Although he successfully infiltrates the Golds, he finds the social order is a cruel and confusing mash-up of deception and intrigue. He’s recruited by a rebel cell and “becomes” a Gold by having painful surgery-he has golden wings grafted on his back-and taking an exam to launch himself into the academy that educates the ruling elite. When Eo leads him to a mildly rebellious act, she’s caught and executed, and Darrow decides to exact vengeance on the perpetrators of this outrage. He’s a member of the Reds, an “inferior” class, though he’s happily married to Eo, an incipient rebel who wants to overthrow the existing social order, especially the Golds, who treat the lower-ranking orders cruelly. In the beginning, Darrow, the narrator, works in the mines on Mars, a life of drudgery and subservience. Set in the future and reminiscent of The Hunger Games and Game of Thrones, this novel dramatizes a story of vengeance, warfare and the quest for power. But otherwise, this is a colorful, imaginative spin into SF by the prolific, wide-ranging writer. And it is not always easy to keep all the multiple Earths and versions of people straight. For all the other scary things there are across the multiverse, including genocidal robots marching up the Pacific Coast Highway, none is more frightening than the neo-fascist enforcers now operating back home on 'Earth Prime.' As heavy-handed as Koontz is in nailing down this timely theme, it's disappointing to see him pull back from its broader implications and invest his villainy in a rather predictable sociopathic bad guy who will do anything to lay his hands on the special device. However, re-connecting with Mom, who walked out on her family seven years ago, saying she felt 'empty,' proves problematic: In this parallel world, Jeffy and Amity were both run over by a car-seven years ago. But Amity is in no rush to return to normalcy after Googling her long-missing mother and determining she is alive and well on Earth 1.13. Danger greets them in the form of a nasty creature that is half boy and half chimp, and there are other threats. But when Amity's pet mouse strolls across its controls, the device activates, whisking father and daughter-and mouse-off to an alternate Earth. The inventor, on the run from dark government forces, instructs Coltrane to put this $76 billion 'key to everything' into safekeeping and never use it.

California man Jeffy Coltrane and his 11-year-old daughter, Amity, discover the wonders and horrors of multiverse travel after an inventor entrusts them with a special device.

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