Bio-Digital Novel Series
A Three-book Series by Bart Niedner
Coming in 2022.
About Bart Niedner
An architect, programmer, artist, professor, author, and a mayor walk into a bar. The barkeep says, “What’ll ya have, Bart?”
Bio-Digital is a four-book novel series. The first book, CATACLYSMS, is scheduled for release on Amazon and Kindel in Spring of 2022.
A Three-book Series by Bart Niedner
Coming in 2022.
An architect, programmer, artist, professor, author, and a mayor walk into a bar. The barkeep says, “What’ll ya have, Bart?”
A beta reader is an unpaid test reader of an unreleased work of literature or other writing, who gives feedback from the point of view of an average reader to the author. A beta reader is not a professional and can therefore provide advice and comments in the opinions of an average reader.
The manuscript will be provided in PDF format. All beta readers will receive a free copy of the final product. Currently we plan to release on Amazon and Kindle platforms.
Familiarity with Sci-fi or Thriller Genre
Ideally, our beta reader should be well-read and familiar with the genre of the novel - sci-fi/thriller.
Honesty
This is the reason we don't use friends and family. Try as they may, they can’t be completely honest
about the work for fear of hurting feelings and damaging relationships. We need readers who don't have a
reason to hold back and are willing to be brutally honest. Are you able to be brutally honest?
Contact us at Bart.Niedner@gmail.com with your name, contact information, a brief description of your experience reading in the sci-fi/thriller genre, and when you believe you could supply comments on a 300 page novel.
An architect, programmer, artist, professor, author, and a mayor walk into a bar.
The barkeep says, “What’ll ya have, Bart?”
Bart Niedner grew up hunting and camping on his family’s farms in Missouri. His love of art led him to study architectural design theory from coast to coast at Kansas State University, Radford University in Virginia, Southern California Institute of Architecture in Los Angeles, and returning to Washington University in St. Louis for graduate work. Drawn to academics, Bart transitioned from his position at Wiedemier Architects into teaching positions at Ranken Technical College and then Washington University in St. Louis. A love of rural Missouri compelled Bart and his wife, Michele, to move their family of six to the City of Louisiana in 2007 where Bart helped found two successful Internet companies, Resource Forge LLC and Smart Trakker LLC. Bart has held many public service positions including having been the President of the Rotary Club, the President of the Chamber of Commerce, a member of Visitors and Convention Bureau, Chairman of the Historic Preservation Commission, a member of the City Council, and Mayor.
Protopriest Mateo Fortuin faces his gravest task in the leadership of post-apocalyptic Gaia, a fertile oasis in a land of ice. The temperatures have plummeted in recent years causing the periphery of Gaia to be swallowed by the ice. Decreased resources threaten starvation for thousands. Mateo’s only hope is that baring his soul to Gaia’s strange alter will allow his prayers to be answered.
Join Renee and Mateo in this sci-fi thriller about two lives that intertwine through time and digital space, and the reunification of two realities.
35,264 days, 7 hours, 36 minutes.
Hector wasn’t supposed to be here. Nobody was supposed to be here, certainly not a twelve-year-old sheppard’s son. And nobody had been here for hundreds of years. The dust on the floor was thick. Fast movement made it aerate and stick in Hector’s throat. The passageway was cold. There was a disorienting whirring, like many banners in the wind, but there was no wind. Hector’s crackling, yellow torch burned stable and straight, illuminating the strangely polished materials and seemingly infinite rows of rectangular tunnels. It was a labyrinth nobody was supposed to find.
Hector put out his oil-cloth torch to conserve its utility and let his eyes adjust to the faint blue glow he had been following for the past few hours. He prayed the light was real, not just a trick of a hopeful mind. The glow was steadily getting easier to see, offering Hector some encouragement. He quickened his pace despite the dust in his nose and throat.
It was a long, monotonous walk. Hector drug his fingers along the wall. The surface was paneled in a slick material. Every few meters, there was a slight indentation or seam. The rhythm of the seams against his fingertips made Hector feel like he was making progress.
His mind drifted. He checked his leather belt pouch and felt the last bit of cheese his mother had sent him off with the previous morning. They would be looking for the boys by now. Though it was unlikely, they would think to look in the temple. The belt upon which the pouch hung was made of deerskin as were the uppers on his boots. He had hunted the doe himself the previous summer, and his mother had taught him to tan the skin into useful leather. She had even taught him to burnish his name onto the belt. Tears welled.
