Brandon is a seventeen year old high school computer hacker, who hacks bank accounts then sells the information. He is your average looking bad boy, complete with tattoos and piercings and attitude. With parents so absorbed into their careers to even see that their son is shouting for some sort of attention, Brandon keeps the persona of living like a machine, all gears and wires. He has learned not to invest too much time into friends or relationships, since they will most likely be moving soon. That is until Emma comes along.
Emma is the kind, and stubborn girl who has insisted on helping Brandon get act together in school and the principal off his back. Only Emma looks beyond the tattoos and piercings to the person that Brandon keeps hidden away from everyone.
When a routine cyber hack throws Brandon off his game, and a mirror that is moving on its own. Brandon begins to think that he has lost his mind. Brandon's reflection, also named Obran, has a mind of its own and seems to be changing Brandon for what it to come. Brandon's piercings disappear, his black hair dye washes out, and his black goth clothes are replaced with pastel polo shirts and slacks.
Then Brandon realizes, that the reflection, is wanting to trade places with him. When he is pulled in through the mirror, Brandon is dropped into a world that the hacking world has thought to be a myth. Now Brandon must use his hacking skills to get himself out of the cyber prison he finds himself in and back to the real world.
Duplicity is nothing like anything that I have ever read. Its an originally, page turning, extremely well written cyber thriller which is told in Brandon's point of view. There are twists and turns that the reader doesn't see coming. If this debut is any indication of things to come, then I will certainly be looking for more from N.K. Traver.
A computer-hacking teen. The girl who wants to save him.
And
a rogue mirror reflection that might be the death of them
both.
In private, 17-year-old Brandon hacks bank accounts for
thousands of dollars just for the hell of it. In public,
he
looks like any other tattooed bad boy with a fast car and
devil-may-care attitude. He should know, heβs worked hard
to
maintain that façade. With inattentive parents who move
cities every two years, heβs learned not to get tangled up
in friends and relationships. So heβll just keep living
like
a machine, all gears and wires.
Then two things shatter his carefully-built image: Emma,
the
kind, preppy girl who insists on looking beneath the
surface
β and the small matter of a mirror reflection that starts
moving by itself. Not only does Brandonβs reflection have
a
mind of its own, but it seems to be grooming him for
somethingβ washing the dye from his hair, yanking out his
piercings, swapping his black shirts for β¦ pastels.
Changes
he canβt explain to his classmates, who think heβs having
an
identity crisis, and certainly not to nosy Emma, who
thinks
this is his backward apology for telling her to get lost.
Then Brandonβs reflection tells him: it thinks it can live
his life better, and itβs preparing to trade places.
And when it pulls Brandon through the looking-glass, not
only will he need all his ill-gotten hacking skills to
escape, but heβll have to face some hard truths about who
heβs become. Otherwise heβll be stuck in a digital hell
until heβs old and gray, and Emma and his parents won't
even
know he's gone.
No excerpt available.
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