Blue Ant Series by William Gibson
Blue Ant #1
Pattern Recognition
William Gibson
Cayce Pollard is an expensive, spookily intuitive market-research consultant. In London on a job, she is offered a secret assignment: to investigate some intriguing snippets of video that have been appearing on the Internet. An entire subculture of people is obsessed with these bits of footage, and anybody who can create that kind of brand loyalty would be a gold mine for Cayce's client. But when her borrowed apartment is burgled and her computer hacked, she realizes there's more to this project than she had expected. Still, Cayce is her father's daughter, and the danger makes her stubborn. Win Pollard, ex-security expert, probably ex-CIA, took a taxi in the direction of the World Trade Center on September 11 one year ago, and is presumed dead. Win taught Cayce a bit about the way agents work. She is still numb at his loss, and, as much for him as for any other reason, she refuses to give up this newly weird job, which will take her to Tokyo and on to Russia. With help and betrayal from equally unlikely quarters, Cayce will follow the trail of the mysterious film to its source, and in the process will learn something about her father's life and death.
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Blue Ant #2
Spook Country
William Gibson
Tito is in his early twenties. Born in Cuba, he speaks fluent Russian, lives in one room in a NoLita warehouse, and does delicate jobs involving information transfer. Hollis Henry is an investigative journalist, on assignment from a magazine called Node. Node doesn't exist yet, which is fine; she's used to that. But it seems to be actively blocking the kind of buzz that magazines normally cultivate before they start up. Really actively blocking it. It's odd, even a little scary, if Hollis lets herself think about it much. Which she doesn't; she can't afford to. Milgrim is a junkie. A high-end junkie, hooked on prescription antianxiety drugs. Milgrim figures he wouldn't survive twenty-four hours if Brown, the mystery man who saved him from a misunderstanding with his dealer, ever stopped supplying those little bubble packs. What exactly Brown is up to Milgrim can't say, but it seems to be military in nature. At least, Milgrim's very nuanced Russian would seem to be a big part of it, as would breaking into locked rooms. Bobby Chombo is a "producer," and an enigma. In his day job, Bobby is a troubleshooter for manufacturers of military navigation equipment. He refuses to sleep in the same place twice. He meets no one. Hollis Henry has been told to find him.
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Blue Ant #3
Zero History
William Gibson
London, after the money-shock. Semi-famous former hit-singer Hollis Henry is running on empty. Short of funds. Short of a new project. Short of whatever it was that made her life tick, she agrees - reluctantly - to work again for sinister Belgian businessman Hubertus Bigend, proprietor of the mysterious ad agency Blue Ant. Bigend, an excavator of the world's hidden architectures, explains that he needs a freelancer, a wildcard. There's a secret, obscurely fashionable denim called 'The Gabriel Hounds', which is revered by an exclusive, well-connected elite. He needs Hollis to hunt down the person behind the Hounds. Ex-junkie Milgrim's also on the payroll. Bigend appreciates Milgrim's knowledge of the street and his linguistic skills so much that he's paid for his costly rehab, and now he has him on a project working on something involving military designs. Milgrim doesn't know why - and Bigend isn't saying. But then Milgrim's also not telling Bigend about the US agent on his trail. Soon it's clear to Hollis and Milgrim that Bigend and Blue Ant are in trouble. Deep trouble. Powerful and threatening groups want Blue Ant to back off. And anyone considered a footsoldier for Bigend, or even just in the way, is liable to find themselves caught in the crossfire. Set among London's dark and tangled streets, Zero History is a brilliant thriller about the hidden webs and patterns that underlie the new century.
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