PRISM Break

Grand Theft AI, Book 2

By: James Cox

“The Matrix meets Blade Runner.” —Nicholas Sansbury Smith, New York Times bestselling author of Hell Divers, on Grand Theft AI

If you thought the Glitch was bad, that’s nothing compared to a Federal Virtual Detention Construct.

The world is faster, looser, and deadlier than ever. Why slot digital dreams behind your ear when you can implant the real thing: cybernetic augments offer superhuman abilities beyond imagination—if you can afford them …

After hitting the hottest dancebot club in the world and pulling off the score of the century, Ria Rose and Baz Covane full-on bolted, off grid, all the way to a beach in the Tahitian Protectorate. The fixer, her battle-scarred lover, and their crew got out—escaping the grind and their haunted pasts.

But the world in the rearview is jacked. And our heroes just might be the reason why—since the fiery finale of Grand Theft AI is being used by psychopath technocrat, Ken Cates, to justify a quarter-million android soldiers rounding up anyone suspected of betraying the human species, aka, 99.99% of Americans who can’t afford an augment waiver.

Wirecrime’s Sentry Squads patrol the city by day. Human-first Redblood gangs roam its streets at night. Step out of line, and you find yourself before an Augment Review Board, fighting for what human rights are left in a system rigged to relocate the masses to urban augment wards, a veritable prison sentence, or worse …

FVDC Angola. The Alcatraz of the South.

When Baz gets pinched and locked up, suddenly Ria must mastermind a raid on the prison industrial complex’s ultimate stronghold—even if her ace-in-the-hole AI, Fastlight, lacks the firepower to hack through PRISM, the vicious rehab sim deep inside Angola.

So, Ria and her crew of misfits have a choice.

Stay out and stay safe?

Or fight for what’s right and dive back in.

©2026 James Cox (P)2026 Blackstone Publishing

Critic reviews

“The Matrix meets Blade Runner.”