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A review by ali_brarian
Brainjack by Brian Falkner
5.0
Falkner, Brian. Brain Jack. Random House, 2009. 13-15 yrs.
Sam Wilson is a high school computer hacker living in the near future where Las Vegas has been destroyed in a nuclear terrorist attack. Online gamers get so addicted to their games that the addiction has become illegal and neuro-headsets have taken the place of keyboards – allowing the wearer to control the Internet with their thoughts. After pulling off a hack on Telecomerica, one of the world’s leading telecommunication companies, Sam is recruited by the Cyber Defense Division of Homeland Security to protect the United States from potential hacks. Sam suddenly gives up his high school life in order to become part of CDD, leaving behind his mother and his best friend Fargas who is slowly becoming addicted to the neuro video games. Neuro-headsets are taking off and are suddenly discovered by the group at CDD to be controlling all humans who put the headsets on, forming a “collective consciousness.” Soon everyone has turned on Sam, Dodge and Vienna, three members of CDD who were not affected by the headsets. Fleeing to the radioactive nuclear wasteland that was Vegas, the trio attempts to create a virus that will reverse the damage the neuro-headsets have caused. But when the virus doesn’t work, Sam has to come head-to-head with the neuro-technology in order to reverse the devastation the brain hijacking technology has caused.
Falkner creates an imaginative world where the high-tech language of hacking is in its least daunting form. Even those readers who are less than tech-saavy will find themselves becoming immersed in the cyber network where Sam lives out his reality. Computer-hacking terms and techie-acronyms galore don’t pigeonhole Brain Jack. Multiple twists and turns will entertain readers of Sci-Fi, Mystery and Suspense. Although the main characters are mainly young men, girls can find something of value in Falkner’s fast-paced writing. Brain Jack could easily be integrated into junior high and early high school curricula in tandem with other more classic dystopian works such as Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four. Readers will be left on edge contemplating how the future of technology could fatally transform society and wondering along with Sam: “Could consciousness itself be highjacked?”
Sam Wilson is a high school computer hacker living in the near future where Las Vegas has been destroyed in a nuclear terrorist attack. Online gamers get so addicted to their games that the addiction has become illegal and neuro-headsets have taken the place of keyboards – allowing the wearer to control the Internet with their thoughts. After pulling off a hack on Telecomerica, one of the world’s leading telecommunication companies, Sam is recruited by the Cyber Defense Division of Homeland Security to protect the United States from potential hacks. Sam suddenly gives up his high school life in order to become part of CDD, leaving behind his mother and his best friend Fargas who is slowly becoming addicted to the neuro video games. Neuro-headsets are taking off and are suddenly discovered by the group at CDD to be controlling all humans who put the headsets on, forming a “collective consciousness.” Soon everyone has turned on Sam, Dodge and Vienna, three members of CDD who were not affected by the headsets. Fleeing to the radioactive nuclear wasteland that was Vegas, the trio attempts to create a virus that will reverse the damage the neuro-headsets have caused. But when the virus doesn’t work, Sam has to come head-to-head with the neuro-technology in order to reverse the devastation the brain hijacking technology has caused.
Falkner creates an imaginative world where the high-tech language of hacking is in its least daunting form. Even those readers who are less than tech-saavy will find themselves becoming immersed in the cyber network where Sam lives out his reality. Computer-hacking terms and techie-acronyms galore don’t pigeonhole Brain Jack. Multiple twists and turns will entertain readers of Sci-Fi, Mystery and Suspense. Although the main characters are mainly young men, girls can find something of value in Falkner’s fast-paced writing. Brain Jack could easily be integrated into junior high and early high school curricula in tandem with other more classic dystopian works such as Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four. Readers will be left on edge contemplating how the future of technology could fatally transform society and wondering along with Sam: “Could consciousness itself be highjacked?”