Change Agent

By: Daniel Suarez

Narrated by: Jeff Gurner

Length: 15 hrs and 2 mins

Publisher's summary

New York Times best-selling author Daniel Suarez delivers an exhilarating sci-fi thriller exploring a potential future where CRISPR genetic editing allows the human species to control evolution itself.

On a crowded train platform, Interpol agent Kenneth Durand feels the sting of a needle - and his transformation begins....

In 2045 Kenneth Durand leads Interpol's most effective team against genetic crime, hunting down black market labs that perform "vanity edits" on human embryos for a price. These illegal procedures augment embryos in ways that are rapidly accelerating human evolution - preying on human-trafficking victims to experiment and advance their technology.

With the worlds of genetic crime and human trafficking converging, Durand and his fellow Interpol agents discover that one figure looms behind it all: Marcus Demang Wyckes, leader of a powerful and sophisticated cartel known as the Huli jing.

But the Huli jing have identified Durand, too. After being forcibly dosed with a radical new change agent, Durand wakes from a coma weeks later to find he's been genetically transformed into someone else - his most wanted suspect: Wyckes.

Now a fugitive, pursued through the genetic underworld by his former colleagues and the police, Durand is determined to restore his original DNA by locating the source of the mysterious - and highly valuable - change agent. But Durand hasn't anticipated just how difficult locating his enemy will be. With the technology to genetically edit the living, Wyckes and his Huli jing could be anyone and everyone - and they have plans to undermine identity itself.

©2017 Daniel Suarez (P)2016 Penguin Audio

A terrifying look into our future

I really enjoyed Daemon by Daniel Suarez so when I saw that Change Agent was coming out, I had to get it. I pre-ordered it from Audible (something I rarely do) and the day that it arrived I was lucky that I was just about to finish the last book I started.

Change Agent is a story about Kenneth Durand an Interpol agent who is mysteriously changed into someone that he is not. Not just a small change either, but a full change. So much so that he quickly realizes that he is a wanted man and that this will forever change the way that the police will be able to solve crimes.

There are two authors that I read that remind me of Michael Crichton. Douglas E Richards and Daniel Suarez. Suarez is able to weave what is going on today with what he thinks will come in the future and it's terrifying. I work in a technology firm and he's not wrong with what he's thinking. I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of what was written in Change Agent comes true at one time or another.

Durand as a character allowed the reader to follow along with someone as their own opinions of people and things they fought for so long was changing. Kenneth grew many times throughout Change Agent and really became one of the more dynamic characters I've read in a long time.

The overall story was one of the best I've read this year. It kept me wondering throughout and I honestly couldn't put this book down. I kept saying "one more chapter" late into the night. Each chapter brought me closer to the end, but I promise that this book will have a hold on my mind for a while.

A fast-paced technothriller on par with every Crichton novel I've ever read, maybe even a little more terrifying. Suarez took things that are real today and showed us what could happen in the future if we're not careful.

a frustrating pop-sci thriller

Change Agent, by Daniel Suarez, is a frustrating pop-sci thriller, more focused on whiz-bang tech than telling an original story. At its core, this Crichton-esque soft-serve is a generic lone hero on the run chase book, set in the near-future where the threats of illicit genetic modification are rearing its ugly head and Interpol is working on cracking down on underground biohackers. After shutting down an illegal gene shop, analyst Kevin Durand becomes the target of Eurasian gang boss, Marcus Wyckes. Durand is injected with a “change agent” and wakes up in the hospital five weeks later, his entire genetic structure altered so that he is now the spitting image of Wyckes, the Most Wanted Man In The World! Durand, on a mission to reclaim his identity, has to elude police, escape from his own team of Interpol agents, and go deep, deep, deep, deep undercover to secure the help of some of those underground biohackers he’s been tracking for arrest.

If you’ve seen the movies Face/Off and Minority Report, you’ve basically read this book already, and Saurez fails to inject many change agents into the formulas established by so many other body-swap and hero on the run thrillers. While it’s clear Saurez has certainly done his homework and there’s plenty of next-gen sci-fi tech to go gaga over, the story itself is too derivative for me to muster up much enthusiasm. There were also too many moments that ripped me right out of the narrative with how clumsily they were handled. In one instance, we’re introduced to a strange villain who is so evil a guard pees himself at the mere sight of the man, a scene that reads far more goofy than threatening. On another occasion, Durand has to flee a building swarming with cops by rooftop and surrounded by drones. He leaps off the roof and onto one of the drones, whose far-away pilot registers the error, but it never occurs to anybody to turn one of the other nearby drones to examine the “glitch” their sensors are reading. Later, Saurez details an underground slavers club where people have been modified to look like celebrities. It found it rather odd that people nearly 50 years in the future would still be modifying themselves to look like young Brad Pitts and Scarlett Johanssons rather than their current contemporaries, but maybe that’s just me. At other times, Saurez stops to linger for far too long, bearing the story down with a lot of exposition and infodumps on current affairs, the tech of the day, and detours into the Malaysian jungle that serve to slow the narrative to a crawl when it should be racing full speed ahead.

While Saurez’s writing failed to sell me on Change Agent, Jeff Gurner’s narration was at least well done. Gurner has a rich timbre and is able to provide a wide range of voices and accents to keep the large cast distinct. At times the reading felt a little too much like the voice-over work of a documentary, but it’s a solid enough listen overall. Given the flaws in pacing and Saurez’s been there, done that narrative choices, though, this was hard a audiobook to really sink into and enjoy, which made keeping my attention focused on the material all the more difficult. On the production end of things, the audio comes through clear and consistently, as one should expect of a major publisher like Penguin Audio.

Audiobook was purchased for review by ABR.

Please find this complete review and many others at my review blog

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cartoony writing with a few​ interesting ideas

The writing is mediocre at best but often cringe inducing, yet there are a few interesting ideas presented.

Amazing future of tech/bio-tech in a non stop thriller

This was an excellent book with highly entertaining narration. I would definitely recommend for anyone into future world scenarios including technology and bio-tech. Really fascinating story line that appears within reach, only a few decades away.

Good book, not enough thrill though

took a bit to get into, but was worth it in the end. if you try to compare it to his other books, don't.

Suarez knocks it out the park again!

Starts slow but WELL worth the wait. This book made me wonder how far I would go to find myself. Does our DNA define us, our actions? Or is it something deeper, not quantifiable? Daniel Suarez definitely got this one right and his near future setting is real enough to be believed.

I did not put this book down.

Probably the BEST reading performance ever

Incredible voices and accents. A fantastic story combined with fantastic reading. CRISPR is coming and this is a really good look at it's potential.

Fun adventure, but the biology is *real* bad

It's always hard to listen to science fiction about your own expertise. As a biologist, this was tough to listen to, but as always Suarez paints a compelling narrative of the future. Some of the specific science is silly wrong, but the general future of synthetic biology probably isn't far off.

Another hit by Suarez

A really nice listen. The story and performance are great. i can't wait for the next offering.

Very fun and timely premise

I really enjoyed the book. Suarez really leaps into deep water with his imaginings of the complexities we face in a genome centric future. The tech is fleshed out and fun! Not broad stroked or exhausting. I got a little weary of the main characters "give me a break" shtick that seemed to take hold once it transitioned into a heist story. I wouldn't be surprised if I was the only one who had that reaction.
Fantastic performance. Nailed every accent. (At least enough to maintain the 4th wall)
Solid read.