Black Man

Published in the US as Thirteen.

Arthur C. Clarke Award 2008, BSFA Award nominee 2008.

The 13s are genetically engineered alpha males, designed to fight the century's last conflicts... but when there are no wars left to fight they become surplus to requirements. And a man bred and designed to fight is a dangerous man to have around in peacetime. Many of them have left for Mars, but one has returned... and a series of brutal murders has erupted across America.

Carl Marsalis, a genengineered ex-soldier himself, hunts down rogue alpha-males for the UN. It's not an easy gig; he's hated and feared by his fellow 13s as a traitor and a bringer of death, and by the rest of humanity as a genetic freak and an unwelcome reminder of all that is dark in the human psyche – he is, in every sense of the words, a Black Man. And at the moment he's beyond the UN's jurisdiction, banged up in a Florida jail for financing an illegal abortion. So when the US police call for help, Carl cuts a deal.

And so begins a frenetic man-hunt, a battle for survival, and a search for the truth about what was really done with the world's last soldiers. Black Man is an unstoppable SF thriller as well as a novel about prejudice, and the ramifications of playing with our genetic blueprint. It is about our capacity for violence, for deceit, and for corruption.