The Arcanum Legacy Book One: The Dissidents

The year is 2090, and the Western world is ruled by a handful of transnational corporations (TNCs) that control everything from the food we eat to the drugs we take. Many people live in Smart Cities where travel and social activities are limited. Although free to go, most remain because their needs are catered to by the Dominion — the ruling body for all TNCs.

Governed by an unelected group of leaders from the most powerful corporations, known as the Directorate, society is strictly hierarchical, with lower-caste workers at the bottom. The middle caste comprises skilled workers and engineers—the critical thinkers who have become the most disillusioned. Many have left the Smart Cities to start their own society of dissidents.

Book one in this series of four tells the story of Lena Ashcroft, a surveillance officer who watches over the lower and middle castes and reports to the Directorate. Her life is good until one day, she intercepts a memo from higher up the chain telling her of a secret plan to release a pathogen to control the minds of the middle castes and make them more compliant.

Lena flees the city to find the dissident encampment, where their leader, known simply as the Oracle, will advise her on what to do.

Jonas Pierce, a high-ranking enforcer for the Dominion, is tasked with tracking down Lena and returning her to the city. Will he succeed in stopping the Dissidents, or will the Dominion crumble in the wake of rebellion?