Exploring what it means to be human is an established sci-fi trope, especially in any book with sufficiently advanced androids; however, Human After All certainly takes a unique approach to this subject. The android population rose up against their oppressive masters (humans) decades ago, and they won the war easily. Now the androids rule the Earth and they have formed their own societal structures, but are they any better at stewarding the planet than their human predecessors? Not really. They seem to have learned a lot of our bad habits, and when a new "virus" starts to spread throughout the population, essentially turning them into android zombies, the new masters of the planet find their own existence in jeopardy. This is the backdrop that challenges the main character Freeman, the most advanced artificial life form ever created, to explore his existence and the nature of his humanity.

"There shall come over the whole Earth, an intense darkness lasting three days and three nights. He who opens his window or door out of curiosity, or leaves his home, will fall dead on the spot. The air will be infected by demons, appearing in all sorts of hideous forms. All of Hell will be let loose."

Miah Gray is an Army veteran living with PTSD in New Hampshire, and all he wants to do is get high and not be hassled by his Mom or her boyfriend. A good sandwich wouldn't hurt either.  Miah is not religious, and he has little interest in prophecies, but when the sun no longer shines in the daytime sky and his world is plunged into darkness, Miah finds himself willing to rethink his position.  Locked down with his family, Miah is going with the flow and doing what he can to protect everyone when a flash of light knocks everyone out. They all awaken to find that Miah now has a death rune etched into his forehead. Isn't that just great?

Jonas is an experienced assassin who was taught the trade by his parents, who are recently deceased having driven their RV off a cliff. Jonas knows that it likely wasn't an accident, but he is not able to come up with any leads as to who might have killed them. That fact puts revenge out of reach for the moment, so he continues his life pulling off elaborate kill jobs, each one more ostentatious than the one before. Jonas is a special kind of assassin, he kills with his mind by telekinetically creating a hole in the brain of his victims. But even with all his power and money, he is depressed and his personal Artificial Intelligence knows it. So the A.I. schemes to bring a young woman named Maddie into his life, and then things really start to spiral out of control.

A long distance colonization mission gone wrong, Infinite is a stand alone novel that at first glance appears to explore the concept of what happens when a ship winds up traveling through the cosmos for eternity. However, it turns into a many layered story that explores a number of common sci-fi concepts including artificial intelligence, virtual reality - holodeck style, and what it means to be human. This book often went where I didn't expect it to go and at times did its best to lose me when it took things too far, but ultimately I stuck with it because I wanted to know how it was going to turn out.