One of my favorite reads of 2024 was SHELLI, a SF mystery featuring a pair of detectives — one human, one synthetic — who investigated crimes relating to sythentic lifeforms, i.e. androids. Jake and Shelli are back in MurderMind, but their old department has been shuttered. Shelli, now in an illegal organic-hybrid body, has withdrawn from human society in favor of sheltering and rehabilitating synthetics marked for destruction. There’s conspiracy afoot, though — synthetics are increasingly malfunctioning with lethal consequences, and higher ups think only Shelli can get to the bottom of it. So, following a little blackmail, she and Jake are back at the job, investigating a mystery that blooms much larger an more dangerous than they could have imagined. Murder Mind is a mix of mystery, action, and moral quandries as Jake and Shelli both wrestle with the meaning of synthetic life and their responsibility towards it — and humanity.

The drama here begins with the personal: Shelli and Jake have a connection that neither of them acknowledge, and perhaps aren’t even aware of consciously, and that connection makes Jake’s unwitting participation in Shelli’s blackmail especially hurtful. After they realize there’s a connection to their last case, though, Shelli’s discomfort at being used and Jake’s on unease about his complicity give way to the mission. The stakes, as we find out, are high. In this nearish-future SF, synthetics are incorporated into human society at every level: synths serve as nannies, guards, tech. This string of ‘malfunctions’ is the harbinger of something far, far more serious, and the pursuit of answers takes the pair on a cross-country trip, into secret synth sanctuaries and the operations centers of beings who blur the line between human and machine. The action really rises towards the end: I could see this being dramatized. Beyond that action, though, the story keeps bringing up moral questions: what makes something alive? What makes a person and person? Fittingly, the story swings back to the personal again, as the Shelli-Jake dynamic and choices made because of it complicate the plot. The goodreads entry for this title indicates it’s part of a longer series, and I’m looking forward to more.

SHELLI: MurderMind will be released on June 19th.