The Last Hack

May 1, 2017
Shy, lacking in self-confidence, Samantha Morpeth is really up against it. She's 19, her mother is in prison, she's trying to qualify for university admission, and she's the sole support of her younger sister with Down syndrome. To add to Sam's problems, a social-welfare agency has decided she is no longer eligible for benefits. But, come evening, Sam, who lacks self-confidence in the real world, becomes Buzzkill, a brilliant and infamous computer hacker. Investigative journalist Jack Parlabane, whose sometimes dodgy investigative techniques have been noted by the blue-ribbon Leveson Inquiry into Britain's tabloid press, may have his last chance to resurrect his career when he's hired by a trendy web magazine. Jack secures an exclusive interview with Buzzkill, but, in short order, Buzzkill is threatened with exposure by another shadowy web presence, and Sam exhorts Jack to help her with the hack her blackmailer demands. Sam and Jack soon learn that failure could be fatal. Brookmyre has produced another compelling thriller, and Sam is a delightfully complex and engaging character.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

May 1, 2017
In Brookmyre’s overly technical eighth Jack Parlabane thriller (after 2016’s Black Widow), the Scottish journalist is lucky to land an interview with the online magazine Broadwave, whose editors are eager to milk his connections to an infamous hacker known as Buzzkill. Bucking hacking stereotypes, Buzzkill is a 19-year-old black Londoner named Samantha Morpeth who’s juggling caring for her younger sister with Down syndrome—while their mother is in prison—and attending college. All that changes when she’s blackmailed, following a group hack of a major bank, by a figure identified only as Zodiac, who instructs her to steal a flashy new product from a big-name tech company or else be exposed for her role as one of the Uninvited (think Anonymous). Sam turns to Jack for help, though their connection is frustratingly tenuous for too much of the narrative. Brookmyre excels when he focuses on human relationships, but too often he gets bogged down in the minutiae of carrying out a hack. Agent: Dan Mandel, Sanford J. Greenburger Associates.