a decade. Efforts to tighten its grip have resulted in mounting violent resistance. The American president has control of the media, but he is beginning to lose control of the streets. Many fear he’ll stop at nothing to remain in the White House. Suddenly, he collapses in the middle of an address to the nation. After an initial flurry of misinformation, the administration reluctantly announces his death. A cover-up ensues, conspiracy theories abound, and the country descends into a new type of civil war. A handful of elite actors from the worlds of computer science, intelligence and business have a fairly good idea what happened.

ISBN: 9780241694978 Category:

Description

‘A pacy, gripping page-turner of a thriller . . . Don’t venture into the future without having read this book’ Andrew Roberts

From the acclaimed authors of the runaway New York Times bestseller 2034 comes an explosive work of speculative fiction about a radical leap forward in artificial intelligence that combines with America’s violent partisan divide to create an existential threat to the country – and the world.

The year is 2054. It is twenty years after the nuclear war between the United States and China that brought down the old American political order. The new American Dream Party has emerged in the US and held power for over a decade. Many fear the president will stop at nothing to remain in the White House. Suddenly, he collapses in the middle of an address to the nation. After a flurry of misinformation, the administration reluctantly announces his death. A cover-up ensues, conspiracy theories spread like wildfire and the country descends into civil war.

A handful of elite actors from the worlds of computer science, intelligence and business have a fairly good idea what happened. All signs point to a profound breakthrough in AI, of which the remote assassination of an American president is hardly the most game-changing ramification. The trail leads to an outpost in the Amazon rainforest: the last known whereabouts of the tech visionary who predicted this breakthrough. As some of the world’s great powers – old and new, state and nonstate alike – struggle to outmanoeuvre one another in this new Great Game of scientific discovery, the outcome becomes entangled with the fate of democracy itself.

Combining a deep understanding of AI, biotech and the possibility of a coming singularity, along with their signature geopolitical sophistication, Elliot Ackerman and Admiral James Stavridis have once again written a visionary work. 2054 is a novel that reads like a thriller even as it demands that we consider the trajectory of our society and its potentially calamitous destination.

‘A satisfying combination of two very different things: “chilling vision of things to come” and “page-turning beach-read”‘ Daily Telegraph

Additional information

Weight 0.502 kg
Dimensions 24.1 × 16.2 × 2.7 cm
Author

Publisher

Imprint

Cover

Hardback

Pages

304

Language

English

Edition

Hardback original

Dewey

813.6 (edition:23)

Readership

General – Trade / Code: K

Join our Mailing List

Sign up to the Jaffé & Neale newsletters to receive updates on forthcoming titles we’re excited about, book club information and book signing events at the store.