Don DeLillo’s 2016 novel Zero K follows Geoffrey Lockhart, a billionaire summoned to The Convergence, a desert retreat manned by pseudo-monk scientists who offer the opportunity to preserve bodies in the hope of resurrection when future nanobot technology allows it.
Geoffrey’s stepmother Artis is about to resign her body to the program, and his healthy father Ross might join her.
A short book about life and death, this short novel amalgamates a number of DeLillo tropes: religion, death, art installations, uber-rich people and over-thinkers. Intriguing, hypnotically written and with some devastating twists, Zero K is characteristically eloquent but a lot of detail doesn’t seem to tie into the central structure. Why are these people monks? Why is everything underground? Who pays for all this?
For fans, a worthy inclusion to the canon. Not something I’d recommend to introduce someone to DeLillo.
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