The Mountain in the Sea

  

I received a copy of this release from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Title: The Mountain in the Sea

Author: Ray Nayler

Publisher: MCD

Release Date: 10.4.22

Publisher’s Summary 

Humankind discovers intelligent life in an octopus species with its own language and culture, and sets off a high-stakes global competition to dominate the future.

Rumors begin to spread of a species of hyperintelligent, dangerous octopus that may have developed its own language and culture. Marine biologist Dr. Ha Nguyen, who has spent her life researching cephalopod intelligence, will do anything for the chance to study them.

The transnational tech corporation DIANIMA has sealed the remote Con Dao Archipelago, where the octopuses were discovered, off from the world. Dr. Nguyen joins DIANIMA’s team on the islands: a battle-scarred security agent and the world’s first android.

The octopuses hold the key to unprecedented breakthroughs in extrahuman intelligence. The stakes are high: there are vast fortunes to be made by whoever can take advantage of the octopuses’ advancements, and as Dr. Nguyen struggles to communicate with the newly discovered species, forces larger than DIANIMA close in to seize the octopuses for themselves.

But no one has yet asked the octopuses what they think. And what they might do about it.

A near-future thriller about the nature of consciousness, Ray Nayler’s The Mountain in the Sea is a dazzling literary debut and a mind-blowing dive into the treasure and wreckage of humankind’s legacy.

My Review

A marine research scientist joins forces with an android,"the only (allegedly) conscious being humankind had ever created" at a repurposed resort, on a privately owned archipelago in the Ho Chi Minh Autonomous Trade Zone, to study a group of hyperintelligent octopuses. 

(Side note, I'm choosing to use this pluralization, but there are grammatical rules supporting octopi and octopodes. You can read more about that HERE.) 

The second storyline follows an AI-operated fishing boat with a constantly replenished supply of human slaves performing the physical duties necessary to maximize profits. In this world of overfished oceans, profits reign supreme, and computers/automated workers cost more than human workers. There are lots of big ideas at play in this novel: collapsing ecosystems, the evolution of language, consciousness, and corporate science to name a few. Ray Nayler weaves them all in a way to make you switch between being totally immersed in the actions of each character one minute and drifting off into a daydream of existentialism the next. My mind is absolutely blown that this is a debut novel. I will read anything that Nayler writes in the future. If you love near-future, science-heavy science fiction or are in the mood for a book that will cause you to do a bit of deep thinking about humankind and our planet, this is the one for you.