The New One by Evie Green #BookReview #Thriller #scifi #excerpt

About THE NEW ONE by Evie Green (Berkley Trade Paperback Original; March 28, 2023)

A suspenseful, cutting-edge novel about two parents who finally get the daughter they’ve always wanted—it’s too bad she isn’t real. From the author of We Hear Voices.

For Tamsyn and Ed, life is tough. They both work long hours for very little money and come home to their moody, rebellious daughter, Scarlett.
 
After a tragic accident leaves Scarlett comatose and with little chance of recovery, Tamsyn and Ed are out of options until a lifeline emerges in the form of an unusual medical trial. In exchange for the very best treatment for Scarlett, a fully furnished apartment, and a limitless spending account, the family must agree to move to Switzerland and welcome an artificial copy of their daughter into their home.
 
Suddenly their life is transformed. Tamsyn and Ed want for nothing, and the AI replacement, Sophie, makes it feel just like having their daughter back—except without all the bad parts. Sophie is engaged, happy, and actually wants to spend time with her parents.
 
But things take a turn for the worse when Scarlett makes a very real recovery and the family discovers that the forces behind their new life are darker than they ever could have imagined.

About the Author

Evie Green is a pseudonym for a British author who has written professionally for her entire adult life. She lives by the sea in England with her husband, children, and guinea pigs, and loves writing in the very early morning, fueled by coffee.

THE NEW ONE by Evie Green

Berkley Trade Paperback Original | On sale March 28, 2023

Excerpt

PROLOGUE
I listen for a long time before any of the words make sense. When they do, I can grab only a
word here or there. Soleil. Le weekend.

I try to hold on to the other words but I can’t reach them. Everything comes and goes. I am
floating.

After a while I realize I am not floating. I have a body.
I am in a body.
I am a body.

My eyes are closed, and after a long time I think that since I am back in my body, I might try to
open them. After some more time, I try. It doesn’t work.

I know there is noise, but I can’t make sense of it. My sense of smell seems as if someone
switched it on, and it is unbearable. The smells crowd into my head and I want them to go away.
It smells like medicine, clean things, chemicals. Not home.

Things hurt. People do things to me. They poke me and move me, and sometimes it hurts and
sometimes I don’t feel anything. I sense light outside my eyelids. It goes away and comes back.
It gets darker and then lighter. I drift back to my dark place, and I come up again.

One day the sounds start to form shapes and I find that I know a word. I know that it is the word
for the person I need, the person who will pull me out of here.

I try to make my mouth say it: “Mum.”

Chapter 1
Five months before

November

She had been daydreaming. The water had evaporated and the cauliflower was sticking to the
bottom of the pan and the potatoes were burning, because she’d forgotten all of it. It was
salvageable, but she didn’t want it.

“Oh, shut up,” she told it nonsensically, and turned off the gas ring. Everything annoyed her.
She tried to focus on the television. It was a reality show, one that usually distracted her just
enough. Tonight, though, it wasn’t working.

Scarlett wasn’t missing. She was out. If she hadn’t overdone the cover story by throwing in
Leanne, it wouldn’t have been worrying yet. It was still all right.

She messaged her. Please just send a text. Nothing happened. She messaged again and called her
phone and she didn’t answer.

She turned the TV off and messaged Ed, hating the fact that she was admitting defeat again. He
replied at ten forty-five.

Fuck’s sake honey! Again?!???? Yeah, I’ll find her.

At least he replied to her when it was about Scarlett. Since he worked late nights and she worked
early mornings, they hardly saw each other. That was why they were still together.

She looked at the photo on the wall. They had been happy once.

It was a picture of the three of them taken when Scarlett was about four. They had been on the
beach at Perranporth, standing in front of the Atlantic Ocean, the beach wide and sandy around
them. Their hair was blowing around and they were laughing. Scarlett stood between them,
holding their hands.

They had been happy because Scarlett had been a dreamy child. They had been happy because
their relationship was newer, and they weren’t ground down by life. Scarlett had been an
adorable little girl, always asking questions about everything. They had kept her supplied with
books from the library, had tried to find the answers she needed, had done everything they could
to help her have a better life than they did.

She had learned to read before she went to school, and together they had all learned a bit of
French from an app. Her parents agreed (as all parents probably did) that their daughter was
exceptionally bright and brilliant, and as the years went by, they encouraged her to do her
homework, to be top of the class, to excel at everything and keep her options wide open.

She was exactly average-sized for her age, which seemed like a good thing: she could never be
teased for being too big or too small. She had curly dark hair and intense brown eyes, and she
would climb into bed with them at night, cuddling up and whispering, “I love you so much,
Mummy.” She used to ask for a baby brother. Her favorite color was blue. She wanted to see
snow. She wanted to have snowball fights, to climb mountains, to see the pyramids. She wanted
to do everything.

She had been the best child ever. And then, a few weeks before she turned thirteen, Scarlett had
changed.

Excerpted from The New One by Evie Green Copyright © 2023 by Evie Green. Excerpted by permission of Berkley. All rights reserved.