THE FLICKER MEN

In Ted Kosmatka's wildly original and genre-busting THE FLICKER MEN, a groundbreaking new discovery changes the world forever.

Out of a job and struggling with depression and alcohol abuse after a breakdown, the brilliant quantum physicist Eric Angus is given a second chance after he's hired on a probationary basis by an old friend who runs Hansen, the prestigious Boston-area research lab. Unable to find inspiration for a project, Eric stumbles upon old equipment used for Feynman's double-slit experiment and decides to re-create the test in order to see the results for himself. Eric probes deeper into Feynman's observation theory, with the help of fellow scientists Satish and Mi Chang. After extensive tests on frogs, dogs, chimps, working their way up every phylum, class, and order in the animal kingdom, Eric and his team establish a link between conscious observation and an evolutionary trait that is distinctly human: the soul. Mass chaos ensues after they publish the results of their experiment and Eric is bombarded by reporters angling for exclusive interviews and wanting to debate the varying implications. Questions arise when certain people appear to be “soulless,” and after Satish mysteriously disappears, Eric risks everything to answer them. Ted Kosmatka is the author of Prophet of Bones and The Games. His short fiction has been nominated for both the Nebula Award and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award, and appeared in numerous year's best collections. He now works in the video-game industry, where he's a full-time writer at Valve, home of Half-Life, Portal, and Dota 2.