Some kind of monster (book)

February 23, 2008 6:39 PM

I am trying to find a SciFi book that I read the first couple of chapters of. It involved two companies racing to come up with some kind of genetic cure and in the process creating a monster or something.

If I recall, it was linked to either here or on boingboing (I asked Doctorow and he has no memory of it). Anyway, it was originally released a chapter at a time and people tipped the author and he kept writing and it was available on Amazon.

What was it?

posted by rbs to media & arts (6 comments total)

David Wellington's Monster Island?
posted by djb at 7:45 PM on February 23, 2008

I don't recall that Monster Island ever explains the origin of the zombies (although, the "dark energy" aspect of the story implies an occult origin). This sounds more akin to Michael Crichton's Prey (although that's a nanotech monster rather than a biologic).
posted by SPrintF at 8:21 PM on February 23, 2008

Sounds like Ancestor.
posted by spartacusroosevelt at 8:31 PM on February 23, 2008

Yep, that's it. Looks like it's out of print. Damn.
posted by rbs at 6:55 AM on February 24, 2008

I think you're probably thinking of Peter Watts's Blindsight.

The related phony pharma company presentation via boingboing. I think it was also linked on metafilter.

Oh, I see on preview I'm wrong. Oh well, I'll post anyway since Blindsight has some similar elements.
posted by sevenyearlurk at 7:17 AM on February 24, 2008

Here is the PDF.
posted by spartacusroosevelt at 11:31 AM on February 24, 2008 [2 favorites has favorites]