Wyman Ford is back again in The Kraken Project, the thrilling new novel from New York Times bestselling author Douglas Preston.
NASA is building a probe to be
splashed down in the Kraken Mare, the largest sea on Saturn’s great
moon, Titan. It is one of the most promising habitats for
extraterrestrial life in the solar system, but the surface is
unpredictable and dangerous, requiring the probe to contain artificial
intelligence software. To this end, Melissa Shepherd, a brilliant
programmer, has developed "Dorothy," a powerful, self-modifying AI whose
true potential is both revolutionary and terrifying. When
miscalculations lead to a catastrophe during testing, Dorothy flees into
the internet.
Former CIA agent Wyman Ford is
tapped to track down the rogue AI. As Ford and Shepherd search for
Dorothy, they realize that her horrific experiences in the wasteland of
the Internet have changed her in ways they can barely imagine. And
they’re not the only ones looking for the wayward software: the AI is
also being pursued by a pair of Wall Street traders, who want to capture
her code and turn her into a high-speed trading bot.
Traumatized, angry, and
relentlessly hunted, Dorothy has an extraordinary revelation—and devises
a plan. As the pursuit of Dorothy converges on a deserted house on the
coast of Northern California, Ford must face the ultimate question: is
rescuing Dorothy the right thing? Is the AI bent on saving the world… or
on wiping out the cancer that is humankind?
