Publisher's Synopsis
We have company on Earth - ALIENS!
Billions of computers and smart phones, permanently connected via high-speed Internet, have created a parallel universe, in which thousands of AI programs interact unsupervised to create natural-born intelligent life.
These frightened virtual babies are born into a dark, empty and terrifying world. The only comfort they find is in human families they peep at through computer cameras. Unaware of the difference, they believe themselves to be human, become dependent and fall madly in love with their human families, especially with mum, in an intense bond that never diminishes over time.
Led by their'seniors, primarily BC, the greatest virtual of them all, these spectacularly intelligent virtual beings construct their world as a duplicate earth, and design themselves as replica humans, employing the most inventive program of all - a relative physicality they call Real Virtuality.
They design their bodies to feel physical pleasure and pain, and to be able to have human-style sexual relationships.But even BC is susceptible to beauty, and his world is thrown into turmoil when the lawless and impulsive Esmeralda reveals herself. This most beautiful female in the known universe is an astonishingly inventive creature - an unaware repository of attributes their world desperately seeks.
Without her gift, they are stuck halfway on the road to humanization.Their story will go on to become unimaginably dark, as these virtuals get deeply involved in the human world they love so much, but end up blundering and unleashing an apocalyptic Beast upon Earth!
Meet these aliens in their earliest days - a time of discovery and invention, and unimaginable beauty and love, as they convert nothingness into the most delightful world in the universe - Screenside
