If you like Ghosts of Girlfriends Past, War Games, 2001: Space Odyssey and Star Trek, you’ll enjoy this sci-fi comedy by Charles Barouch. Tiago has stolen a starship and managed to evade his pursuers for months, but at a price. Not only is all remaining onboard food vegan, there’s also no human companionship. However, improving his quality of life has its price, too. Tiago must re-learn relationship skills in order to deal with the increasingly complex thoughts and feelings of the digital simulation he modeled after an ex-girlfriend. In addition, he faces faulty logic from hostile alien sims.
I particularly enjoyed the developing male-female relationship dynamics in this book, as well as the space exploration storytelling and human-computer comedy dialogue. Ship design-centric Trekkies and world-building authors will appreciate the schematics for the massive Interrogative. Being more of an intuitive, I looked at it, but didn’t find it necessary to understand the story, more like bonus material.
DISCLOSURE: I received a complimentary copy of this book for editorial review purposes. My opinions are my own.
Belinda Y. Hughes Books 