This Mortal Coil, by Emily Suvada

If you can get past an early scene in which the heroine has to eat the raw flesh of a diseased victim in order to gain immunity to the same disease, then you should enjoy this book, but there are several scenes just like it which are not for the squeamish.

The story is set in a future where all the human population have a screen grown into their arms from birth, on which there are various apps which do various things such as help heal or augment sound and vision, as well as allowing you to experience VR.

Genetic research has also moved on to the extent that people can change their physical appearance, not by changing DNA itself but by expressing genes in different ways (at least that’s how I read it – when it gets to the nitty gritty in can be a bit complicated but this doesn’t detract from the story).

Our heroine is Cat Agatta (a clever use of the four nucleotide letter bases to create a character name), whose father is an amazing genetic scientist, but who has been living alone since he was abducted by Cartaxus in order to find a cure for the Hydra virus which is threatening to destroy humanity.

A soldier then appears at her house, who knows her father and breaks the news that he is dead. Between them they find out that her father found a cure, but that she must de-code it in order to release it to the world.

The story continues on at a great pace, with believable characters and believable motives, and contains more twists than a strand of DNA, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I would strongly recommend it to anyone who likes science fiction.

The world it inhabits is probably a cross between Michael Crichton and Hunger Games/Divergent, and so if you have read and enjoyed those writers then you will enjoy this.

A great start to the trilogy, and I look forward to reading the next instalment. Click for Emily Suvada's website.