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This book had a fantastic premise and as soon as I read the synopsis, I couldn’t wait to start it.

Set in a future where everyone uses a programme called ClearVista that can predict, with unparalleled accuracy, the probability of an event happening, our protagonist, Lawrence Walker, uses it to predict whether he’ll be President or not. He’s currently in the running you see, what with being a Congressman. ClearVista uses all available information, for example the internet, statistics or public opinion, to predict events. It can then say with accuracy whether or not it’s likely.

Something terrible happens to Lawrence and his family pretty early on and ClearVista uses this event as a determining factor when considering whether he’ll still be President. Without going into too much detail and perhaps giving something away, I’ll just say that this new determining factor has some pretty disastrous effects. It’s impossible to say anymore without giving something away, so I’ll just say, go read it!

What the novel does so well is show how one incident can be a catalyst for so many more and how close a life can be to falling apart. While uncomfortable at times, it was very well done.

The characters were well developed as we had a large portion of the beginning of the book devoted to them. Because of this, I began to feel like I really knew them and could understand some of their motivations.

This novel didn’t really suffer from the usual problem of the author’s overuse of punctuation and therefore moved along quite well. It wasn’t a long read, but didn’t feel too short either, so was just right, I thought.

The ending was exactly what it was supposed to be and rounded things off pretty well. It did suddenly end after that though and left me wishing I had of known what happened to everyone! That’s only because I cared about the characters though, which is testament to how much I liked them.

If you read my last review of The Machine by James Smythe, you'll know I'm a bit unsure about the author at the minute. I think as it's an unsubstantiated claim though, I should take it a bit less seriously, but keep a firm eye on Mr Smythe. I wish I had ClearVista right now to tell me more about him!