When college student Emery Driscoll is blackmailed into being a courier for a clandestine organisation, she’s cut off from the neural implant community which binds the domed city of New Worth together. Her new employer exploits her rare condition which allows her to carry encoded data in her blood, and train her to transport secrets throughout the troubled city. New Worth is on the brink of Emergence – freedom from the dome – but not everyone wants to leave. Then a data drop goes bad, and Emery is caught between factions: those who want her blood, and those who just want her dead.
Advance Praise:
“Lauren C. Teffeau brings us a fully-realized world filled with conflict, drama, and insight. When the city of New Worth hid from a hostile climate under its dome, it also bottled a host of tensions and disparities inside its soaring architecture. Bridging the lower depths and the heights of privilege is sympathetic, believably flawed courier Emery, whose very blood holds a secret that could bring the city crashing into ruins. . .”
– Walter Jon Williams, multi-award-winning and New York Times bestselling author of Hardwired and the Praxis series.
“Implanted takes readers to the bleeding edge of a hopeful future and dives headlong into the risks required to make that future real. Emery is a character I loved from the start for her skills and flaws both, and Teffeau takes this ultra-high-tech future to new heights and depths with incredible skill. Such a great adventure!”
– Fran Wilde, Hugo and Nebula finalist and Andre Norton-winning author of the Bone Universe series
“Futuristic intrigue solidly rooted in intricate, multi-level worldbuilding – spiced with just a touch of romance – singles Lauren C. Teffeau’s Implanted out from the cyberpunk pack.”
– Jane Lindskold, New York Times bestselling author of Through Wolf’s Eyes
“Teffeau serves up the future and it’s entertaining and scary! The arms race of hackers and blockers goes to new heights, in an intriguing tale of life in the automated cities of the future.”
– S.M. Stirling, New York Times bestselling author of The Sky-Blue Wolves and The Black Chamber
“Imaginative and thrilling, Implanted features a truly unique premise, characters you’ll want to root for, and a fascinating, fully-realized future.”
– Lori M. Lee, author of Gates of Thread and Stone and The Infinite
About the Author:
Lauren C. Teffeau is a speculative fiction writer based in Albuquerque, New Mexico, whose work focuses on environmental issues, examines the role of technology in our lives, and centers women’s voices through fantastical adventures and immersive worlds. Her novella A Hunger with No Name was published by the University of Tampa Press in 2024. Named a definitive work of climate fiction by Grist, her novel Implanted (2018, Angry Robot) was a finalist for the 2019 Compton Crook award for best first SF/F/H novel. She’s had over twenty short stories appear in venues like After Dinner Conversation, Sunday Morning Transport, DreamForge Magazine, and the Stoker Award-nominated Chromophobia: A Strangehouse Anthology by Women in Horror. Look for a new novella from her next spring. To learn more, please visit: http://www.laurencteffeau.com
