A Recorder is a person, but made like an android using nanotech the Consortium can manage. And a Recorder has no name, only an inalterable place. In Recorder, Cathy McCrumb weaves a sci-fi tale with threads of dystopia. In the distant future, society is accustomed to technological miracles, but quiet repression hangs over everyone. The heroine’s journey reveals both ordinary life and hidden, sinister truths. This future regulates religion away from most of life; faith is occasionally referenced, but plays a minor role in the story. McCrumb handles heavy subjects with a light touch, keeping the novel from grimness. Recorder is a creative and engaging novel that will appeal to a broad audience.

Best for: Fans of science fiction and young-adult narratives.

Discern: Some violence includes an explosion that harms children, a man forcibly kisses a woman without her consent, a mother gives away her “defective” children, murder investigators play an autopsy recording, several corpses are discovered in an abandoned facility, and one possibly disturbing sequence involves gargantuan cockroaches.