A PHILOSOPHY OF THIEVES

Living since the Mess, or the Turbulence—depending who you ask—is a struggle.

In a prescient climate-changed future, where sea levels have risen and social stratification is clearer than the air, the ultrawealthy in New Washington are living in a new gilded age, while the poor majority lives in a surveillance state. There’s plenty to see on the New Washington City Feed when content isn’t redacted. Either way it comes at a price. Dropped right into the midst of a heist, this story follows the Canarvier family—thieves who can be hired to rob lavish parties as entertainment for the wealthy guests. This dystopian pastime goes as follows: Hire performers, the best thieves in the business, then catch them in the act before time is up and the partygoers win. But let them get away with the heist and they’ll sell the host’s belongings back for a profit. When the Canarvier patriarch, King, goes missing, his family must take on a grand heist—a well-paying gig with much higher risk—and buy his freedom before he’s shipped off to the water mines of Alaska. Besides the challenge of planning to steal without their mastermind, the Canarviers don’t really know their target, Mason, a young and wealthy entrepreneur. And they certainly don’t know what lengths he will go to catch them and recover his fortune. Ultimately about family and what we can risk for one other, this story pushes its characters to reckon with legacy, built and given, and how to choose between the comfort of what they know or striving to be better. The novel’s simple prose gives way to such complex and richly imagined worldbuilding that you’ll forget you’re reading about fabricated nutrition and clothing that listens.

Buckle up for a cyberpunk Great Gatsby, anchored by a thrilling heist.