"Freedom(TM)" by Daniel Suarez is the exciting sequel to "Daemon"

If you have not read "Daemon" by Daniel Suarez, you have to stop and read it first. It is possible to read some sequels without having read the first book, but this is not one of them. The author jumps right into the story shortly after the end of "Daemon" and provides very little background information.

The first book was about the genesis of the Daemon and the shock of the terrible things it could do, it taking over systems and seeming to act like an all-powerful entity. In this book the Daemon has been spread worldwide and there is an established darknet community. People generally fall into three different categories: Daemon followers on the darknet, those who are unaware the Daemon exists (or who believe the cover story that it was a hoax), and those who want to either destroy the Daemon or find a way to use or corrupt it for their own economic benefit. There are several returning characters from the first book.

The scary part of Daemon for me was in wondering if someone could write a program that could do everything the Daemon did and react to threats as it did. The scary part of "Freedom" is the idea that our personal freedom could be at risk even in the United States. Some of the events in the book are right at the edge where "couldn't happen" meets "what if" and that makes the book more thought provoking than most thrillers. By the end I was just as conflicted as the main character who had to answer the question of whether the Daemon should be destroyed or not. (At the end of Daemon, I was convinced it was a completely evil program.)

I loved both Daemon and this book and definitely recommend them to anyone who wants an action-filled thought-provoking techno thriller.

I got this book from the library.  Support your local library!