Scythe

Exactly.

Ranking at number four on our list is the Arc of a Scythe trilogy by Neal Shusterman.

This is perhaps the most intellectually ambitious premise on the entire list, I'd say.

Oh, without a doubt.

The trilogy consists of Scythe, Thunderhead, and The Toll, and Shusterman boldly sets this in an unambiguous, mathematically verified utopia.

Humanity has voluntarily handed over the administration of the entire planet to the Thunderhead, which is this benevolent, omniscient artificial intelligence that essentially evolved from the cloud.

And the Thunderhead is wild because it actually works.

It's just basic math.

I was like, damn.

Bibiana? So Miri's not going to like this one, but I picked Scythe.

Oh, okay.

What is that one? I still never finished it.

Well, it's so interesting.

So they're called Scythes because, not to get too far into it, but there is a selected group of humans who's, because of the planet can only hold so many people, there is a selected group of people whose job it is to essentially cull the population and they're called Scythes and they have... position their positions of honor and it's deeply philosophical as to who is cold and why and it's like fascinating and it's you know it's written for i think like a like i would say like maybe a high school audience um so like it's you can it's it's easy to it's easy to read and i think within two pages i was like oh crap i'm all the way in i gotta know what happens okay let's go um so that's why i'm like going back and forth between that and lonesome dove

For fiction, I just recently restarted, because I read like 20 years ago, the Neil Stevenson Quicksilver series, you know, the Baroque cycle.

I don't know if you guys are Neil Stevenson fans, but man, he writes so well.