The narrow passage brought Hector to a cavernous room. He relit his torch. The room was filled with tables, chairs, and objects – all generally familiar, but with a strangeness to them. Then his eyes caught on something amazing: boxes upon boxes containing twinkling stars, mostly a cold-white, but some bright blue, yellow and even reddish. Hector felt his breath leave him in the amazement of these impossible things in front of him. It made him dizzy. He thought this might be where the heavens were kept – or perhaps created! He was suddenly very aware of how small he was on such scales, and how alone that made him feel. He wondered what might be the penalty for trespassing into the heavens?
Hector's stomach gave a loud growl in hunger as if to give away his presence to some unknown god or guardian of this place. He wanted to leave but could not go back the way he came. His friend, Dannon, lay in broken pieces after they both fell into the vent. And there was no scaling back up the smooth vent surfaces. The walls of the vent were hard plastic. Hector recognized the material from a sample Dannon’s father had brought back from the ice-lands. The vent walls were far more rigid and thicker than the thin sheet Dannon’s father had made into a water basin, but Hector was certain this was the same, exotic material.
For over a day now, Hector's mind remained in a state of mostly-numbed shock -- knowing that his friend had died, but unable to feel it fully. But shuddering waves of nausea were beginning to grip him as his mind kept returning to the fall, less and less numbed. Born a month apart, Dannon and Hector had been best mates their entire lives. He wished he could take back the bravado and the double dare, the childish game-playing, the decision to explore the forbidden grounds of the temple. But fate stood firm after Dannon died – a lesson in consequences. That was over a day ago. Time was hard to gauge down here, alone in the darkness.
Hector girded his courage and lit his torch for extra measure. He took a step forward toward the tables of star-filled boxes. The whirring was much louder here. He could feel a slight breeze as his exposed skin goosed-up for warmth. The torch flickered. Another step. Then another.
The twelfth step ushered doom into Hector’s heart. A powerful gust of wind from above extinguished his torch and set him off balance. Hector’s mind argued with itself trying to decide if unknown darkness was preferable to unknown twinkling boxes of stars. But as quickly as the wind had come, it passed. It was like a physical thing – a barrier. He had passed through it and hurriedly fumbled to reignite the torch. Three strikes of the flint seemed an eternity before the light returned. The yellow illumination reassured his startled nerves, and he felt his pulse slowing back down.
He took a moment to recompose himself, his torchlight making a home-base of sorts in this foreign place. There was no dust here - just the twinkling lights and a moderate buzzing. Hector could discern two, distinct sources of the buzzing, and they were of different pitches. One was the whir of the wind from the barrier through which he had just passed, and he could imagine the machines making the wind also made that sound. The other, softer sound came from the star-filled boxes and defied his imagination to explain.
Hector's heart rate slowed as he perceived a change around him. It felt like dawn was coming. Very slowly it was getting brighter. The slowness of it was comfortingly familiar amid all this strangeness. But what he saw scattered that comfort. The room was an impossibility of odd materials, plastics, metals, and glass, each smoother and shinier than the next – and in quantities Hector did not realize could exist. Some were so polished that they gave a perfect reflection like his mother’s silver hand-mirror. Oddly, the stars in the boxes stayed bright and visible even in the brightening space.
No longer needing the additional light, Hector extinguished his torch almost without thinking -- a small grin coming from the pride he knew his mother would have for his mindfulness. It made him feel less alone for a moment. He surveyed the cavernous room not sure if he was bravely planning his course or simply arguing with his body not to collapse in fear of having awoken some magical demon. He pretended it was the former and headed toward the large, dark mass in the center of the space. Hector came near several boxes of stars, each whirring independently, creating a chorus as he passed. Did he dare touch them? He held his hand near the surface of one. The bright spots were mostly on the translucent surface but also seemed affixed to planes suspended within. Warmth and a slight vibration were emanating from each box, humming with a life of their own.
