"A swift, gripping novel with a goose-pimple mix of scary science and near-future action." —Greg Bear, New York Times–bestselling, Hugo & Nebula Award–winning author of The Unfinished Land June 30th, 1908—In Siberia''s remote Tunguska river basin, the most devastating cosmic collision ever recorded flattens hundreds of square miles with a blast a thousand times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Yet, more than a hundred years later, the cause of the cataclysm remains shrouded in mystery.Maverick astrophysicist Jack Adler thinks he''s figured it out: a submicroscopic black hole, smaller than an atom, more massive than a mountain, made impact with the earth. Jack believes that this fantastic object is still deep inside the Earth, burrowing through its mantle in an orbit that will end only when it has devoured the entire planet. Meanwhile, secret agent Marianna Bonaventure enlists the help of Jonathan Knox, an analyst with an uncanny ability to find hidden relationships between seemingly disparate people and events, to search for three missing scientists and infiltrate the floating headquarters of a Russian industrialist. Together, these three must battle a global conspiracy intent upon exploiting the awesome power of the back hole--a power that can transform the world—or end it. "A swift, gripping novel with a goose-pimple mix of scary science and near-future action" —Greg Bear, New York Times–bestselling, Hugo & Nebula Award–winning author of The Unfinished Land "An action-packed thriller into perilous realms of black hole physics." —David Brin, New York Times–bestselling, Hugo & Nebula Award–winning author of Colony High

"An exciting tale of another path to super intelligence." —Vernor Vinge, three-time Hugo Award–winning author of A Fire Upon the Deep Jonathan Knox is one of the country''s most sought-after management consultants, not least for his uncanny skill at intuiting the solution hidden in the noise. Blessing though it may be to his clients, Knox''s so-called pattern-matching ability began as a curse. The only saving grace is that it blundered him into a relationship with Marianna Bonaventure, an Energy Department agent charged with keeping track of nuclear proliferation risks . . . from behind a desk. Her only foray into fieldwork so far was the mission where she first teamed with Jon Knox, the one where they''d sort of saved the world. Now she''s on another case with Jon, investigating the disappearance of billionaire tech genius Davoud Ansari''s daughter Fatimah. Nietzsche is  the artificial intelligence built by Ansari''s company, Psyche Industries, helping Marianna and John with the investigation. But Nietzsche is also a machine with a secret agenda. Hamza Nassiri is a deep-cover agent for Iran''s feared Quds Force. Posing as Psyche Industries'' security chief, Hamza is laboring in secret to undermine the MERGE, an intelligence analysis capability of unthinkable power. Before it comes on line, he must use Fatimah Ansari to bring down MERGE and the country along with it.

"A swift, gripping novel with a goose-pimple mix of scary science and near-future action." —Greg Bear, New York Times–bestselling, Hugo & Nebula Award–winning author of The Unfinished Land June 30th, 1908—In Siberia''s remote Tunguska river basin, the most devastating cosmic collision ever recorded flattens hundreds of square miles with a blast a thousand times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Yet, more than a hundred years later, the cause of the cataclysm remains shrouded in mystery.Maverick astrophysicist Jack Adler thinks he''s figured it out: a submicroscopic black hole, smaller than an atom, more massive than a mountain, made impact with the earth. Jack believes that this fantastic object is still deep inside the Earth, burrowing through its mantle in an orbit that will end only when it has devoured the entire planet. Meanwhile, secret agent Marianna Bonaventure enlists the help of Jonathan Knox, an analyst with an uncanny ability to find hidden relationships between seemingly disparate people and events, to search for three missing scientists and infiltrate the floating headquarters of a Russian industrialist. Together, these three must battle a global conspiracy intent upon exploiting the awesome power of the back hole--a power that can transform the world—or end it. "A swift, gripping novel with a goose-pimple mix of scary science and near-future action" —Greg Bear, New York Times–bestselling, Hugo & Nebula Award–winning author of The Unfinished Land "An action-packed thriller into perilous realms of black hole physics." —David Brin, New York Times–bestselling, Hugo & Nebula Award–winning author of Colony High

"An exciting tale of another path to super intelligence." —Vernor Vinge, three-time Hugo Award–winning author of A Fire Upon the Deep Jonathan Knox is one of the country''s most sought-after management consultants, not least for his uncanny skill at intuiting the solution hidden in the noise. Blessing though it may be to his clients, Knox''s so-called pattern-matching ability began as a curse. The only saving grace is that it blundered him into a relationship with Marianna Bonaventure, an Energy Department agent charged with keeping track of nuclear proliferation risks . . . from behind a desk. Her only foray into fieldwork so far was the mission where she first teamed with Jon Knox, the one where they''d sort of saved the world. Now she''s on another case with Jon, investigating the disappearance of billionaire tech genius Davoud Ansari''s daughter Fatimah. Nietzsche is  the artificial intelligence built by Ansari''s company, Psyche Industries, helping Marianna and John with the investigation. But Nietzsche is also a machine with a secret agenda. Hamza Nassiri is a deep-cover agent for Iran''s feared Quds Force. Posing as Psyche Industries'' security chief, Hamza is laboring in secret to undermine the MERGE, an intelligence analysis capability of unthinkable power. Before it comes on line, he must use Fatimah Ansari to bring down MERGE and the country along with it.