Science, Religion and Our Emerging Culture

David Brown is a college kid who hates his life. Unlike stereotypical college kids who need to lay off the alcohol/dope, David really does have a reason to hate his life- Ten years earlier (2010 or whereabouts) his father unleashed a virus called Peacemaker, which completely unmade the economy and broke down the world as we know it. David has been moved from school to school, always keeping his eyes down and his shoulder to the wheel. Like his father, he has inherited a preternatural sense for building machines/software. Currently, the next Depression is taking its toll on the population and two factions struggle for power: the shady Domain (aka Technos) led by Dianne Morgan and the Church of Natural Humans, led by fanatic Adam Jordan.

Now, in the year 2022, ten years after Peacemaker, David receives a prerecorded message from his father, shattering the very foundation of all he knows: that his father was not responsible for the Peacemaker attack, but found a lethal virus and was going to attempt to expose those behind it. Now, David begins to put together the pieces to clear his family name. He is tracked by both the Technos and the Church: the Technos want to eliminate him before he exposes the truth while the Church wishes to follow his progress and hopefully uncover enough information to bring down the Technos. These opposing factions take David on a terrifying ride as he struggles to find the truth.

Unholy Domain is a fast paced thriller that never lets you rest. Ronco’s worldbuilding is excellent, which in a way is the scariest part–think about how the internet has pervaded our lives in the past ten years. Where will be in another ten? What will religion look like? The way things are going now, an Army of God whose symbol is a fireplace and bolt-action rifle isn’t that far off. The only downside was a slew of characters that I couldn’t always keep track of.

Overall, Unholy Domain is a great standalone, but I definitely would like to follow up on the other two in the trilogy: Peacemaker and Tomorrow’s Children.

Once you have read Unholy Domain you may want to check out this article about Reinventing Slavery…Dan Ronco is clearly on the right track