Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
In this "classic haunted house tale meets Black Mirror" (Book Riot), a family moves into a home equipped with the world's most intelligent, cutting-edge, and intuitive computer ever--but a buried secret leads to terrifying and catastrophic consequences. After two years of living on cheap beer and little else in a bitterly cold tiny cabin outside an abandoned, crumbling mansion, young programmers Shawn Eagle and Billy Stafford have created something that could make them rich: a revolutionary computer they name Eagle Logic.
But the hard work and escalating tension have not been kind to their once solid friendship--Shawn's girlfriend Emily has left him for Billy, and a third partner has disappeared under mysterious circumstances. While Billy walks away with Emily, Shawn takes Eagle Logic, which he uses to build a multi-billion-dollar company that eventually outshines Apple, Google, and Microsoft combined.
Years later, Billy is a failure, beset by poverty and addiction, and Shawn is the most famous man in the world. Unable to let the past be forgotten, Shawn decides to resurrect his and Billy's biggest failure: a next-generation computer program named Nellie that can control a house's every function. He decides to set it up in the abandoned mansion they worked near all those years ago. But something about Nellie isn't right--and the reconstruction of the mansion is plagued by accidental deaths. Shawn is forced to bring Billy back, despite their longstanding mutual hatred, to discover and destroy the evil that lurks in the source code.
From the internationally bestselling author of the "apocalyptic extravaganza" (Publishers Weekly) The Hatching series, this white-knuckled thriller is perfect for fans of Stephen King and Iain Reid.
Synopsis
When a family moves into a remote high-tech mansion equipped with next-generation artificial intelligence that can control the house's every function--a buried secret leads to terrifying and catastrophic consequences. Nellie is programmed to be the perfect digital assistant. But something sinister lurks in her source code--and now she's the perfect killer.
When Billy Stafford and his wife move into their house designed with every comfort in mind, he thinks it will be the perfect chance to work on their marriage and to restart his career. A brilliant computer engineer fallen on hard times, Billy's been hired by his former business partner to test out Nellie: a cutting-edge artificial intelligence program hardwired into the house. All Billy has to do is fix a few bugs in the system, which sounds easy enough.
But as winter settles in and Billy and his wife are left alone in the woods, a dark reality begins to emerge. Nellie's problems are much worse than a few technology glitches. Infused with the sinister history of the mansion and her own creator's sins, she has, in fact, become a killing machine. And the only way to escape is to give her what she wants...
A gripping technothriller about AI gone rogue, The Mansion is "a thrilling story that combines modern technology with old fears" (Shelf Awareness).