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Following a painful breakup, twenty-year-old Indiana University student Arthur is suffering from a spate of unnaturally terrible dreams. As part of his efforts to combat these nightmares, Arthur signs up for an experimental brain implant called a Curio.
Soon after receiving his Curio, Arthur is recruited by a rogue team of developers to help build the world’s first alternate reality — a hidden city called Polaris. At first, everything seems to be going well: Arthur is good at the work, his mind is finally off his ex, and he is quickly swept into a so-called “Starside” courtship with a mysterious young woman named Rebecca.
Yet Arthur’s best friend Alena isn’t quite sold on Polaris. Who are these developers, and why are they interested in Arthur at all? As students around campus start to complain of strange and frightening dreams, Alena begins to suspect that the Polaris project is not what it seems — and that Arthur’s new girlfriend may not be who she claims.
After a gruesome incident connected to the project shocks the school, Arthur and Alena must unravel the riddle of Polaris before the city’s dark secret changes reality as they know it forever.
With its horror-infused mystery, flashes of fantasy magic, and commentary on the perils of technology, POLARIS combines the puzzle box narrative structure of CLOUD CUCKOO LAND by Anthony Doerr with the intricate menace of RECURSION by Blake Crouch.
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