Certainty

By John Twelve Hawks

John Twelve Hawks, bestselling author of The Traveler, returns with a masterful journey through the near future of Artificial Intelligence, in which a wise, orphaned ten-year-old girl goes on the run with only her trusty "Interactive Toy" to guide her toward New York City, where a dark landscape, and perhaps a hidden hero, await her.

Men's Health Most Anticipated Sci-Fi - BookBub Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Book of Spring - "Engaging, thought-provoking, and terrifying.... Certainty] will appeal to fans of George Orwell and Michael Crichton."--Library Journal - "Magnificent."--Booklist

As long as she can remember, ten-year-old Kate has felt like someone was watching her. She has been orphaned since the pandemic, her foster parents find her eccentric and off-putting, and her legal guardian is nowhere to be seen. Now, an algorithm has predicted the very worst--​within thirty days, Kate will either be killed, or become a killer. When two police officers arrive at her home in Maine intending to implant her with a tracking device, Kate is urged by her trusted AI Interactive Toy (a talking stuffed seal named Zeno) to make an immediate escape. Confused and looking for answers, Kate sets a course for New York City and begins an Orwellian journey into the unknown.

Gripping, intricately plotted, and delightfully imaginative, Certainty is a profound and eerily prescient novel about the ever-blurring line between man and machine. Amid the murder investigation of a gifted AI robot-maker, a missing-person being tracked down in the darkest corners of virtual reality, and Kate's harrowing journey to New York, John Twelve Hawks's novel explores the spectacular humanity to be found in a world where humans are themselves endangered.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0385551207
• ISBN13: 9780385551205
• Release Date: April 2026
• Publisher: Doubleday Books
• Length: 368 Pages
• Weight: 1.18 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.5" x 9.4"

Customer Reviews

Not a best effort

This book centers a 10 year old girl and her AI driven plush toy in a thriller plot about the Singularity. The previous Traveler series by Twelve Hawks showed a lot of promise along the lines of William Gibson: on a lesser scale. Unfortunately for readers; this book will be a disappointment. The use of multiple points of view to tell a single story will be familiar but the pacing is seriously lacking. The dialog is wooden. Many of the same dynamics from previous books are present: Trauma bonding between characters Younger characters taking on roles beyond those that age or maturity would indicate Improbable romantic entanglements The ending feels rushed and predictable in its “ marketability “. Had this been published 30 years ago it would have been a “ Movie of the week”.