CrossTalk

ldquo;A rollicking send-up of obsessive cell phone usage in too-near-future America . . . [Connie] Willis’s canny incorporation of scientific lore, and a riotous cast . . . make for an engaging girl-finally-finds-right-boy story that’s unveiled with tact and humor. Willis juxtaposes glimpses of claimed historical telepaths with important reflections about the ubiquity of cell phones and the menace that unscrupulous developers of technology pose to privacy, morality, and emotional stability.”—Publishers Weekly 

“An exhilarating and laugh-inducing read . . . one of those rare books that will keep you up all night long because you can’t bear to put it down.”—Portland Book Review

“A fun technological fairy tale.”—BookPage

“One of the funniest SF novels in years.”—Locus

Praise for Connie Willis

“A novelist who can plot like Agatha Christie and whose books possess a bounce and stylishness that Preston Sturges might envy.”—The Washington Post

“If anyone can be named ‘best science fiction writer of the age,’ it’s Connie Willis.”—Analog

“One of America’s finest writers . . . Willis can tell a story so packed with thrills, comedy, drama and a bit of red herring that the result is apt to satisfy the most discriminating, and hungry, reader.”—The Denver Post
 
“Willis can tell a story like no other. . . . One of her specialties is sparkling, rapid-fire dialogue; another, suspenseful plotting; and yet another, dramatic scenes so fierce that they burn like after-images in the reader’s memory.”—The Village Voice
 
“The Best of Connie Willis? Isn’t that like sorting through diamonds?”—Lytherus

Autorentext
Connie Willis is a member of the Science Fiction Hall of Fame and a Grand Master of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. She has received seven Nebula awards and eleven Hugo awards for her fiction; Blackout and All Clear—*a novel in two parts—and *Doomsday Book won both. Her other works include Passage, Lincoln’s Dreams, Bellwether, Impossible Things, Remake, Uncharted Territory, To Say Nothing of the Dog, Fire Watch, and Miracle and Other Christmas Stories. Connie Willis lives with her family in Colorado, where she deals on a daily basis with the delights (and the more maddening aspects) of our modern oh-so-connected world.

Zusammenfassung
Science fiction icon Connie Willis brilliantly mixes a speculative plot, the wit of Nora Ephron, and the comedic flair of P. G. Wodehouse in Crosstalk—a genre-bending novel that pushes social media, smartphone technology, and twenty-four-hour availability to hilarious and chilling extremes as one young woman abruptly finds herself with way more connectivity than she ever desired.

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY NPR

In the not-too-distant future, a simple outpatient procedure to increase empathy between romantic partners has become all the rage. And Briddey Flannigan is delighted when her boyfriend, Trent, suggests undergoing the operation prior to a marriage proposal—to enjoy better emotional connection and a perfect relationship with complete communication and understanding. But things don’t quite work out as planned, and Briddey finds herself connected to someone else entirely—in a way far beyond what she signed up for.

It is almost more than she can handle—especially when the stress of managing her all-too-eager-to-communicate-at-all-times family is already burdening her brain. But that’s only the beginning. As things go from bad to worse, she begins to see the dark side of too much information, and to realize that love—and communication—are far more complicated than she ever imagined.

**Praise for *Crosstalk

“A rollicking send-up of obsessive cell phone usage in too-near-future America . . . [Connie] Willis’s canny incorporation of scientific lore, and a riotous cast . . . make for an engaging girl-finally-finds-right-boy story that’s unveiled with tact and humor. Willis juxtaposes glimpses of claimed historical telepaths with important reflections about the ubiquity of cell phones and the menace that unscrupulous developers of technology pose to privacy, morality, and emotional stability.”—Publishers Weekly *

“An exhilarating and laugh-inducing read . . . one of those rare books that will keep you up all night long because you can’t bear to put it down.”—Portland Book Review

“A fun technological fairy tale.”—BookPage

“One of the funniest SF novels in years.”—Locus
*
Praise for Connie Willis*

“A novelist who can plot like Agatha Christie and whose books possess a bounce and stylishness that Preston Sturges might envy.”—The Washington Post

“If anyone can be named ‘best science fiction writer of the age,’ it’s Connie Willis.”—Analog

“One of America’s finest writers . . . Willis can tell a story so packed with thrills, comedy, drama and a bit of red herring that the result is apt to satisfy the most discriminating, and hungry, reader.”—The Denver Post

“Willis can tell a story like no other. . . . One of her specialties is sparkling, rapid-fire dialogue; another, suspenseful plotting; and yet another, dramatic scenes so fierce that they burn like after-images in the reader’s memory.”—The Village Voice

“The Best of Connie Willis? Isn’t that like sorting through diamonds?”—Lytherus

Leseprobe
Chapter One

“Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments.”

—­William Shakespeare, “Sonnet 116”

By the time Briddey pulled into the parking garage at Commspan, there were forty-­two text messages on her phone. The first one was from Suki Parker—­of course—­and the next four were from Jill Quincy, all saying some variant of “Dying to hear what happened.” Suki’s said, “Heard rumor Trent Worth took you to Iridium!???”

Of course you did, Briddey thought. Suki was Commspan’s very own Gossip Girl. And that meant by now the whole company knew it. It was a good thing Commspan didn’t have a no-­fraternization policy—­she and Trent could never have kept their romance secret. But she’d hoped to keep them from finding out about last night at least until she could tell her family. If they don’t know already.

She scanned through her other texts. There were five from her sister Kathleen, eight from her sister Mary Clare, and nine from Aunt Oona reminding her of the Daughters of Ireland Gaelic poetry reading Saturday night.

I should never have given her a smartphone, Briddey thought. It had never occurred to her that her great-­aunt would figure out how to use it—­she couldn’t even set her DVR. Or her clocks. But Briddey had reckoned without Aunt Oona’s desire to pester her constantly about the Daughters of Ireland. She’d gotten Maeve to teach her, and she now sent Briddey texts about it twenty times a day.

Briddey quickly read through the rest of their messages, but none of them began, “OMG! You can’t be seriously thinking of doing this!”

Good. That meant she still had time to decide what she was going to say to them—­though not much, given the speed of communication these days.…