Bharath's Reviews > Upgrade

As a Blake Crouch fan (especially of his more recent books), it was only a matter of time before I read this – though I am later in reading it than I expected to be. This follows the style of ‘Dark Matter’ and ‘Recursion’ (Blake Crouch himself mentioned in an interview that his style has changed starting with ‘Summer Frost’ and I had noticed that as well) – intriguing plot based on plausible science, great pace, strong characters and some food for thought. Since I read a fair amount of non-fiction science books, I appreciate the research which has gone into his recent books.

Agent Logan Ramsey is with GPA (the Gene Protection Agency) which ensures that advances in genetic engineering are not misused. Logan’s mother Miriam Ramsey had been instrumental in many revolutionary advances, especially her Scythe patents on gene editing. She had however inadvertently created global chaos with one of her innovation attempts. Logan was briefly imprisoned, since he worked in her lab. Logan is now happily married with his wife Beth and teenage daughter Ava. He is not in much contact with his sister Kara. A raid in which Logan participates ends in him being injured and contracting a virus. He is concerned that he has been the victim of a genetic hack and is not sure he will survive. Initially, tests reveal no changes in his DNA, but he soon feels himself changing – both physically and mentally.

After I started the book, I just did not want to stop! Yes – much like ‘Dark Matter’ and ‘Recursion’. This is an extremely fast paced story with no let-up right till the end. The scientific background is very good - painting a scenario which we may very well run into. We may be able to upgrade our capabilities in future – but will that mean a better world? As with his earlier books, I liked the fact that the messaging is subtle and indirect, not coming across as sermonizing. There are passages which are intellectually stimulating as below.

We don’t have an intelligence problem. We have a compassion problem. That, more than any other single factor, is what’s driving us toward extinction.


My mother once posited that we are not rational beings. We read about all the looming threats in the paper, we watch it on the news, and then we get on with our day. And, yes, some of that is thanks to our ability to hide from reality with denial, with cognitive dissonance, with magical thinking. But she forgot the most important thing: In the absence of compassion, selfishness is the most rational response of all. Our species’ superpower is not caring. We merely exercised that ability.


Never before had I seen Homo sapiens so clearly—a species, at its most fundamental level, of storytellers. Creatures who overlay story on everything, but especially their own lives, and in so doing, can imbue a cold, random, sometime brutal existence, with fabricated meaning.

I found the character development to be not as good as it was in ‘Dark Matter’ and ‘Recursion’ (especially that of Kara and their mother Miriam). The philosophical musings are left more to the end in notes Logan writes and it would have been good if they were better spaced across the book. While some aspects of the plot in the later sections could have been better, I still liked how the story ended.

I enjoyed reading this, maybe just a little less than ‘Dark Matter’ and ‘Recursion’.

My rating: 4.25 / 5.