Interface
A Systemic Novel — Book 3
Three hundred years after the fall of the System, a new sort of superintelligence has taken root in the bio-amplified forest surrounding Prower. The town's citizens have long since grown dependent upon the forest's gifts, but now an incurable blight is killing the maternalistic forest.
Realizing that their society will collapse without the forest's gifts, Orin DuPre and his fellow Resurrection Archaeologists focus all their hopes and energy on reviving the systemic tech which once helped humanity flourish.
Beyond the Western Desert, across the Great River and mountain passes, the technophobic populace of Seal Tooth are facing their own impending catastrophe. A horrific plague is making its way toward the city. Risking exile and the loss of their hard-won status, Kavi and Avalina break through the quarantine and head to Prower to beg their longstanding adversaries for a cure.
With the fate of Seal Tooth, Prower, and all the world at stake, they must choose between resurrecting a questionable past, surrendering to nature's whims, or forging a new and uncertain future — one where humanity, technology, and nature coexist — and hope that will not prove the worst of all possible options.
Mari tore her hand away from the gnarled hunk of wood as though she'd touched an ember. Her breath came in tiny jerks and sips as her lungs struggled to keep up with the beating of her frantic heart.
As soon as she'd severed the interface, the dull veil of reality came down, shutting out the wonderous hyper-real world she'd been inhabiting. Slowly, she turned back toward the edge of the glade. Whatever she had felt flowing and surging through the forest's infinite tangle of roots, it had felt her too.
— Interface, Prologue
Readers who enjoy the philosophical depth of Neal Stephenson, the unsettling environments of Jeff VanderMeer's Area X, or the expansive world-building of N.K. Jemisin's Broken Earth trilogy will find Interface engaging.