Transcendent

Scintillating follow-up to 'The Sentient', which the Publishers Weekly starred review called a "staggering and un-put-downable debut, offers a fresh and feminist-forward take on cloning." After a fateful confrontation with her former ally, Tony Barlow, Amira Valdez is on the run, pregnant with her own clone and desperate. The fundamentalist Trinity Compound has grown in strength and numbers, and with the help of the powerful mind-controlling drug Tiresia, is ready to march on the city of Westport. All of Amira's hopes lie with finding Nova, the first human clone, and solving the greatest riddle in human history - how to preserve human consciousness after death. Only Amira and Nova, together, can stand in the face of a world on the brink of disaster. AUTHOR: Nadia Afifi is an Arab American science fiction author who lives in Denver, Colorado. Although born in the United States, she grew up in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain before returning to Missouri for college. From an early age, she knew she wanted to be a writer, but having two scientists as parents also instilled a love of speculative fiction. Her experiences in the Middle East and her multicultural upbringing have driven the stories she wants to tell, by exploring present-day issues such as women's rights, religion and cultural identities through a futuristic lens. Her father is a Saudi geologist of Palestinian descent, while her mother is an American geologist from St. Louis, Missouri.