Witness X by S E Moorhead, Published by Orion. @semoorhead #Blog #Review @piperverlag @TrapezeBooks @Orionbooks
Witness X by S E Moorhead – A mind-bending thriller – coming out in paperback in US on May 25th.
I was very excited to receive an advance copy of this amazing book. Delivered in the past, the present and the future, Doctor Kyra Sullivan finds herself the midst of mortar fire and a scene of violence and carnage. The year is 2035 and she sits on a recliner in the CarterTech lab, wearing a headset. Through Brownrigg’s body, she feels fear, sees what he sees and hears what he hears — a memory transference procedure she has invented. This makes for a compulsive page-turner with prose that moves along at breakneck speed.
Seeing into Brownrigg’s past, not only confirms how useful this technology is but how it could easily get into the wrong hands. For me, this is positively chilling and the terror mounts. Originally made for the criminal justice system, Brownrigg feels it would be better served to tackle terrorism to gain intel that might prevent an attack and save lives. Kyra isn’t so sure, while Carter, the business side of the partnership, has the interests of the company to heart. There is one devastating question; is it possible to inherit someone else’s physical traits whilst being in their memories? This would certainly be my deepest fear.
This is a time where bio-chips and tracking devices make a subject’s whereabouts easy to spot. Brain-hacking sounds frightening, but very plausible given the speed of technology today. Haunted by the Mizpah Murderer, Kyra can’t help thinking Lomas isn’t the right man. With her profiler background, she’s charged with interviewing the man who could have butchered her sister.
The journey she takes to discover the perpetrator is viscerally exciting. Moorhead has great skill in creating believable characters and thrusting them into seemingly impossible situations. The plot is carefully layered, trapping us into the dark paranoia of her world. It’s been described as an apocalyptic dystopian thriller with hints of Blade Runner and its long-buried secrets. This is a suspense worth remembering and I believe the author has yielded her most imaginative and popular work yet.
sarahmoorhead.com 