Omnifix

The synopsis on the backside of the book looked interesting and promising and reminded me a bit of Ship of Fools (Richard Russo) in regards to the unknown alien species: "Ten years have passed since an unknown alien species invaded Earth. Hundreds of unmanned alien weapons platforms armed with deadly nanogens were unleashed throughout the solar system...a new weapon platform enters the solar system and is heading towards Earth". When reading the synopsis of this book, someone might expect a story mostly concerned with this new alien weapon platform. My expectation was certainly headed in that direction. However, as it turned out, the weapon platform was just a small piece in the puzzle and the actual story was much broader and went beyond a simple stop-and-destroy-mission. A vicious conspiracy manifested itself and entered the story at unexpected stages, enriched the overall plot and created a good level of suspense. For a moment, I was a bit disappointed when the actual stop-and-destroy-mission suddenly ended and the main character Alex returned to earth. The book lost a bit of its momentum at that stage but quickly got back on track and rewarded the reader with a superb, almost emotional phase, when the protagonist faced problems only known to nanogen 16 and 17 infected people. In general, the characters are amazingly crafted and go far beyond the average sci-fi character development. I wouldn?t say this doesn?t come at any cost, because the scientific part of the story is somewhat not comprehensive and sophisticated enough. For example, at one stage in the story, cloning comes into the picture and is used to move a human being into a new body, including memories, feelings, experience, and even the personality. This whole process is very simplified and only talks about downloading someone?s existence onto a hard drive and uploading it into the new body?s brain. Fundamental questions, such as are we human beings only a combination of our experience/memory, therefore we can create clones of ourselves and therefore we reach immortality? The author uses this concept without looking at least into the hypothetical issues and details of cloning and mentality transfers. He simply ignores the fact that he created the concept of immortal humans with this cloning solution! Do not get a wrong idea about the story; it is definitely not a stupid cloning type of sci-fi plot! The last thing which I found disturbing is the almost prompt ending. Mackay rushes towards the end and tries to cover too many facts in not enough pages. He could have easily expanded the book by another 100 pages without creating any bored second at all. In summary, I loved the story, the rich characters and the fast pace of events happening. It is for sure one of the better sci-fi books I have read over the last couple of years!

I feel Scott Mackay is an ultimate genius!!! This is the 2nd book that I read by him. Orbis was the first but I feel I like Orbis alot better!! Mr Mackay has a habit of putting you in the middle of the story, even though you don't know what the heck is going on, you are wanting to find what more of what is happening!! The main character Alex Denyer, a scientist, is being put through the most craziest situations that I, myself, couldn't phanthom going through. There were times I felt for the character. Originally, in the begining, I thought I knew who was the villian in this book, then Mr Mackay did a twist on me, then later on he did another twist and I realized I should stuck to my original guess. I felt Mr Mackay did a great job writing about the relationships Alex had with the other characters like his ex-wife & her new husband, his son and ex-girlfriend. There wasn't much action going maybe near the end. I felt the author wanted this book to be written by a scientist point of view. Like for example, if this happen to a scientist what would he do in this situation. No bang, bang shoot up type of violence happening here. In this case, it honesetly work for me!!

"Following on the heels of his critically acclaimed and highly original alternate history novel ORBIS, Scott Mackay now pens an intriguing, complex, and compelling science fiction thriller. He depicts a uniquely disturbing future for North America, where alien nanogens have infected much of the human race. Some nanogens limit life span to thirty years of age, while others disintegrate the body bit by bit, all the while keeping the victim alive. At the center of the story is Dr. Alex Denyer, a man who has spent his whole life fighting the nanogens, and who is now infected with Nanogen Number 17, the one that disintegrates human tissue. Omnifix, a human-designed nanogen, replaces disintegrating tissue with cybernetic equivalents. Alex slowly undergoes the transformation from human to machine. Mackay's grasp of extrapolated science is pitch perfect and convincing. This is a riveting book from first page to last, written in clean and engaging prose, full of twists and surprises, a definite page turner. As a deft portrayal of a man undergoing catastrophic bodily change, OMNIFIX ranks right up there with Kafka's THE METAMORPHOSIS, and should quickly become a classic of modern science fiction. Five stars all the way!"

I do not normally read hard core sci-fi, but I saw the cover and read the back of the book and read Harriett's review and thought I would give it a try. This is a deep book. In the sense that the author delves deep into the nanogens and genetics of the human body - the catch?? He makes it interesting and creates characters that are dimensional and you care about whether or not they are going to get infected with these little itty bitty nanotech creatures. Check it out, I bet you enjoy it.

It is the twenty fourth century and obviously Earth is nothing like we know it. It is made up of five city-states (Hawai is succeeding) and our once great country is a shell of its former self. Ten years ago, aliens from another galaxy launched Alien Weapons Platforms (AWPs) that released nanogens sixteen and seventeen on an unsuspecting populace. Number sixteen affected the children changing their DNA so they died at the age of thirty and number seventeen melted body tissues that in order to survive survive, humans were turned into cyborgs, fighting machines that frightened the normals.Dr. Alex Denyer is a scientist who knows more about alien technology than anyone else does. His son Daryl is a sixteen and he is working frantically to find a cure for him and others that are infected. A new AWP is traveling to Earth, this one bigger and more lethal than its predecessors. Alex and his team are sent up in space to find a way to divert the weapon away from Earth. While he works on solving that problem, nanogen seventeen infects him; he becomes a cyborg, one that the government still has a use for.OMNIFIX is one of the best science fiction discoveries of the year as the plot is innovative and action packed and stars characters that readers will care about and hope they regain the humanity they lost. Alex is a true patriot who cares about curing what the aliens did to mankind. Adding to the feel of overwhelming odds is the ominously and sinisterly aliens never seen since they self terminated. Renowned mystery writer Scott Mackey proves he is an excellent science fiction author.Harriet Klausner