Published 14th August 2025 by Bantam.
From the cover of the book:
Who would you trust with the future?The year is 2050. In the teeth of a climate catastrophe, the world is left with a drastic solution: one global leader to steer it through the coming apocalypse.
The final two candidates are ex-US President Lockwood, and Solomon, the world’s first political artificial intelligence.
As whispers of a global conspiracy emerge, investigative journalist Marcus Tully find himself at the centre of it – when Solomon’s creator turns up murdered.
Overnight, one investigation becomes two, and it’s not just the result of the election that’s at stake but the future of the species. Suddenly humanity must make an impossible choice – between salvation, or freedom.
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2050. The world is in the grip of a climate emergency. Drastic measures are called for if the human race is going to survive. In an unprecedented move, nations have come together to cede power to a single 'protector' of the earth - someone who will have ultimate control over what happens next. Candidates from around the world have gradually been discarded in the biggest election run-offs of all time. Only two remain, former US President Lawrence G. Lockwood, and Governor Solomon, the world's first political AI entity.
As the countdown to the final vote gets underway, journalist Marcus Tully receives a tip off that the climate anomaly that took place ten years ago, in Kuwait, might not have been the natural disaster everyone believes it to be. Marcus' pregnant wife died that day, and he cannot rest until the world knows the truth about the political conspiracy that led to the tragedy.
His quest takes him to the floating cities where Solomon's creator, Martha Chandra, lives. When she turns up dead, his investigation suddenly becomes a murder mystery of a different kind... and what he discovers could change the course of the election.
Thomas Weaver's bold and ambitious novel unfurls from the perspectives of Tully, Livia Chandra (sister of Martha, who works for Tully), and Commander October of the floating cities, who become mired in a tangled mess of conspiracy, power games, and violence when Tully is persuaded to follow a tip-off from an anonymous source.
I came to the novel expecting a dystopian thriller with a philosophical core exploring the dilemma of who was best qualifies to save humanity - a human, or an AI. While it is both of these things, the novel mostly takes the form of a murder mystery, developing from Tully's private crusade for vengeance for sins of the past into a here-and-now, fast-paced investigation against the clock to discover how and why Martha Chandra was killed.
Conspiracy and technology are the names of the game, and the plot twists and turns as Tully, Livia and Orchard burrow into layers of deception hidden beneath cutting-edge virtual reality platforms, password protected safeholds, and skilfully employed propaganda that plays on their expectations and vulnerabilities. Expect your perception about what is really happening in this tale to change radically as the layers are stripped back, and your emotions to be tweaked as Weaver leans heavily into themes of loss and regret.
This is an action-filled book, and I really enjoyed the way Weaver plies his trade as a writer when it comes to the mysteries at the heart of the story. Inevitably, there are no easy solutions to the starkly described situation Weaver's characters face, and he leaves you to make up your own mind about the conclusion to the story. It will certainly leave you with a lot to ponder on when it comes to what the future may look like, and how we save ourselves from a burning world.
Artificial Wisdom is available to buy now in hardcover, ebook and audio formats.
Thank you to Bantam for sending me a copy of this book in return for an honest review.
About the author:
He is also a tech entrepreneur whose last startup was acquired by Just Eat Takeaway.
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