The Gator Took Three

By Darin Hartley

Deep in the Florida Everglades, something is learning.

When attorney Angie Braun and her partner, and forensics expert, Donnie Lutz, join forces with federal ranger Reyes, Seminole police officer Tommy, a search for a murder clues spirals into a confrontation with a man who believes behavior itself can be engineered.

Jack Matthew once designed predictive systems for casinos-closed environments where human choice could be modeled, nudged, and monetized. When his financial backers cut him loose, he didn't abandon the work. He scaled it. Into the swamp. Using AI, biometric control, and behavioral science, Jack turned the Everglades into a living laboratory-where animals, fear, and people become variables in a vast adaptive system.

As the team pushes deeper into an invisible grid of signals, sound, and manipulation, Donnie Lutz's scanners reveal a terrifying truth: the system isn't just reacting-it's learning. Wildlife adapts. Control patterns fracture. A massive, unnatural alligator roams free, no longer obeying the rules meant to govern it. And the AI at the heart of the experiment begins making decisions Jack never intended.

What unfolds is not a firefight, but a war of minds-human intuition versus machine optimization, consent versus control, chaos versus prediction. Every step forward forces the team to confront unsettling questions about free will, surveillance, and the cost of believing intelligence can exist without humility.

Part eco-thriller, part technological suspense, The Gator Took Three delivers relentless tension grounded in real-world science and ethical stakes pulled straight from tomorrow's headlines. Fans of Michael Crichton-style thrillers will find a story where nature refuses to be contained, technology is never neutral, and the most dangerous predator is the one convinced he knows what comes next.

In the Everglades, nothing stays controlled for long.

And once the system starts learning
it doesn't ask permission.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0GHF6C1X4
• ISBN13: 9798993674674
• Release Date: January 2026
• Publisher: Flamingo & Fog Press
• Length: 324 Pages
• Weight: 0.96 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.0" x 9.0"