Adam Colclough lives and works in the West Midlands, he writes regularly for a number of websites, one day he will get round to writing a book for someone else to review.
Chinese philanthropist Jock Lim has a plan to end poverty for good based on unpublished work by Albert Einstein.
There is only one small problem to Jock’s plan - a lot of vested interests are quite happy for things to stay as they are; and they have the backing of a shadowy cabal led by the Choirmaster - they are prepared to kill to preserve the status quo.
On one level, this is a globe-trotting airport thriller, on another it uses the tricks of that familiar genre to touch on some serious issues.
Harris hits squarely all the required bases, keeping the action moving at a rapid pace from New York to London; Stockholm to the teeming cities of an emerging India. There is no shortage of hairs breadth escapes as his characters rush from one crisis to the next, always one step ahead of the forces working for their destruction.
More importantly he uses the novel to examine how the current global economic system creates inequality for the many while helping the wealthy few protect their assets. Along the way Harris suggests how technology allied with the more egalitarian philosophies of non-Western cultures could offer a fairer alternative.
There are some flaws, such as in the middle section of the book (which provided a back-story) is overlong and a little confused. The conspiracy theme also fails to live up to expectations.
These though are minor criticisms of a book that manages for the most part to entertain its readers and make them better informed about the world we live in.