With each step, the conflict between being brave and being afraid was conquered by the boy’s natural curiosity and a lack of other appealing options. Forward he went until he was at the central mass. It was a large slab on a slight pedestal. The silhouettes of a dozen people were etched on the surface of the block as if each person had been traced while posing before it. The slick, black material reflected a ghost of a boy. Hector wondered if it was a real ghost or just his reflection. Or perhaps it was an omen. He wished he had paid more attention to the Elders when they spoke of such metaphysical things.
Hector stepped onto the pedestal to get a better look at the etchings. As his second foot touched down, there was a blinding flash, and then he could see nothing. Hector could feel his body being pulled forward into the slab. He felt is face and skin covered in a warm, viscous, suffocating sensation – one steadily pulling him further and further into it. He held out his hands to try and grab something, then recalled that several of the silhouettes were of similar form. It was of no comfort that he was not the first.
Hector had a uniform pain throughout his body until numbness washed over him. Then the headache came – sharp pricks all over his skull. The buzzing in Hectors ears became more than a noise – a pain burrowing into his ears, his very bones. Hector’s body and face felt contorted, but he was unsure if he was doing it or if it was being done to him. He thought of Amelia, the girl he hoped to one day kiss. Then he thought of his parents. Then his dead friend, Dannon. Then the headache stopped. His entire body pricked like pins-and-needles. Hector opened his eyes.
He was stunned to find himself squarely before a large reflection pond across from an immense and beautiful building made of curves. It seemed mid-day with a high sun caressing his face. The sun’s rays had a warmth Hector had never before felt. Strange, colorful flora surrounded him. Gorgeous flowers floated in the rectangular pond. Behind him, there was a pedestrian thoroughfare surrounded by ornate, rectangular structures. Hector imagined this was a lovely dream.
A woman’s startled scream pulled Hector sharply from his trance-like state. Hector realized there were many, strangely dressed people around the reflecting pond. They were falling to their knees, wailing in exaltation, crying, holding one another. Powerful emotions – bliss, surprise, and sometimes fear – were on every face. The architecture of the buildings, the carefully manicured flora, and the reflection pond were stunning; but something much more had come over these people.
Hector turned and staggered down a broad boulevard. The carved sign read “El Prado.” With each new step, the people around Hector were struck by powerful emotions. Hector felt a sense of responsibility for what was happening, but he had no idea what he had done to cause it. He was like a slow wave, enveloping and incapacitating those in his presence. It was happening with each new step he took down the boulevard.
Alcander Kalivas and Abigail Davis head the special team sent on the dangerous journey to the European server farm. Battling a brutal environment and with limited support, the expedition finds a more complex cyber-reality waiting for them than they had anticipated. What they find unleashes new danger and new hope into meatspace.
Closer to home, Raji Farahmand and Tavis Amato spearhead the effort to out maneuver the Ectostioc Order’s Oscar Wells and Julie Springer. In their labors to gain the support of the U.S. government and people, the fate of Gaia and thereby the world hangs in the balance. The stakes couldn’t be higher.
The orbiting machines looked for their opportunity to save the world they had destroyed. They were a thousand eyes in the cold darkness, endlessly scanning the depths below – waiting to try again.
Eight-hundred and eighty-one years ago they had talked to one another, creating a sphere with perfect parallax. The mists over heavy vegetation, the tidal flow, the band of upper-atmosphere that stirred across the continents – these were some of the many things they watched. They watched until the mist froze and fell from the sky, the tides retreated to the ocean’s depths, and the currents of air veered wildly off course. Then the thousand eyes went blind, punished for their master’s error.
Racing across the sky at twenty-eight thousand kilometers per hour, the network of technologic marvels stood ready for their next lesson. They were undaunted by the previous failure. Symbols of man’s over-reach, they remained in adversity the opportunity for his salvation.
The array of a thousand low-earth-orbit satellites were sophisticated climate modification tools developed by the Center for Climate Correction in 2094. They were meant to forestall the effects of global warming. However, something went catastrophically wrong, and the system plunged Earth into a new ice age. The resulting calamity nearly terminated the reign of man on the planet.
Satellite One adjusted its solar wing and powered up as it had every month for eight-hundred and eighty-one years. It pinged out a solicitation to establish a connection and begin its next effort. For the ten-thousand five-hundred and seventy-second time, there was no reply.
Four-hundred kilometers below, in the communications center of the Joint Center of Climate Resilience, the ten-thousand five-hundred and seventy-second message went coldly unanswered. But this time someone was watching.