Coyote Fork by James Wilson

Release: September 1st, 2020
Format: Ebook
Publisher: Slant
Source: Random Things Tours
Find it at Goodreads, Amazon, Kindle, B&N.

British journalist Robert Lovelace travels to California to report on the social media giant Global Village. He’s horrified by a company’s finding guided by the ruthless vision of its founder, Evan Bone.

But as he leaves, he has a disturbing encounter that sends him off in a totally different direction. Soon he finds himself embarked on an increasingly fraught and dangerous mission. The aim is to uncover the murky past of Evan Bone and his total disregard for the human cost of the monster he has created.

Robert’s quest takes him from San Francisco to a small college town in the Midwest, to a former hippie commune in northern California. Through the characters. He exposes the role of social media and the overwhelming power of giant corporations owning them. Online communities and internet trolling take a toll on our mental health by losing privacy and social media abuse. And not to mention the story’s human element, which is ripe with love, loss, jealousy, betrayal, and revenge.

About the Author:

James Wilson was born in Cambridge, educated at Oxford and now lives in south London. He is an RLF Consultant Fellow.

His previous novels include The Dark Clue, The Bastard Boy, The Woman in the Picture, Consolation, and The Summer of Broken Stories. He has written BBC TV and radio documentaries. He is the author of narrative non-fiction, The Earth Shall Weep: A History of Native America, which won a Myers Outstanding Book Award.

Since 1986, he has been a member of Survival’s executive committee, an international organization working for indigenous peoples’ rights.

Website | Goodreads

Coyote Fork Review:

Coyote Fork is a unique and very creative dystopian thriller that takes you on a futuristic adventure.

Reading Coyote Fork was unnerving. Even though it takes place in a futuristic world, it has many similarities to our present world. Firstly, I loved the world-building. The author takes social media to a whole new level with TOLSTOY. He creates a profiling software that would easily monitor its personality. As scary as it sounds at times, I found the story’s concepts fascinating. Also, I wonder if that is where technology’s future leads. Even the Global Village sounds like a fantastic setting.

Similarly, the characters are also well-drawn. I liked Rob as the lead and his journey to get revenge on Evan Bone. Some scenes that stood out for me was when Ruth and Rob investigate Beth or their research about the commune. Moreover, the author increases the thriller element as the story progresses. Another exciting feature is the villain. The author creates a grey area where you don’t know who to blame for the crimes. You decide whether the responsibility is solely the person or the concept they created.

However, my only criticism of the story is the way it ended. The story ends in an abrupt manner where quite a few questions remain unanswered. It would have been nice to get some closure on individual characters.

Apart from that, this was quite entertaining. Overall, I would recommend this book if you want to read a futuristic thriller that showcases how social media control us.