“ANY SUFFICIENTLY ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY IS INDISTINGUISHABLE FROM MAGIC.”
—ARTHUR C. CLARKE
HELLO, I AM THE TETHER
The Phone Company has been around for a long time. As civilization grew, so did its power, slowly spreading its lines across the continent. Today it’s in everything. It’s in the air around us.
I CAN TRACK YOUR KIDS FOR YOU
Now PCo is building a cell tower in the isolated town of Cracked Rock, Montana, bringing with it infrastructure, opportunity, and the world’s smartest phone: the brand-new Tether.
I CAN SPY ON YOUR NEIGHBORS
But the Tether isn’t just a phone. It knows everything about you. It can give you anything you want. It can even connect you with the dead.
ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS GET CONNECTED
As the Tether digs up the town’s dirtiest skeletons, one father must make a stand to save what’s left of his family, his town, and humanity itself—or succumb to his own desires.
THE TETHER:
I’M NOT TECHNOLOGY
Upon its debut, The Phone Company became a hot new release on Amazon and hit bestseller lists for months, selling hundreds of copies. It regularly lands up there with King and Koontz on the Amazon charts, and that's no accident: many readers compare the writing to King's.
The Phone Company currently has 29 reviews on Amazon, with an average of 4 stars.
JJ hadn’t downloaded the new app yet. He’d been reading the description when Mini Mark interrupted: The Enormous Television, <The only app that allows you to peer into the secret lives of your neighbors.>
JJ read some of the reviews. Usually he would skip to the one-star opinions first to see what was wrong with the app, and to laugh at the obscene comments of internet trolls.
Out of thousands of reviews, there was only one negative comment for The Enormous Television, titled <Only God should be able to see this!>
When JJ pressed DOWNLOAD, a privacy agreement appeared. He pressed ACCEPT without reading it, but glimpsed something weird before it flashed off the screen. Something like, <The makers are not responsible for detached consciousness or other prolonged out of body experiences that may occur.>
Bad ass! he thought, and watched as the progress bar shot across the screen.
Once the app loaded onto his phone, JJ found he could key in a name, any name he wanted, into the search. He got as far as <M-e-g> when autofill predicted some options. The name he was looking for was right at the top. The program was that smart.
Works off GPS, maybe?
JJ tapped the option for <Megan Disney> and his jaw nearly dropped.
She had just stepped out of the shower, and in the seconds before she wrapped the white towel around herself, JJ could see everything. She was beautiful, still tanned from the summer sun except where her bathing suit had kept her pale, her blonde hair darker now as it hung in a single wet rope.
