[Ninjalawyer]

Has anyone read this? I picked it up on a whim a last week and I am floored by how excellent it is and how little buzz the book is getting (judging by Amazon reviews anyway).

Briefly, the book takes place billions of years (quadrillions actually) in the future with the main characters being the last embodied humans and an almost omniscient AI named QOD. The book starts out in the titular Soul Consortium which houses digital versions of all humans that ever lived (it is later explained how this is possible) and the main human character can live any of those lives in real time as if it were his own in real time.

Where I am right now, the main character is obsessed with finding out what happens after he dies and is unwilling to join the rest of the human race in death until he does. He begins exploring digital souls that are marked by QOD as "aberrations". The first being a serial killer, followed by a 17th century Spanish peasant and then a far future detective (there are more lives, but that's where I am so far).

I am really enjoying the book. I love the exploration of the extreme future and the short-story souls that the main character experiences have all been really great so far.