Title: THE PASSENGERS
Expected publication: 27 August 2019
My Rating: 🌟🌟🌟1/2
Book Description:
You're riding in your self-driving car when suddenly the
doors lock, the route changes and you have lost all control. Then, a mysterious
voice tells you, "You are going to die."
Just as self-driving cars become the trusted, safer norm, eight people find themselves in this terrifying situation, including a faded TV star, a pregnant young woman, an abused wife fleeing her husband, an illegal immigrant, a husband and wife, and a suicidal man.
From cameras hidden in their cars, their panic is broadcast to millions of people around the world. But the public will show their true colors when they are asked, "Which of these people should we save?...And who should we kill first?"
Just as self-driving cars become the trusted, safer norm, eight people find themselves in this terrifying situation, including a faded TV star, a pregnant young woman, an abused wife fleeing her husband, an illegal immigrant, a husband and wife, and a suicidal man.
From cameras hidden in their cars, their panic is broadcast to millions of people around the world. But the public will show their true colors when they are asked, "Which of these people should we save?...And who should we kill first?"
My musings:
On our visit to the city this weekend, we saw Perth’s first
driverless bus, which is a trial of new technology that will apparently
“revolutionise transport”. Thanks to Mr Marrs I ran a mile and wouldn’t go near
it, much to the puzzlement of other family members, who were intrigued. I will
probably keep my old manual rust bucket way past the time every other citizen
travels to work in a pneumatic tube or whatever other things they are working
on, all because of this book!
Imagine getting into your fancy driverless car to go to
work, and you’re busy updating your facebook status or applying your makeup whilst
the computerised car takes care of your journey, when it suddenly changes
direction. You stare out of the window in disbelief. Then a voice comes over
the speaker, telling you that your car is no longer under your control. And in
all likelihood, you will soon be dead ....
THE PASSENGERS is a fast paced thriller that describes what
happens when eight driverless cars are being hijacked and programmed to collide
in one chilling act of – what? Terrorism? Murder? Revenge? We don’t know yet,
except that the man who calls himself “the Hacker” is ruthless and will not
hesitate to kill an innocent person to get his way. But Marrs doesn’t just stop
there and let a single evil entity do all his grunt work. No, he very cleverly
brings in the public through social media and news coverage, and it’s no
surprise that soon everyone is glued to a live streaming of the drama unfolding
and has an opinion on it. We seem to be so full of entitlement and have so many
opinions nowadays, don’t we? Well, the stakes have just been raised, because it
is the public who will decide which one of the passengers will live and who
will die. Based merely on a few choice facts the “hacker” is prepared to
release. And don’t we all jump to conclusions immediately, eager to condemn
someone to death? Mr Marrs, you know how to chill us to the core by exposing
the ugly side of human nature and the potholes of social media!
THE PASSENGERS is an
extremely clever book, which will not only chill you to the core but also test
your own pre-conceptions and prejudices as you, a member the public, will have
to make a life or death situation on who gets to live and who has to die. If
you don’t decide, everyone will die. So who would you save? And why? And when
new information comes to light, will you still think the same? In a way, the
story unravels clue by clue like an old-fashioned whodunit, except that the
death has not occurred yet. I admit, I was ready to throw my vote in the pot,
only to be gobsmacked when new information came to light. And I found myself
totally glued to the pages as this drama unfolded.
I admit that the story lost a bit of steam for me once the
passenger situation had been revealed and I was coming off the adrenaline high.
However, as John Marrs’ books tend to do, this story stayed in my mind long
after the last page had been turned, and I was itching to discuss it. It’s one
of those books you should read with a buddy, someone you can text at 2 a.m.
with a WTH??? message and then hotly debate your different opinions. This book
made for an an excellent group read, and entertained as well as challenged our
thought processes. It’s a story that chilled me to the core because if this is
the future, then I may look for a cave to move into with my TBR pile and live
off the grid.
Summary:
All in all, John Marrs has once again delivered a clever,
original and thrilling story that will appeal to readers across a range of
genres and allow for lively debates in group or buddy reads. I devoured this
over the course of a day because I had to find out what would happen. Now back
into my car hoping that I make it to work safely ....
Thank
you to Edelweiss and Berkley for the free electronic copy of this novel and
for giving me the opportunity to provide an honest review.
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