A stressed man on a crowded sidewalk. Everything is too crowded. Too noisy. After a brief rude encounter with a stranger, he daydreams about how he could have reacted differently. What he should have said to the stranger. He gets carried away with his fantasies and conjures up his innermost demons.

Everything wrong with this World

A solar system in which the end of history has already been surpassed: people allow themselves to be ruled by computer reason – ActualSanity – which keeps the community of planets in an harmonious ideal state. Political processes no longer seem to be necessary in this AI-driven, totalitarian and cosy government; instead, identity-forming collectives distinguish themselves from each other solely by subtle behavioural differences. Until a threat looms on the horizon: the Broken Hearts Collective disquiets the solar system with terrorist attacks – a development at the centre of which Marten Eliot and Emma Glendale, young head fellows of the Dolphin Collective, unexpectedly find themselves.