Hardwired

In Walter Jon Williams' classic cyberpunk novel, the remnants of a war-ravaged America endure in scattered, heavily armed colonies, while the wealthy Orbital Corporations now control the world. Cowboy, an ex—fighter pilot who has become "hardwired" via skull sockets directly to his lethal electronic hardware, is now a panzerboy, a hi-tech smuggler riding armored hovertanks through the balkanized countryside. He teams up with Sarah, an equally cyborized gun-for-hire, to make a last stab at independence from the rapacious Orbitals. Together, they gather an unlikely gang of misfits for a ride that will take them to the edge of the atmosphere. This action-packed adventure is a must-read for science fiction fans everywhere.

This second installment in a classic cyberpunk series is a fast-paced ride through a gritty, well-imagined world. Steward is a clone, a beta. His memories are fifteen years old because his alpha never had a brain-scan update. And in those fifteen years, the entire world has changed. An alien race known as the Powers has established relations with humanity. The Policorp that held his allegiance has collapsed. He fought and survived the off-world Artifact War, but dozens of his friends did not. Both his first and second wives have divorced him. And, more importantly, someone has murdered him, causing the activation of the beta backup. Now Steward must probe into the horrors of the war, its politics and betrayals, to find out who wanted him dead-if he doesn't want to die again.