Since the publication of Neuromancer in 1984, William Gibson has written his novels in loose trilogies, and the sequence that began with Pattern Recognition (2003) and Spook Country (2007) and ends now with Zero History, has revolved around the character of Hubertus Bigend, a Belgian multibillionaire who owns a mysterious media/advertising company called Blue Ant. In Gibson's reimaginings of the post-Cold War (and post-9/11) thriller, Bigend has emerged as a not entirely unsympathetic iteration on what a Bond villain might look like in the real world (right down to the implausible master plan that comes to fruition at the end of Zero History). When you read the novels in quick succession, you realize they all follow the same narrative template: Bigend hires a woman to investigate a subcultural phenomenon; somewhere along the line, spies--both active and retired--involve themselves in the events. In order to keep that storyline fresh the third time around, Gibson would have to either tell us more about the characters or plunge them into weirder scenarios, and he uses both approaches here to successful effect.
Zero History takes two characters who circled around the plot of Spook Country without coming into direct contact--Hollis Henry, a rock star turned freelance journalist, and Milgrim, a recovered junkie who's been pressed into Blue Ant's services under ambiguous circumstances--and sets them on the trail of Gabriel Hounds, an anti-fashion line of clothing that, as Bigend puts it in his typically gnomic way, "may prove to be a somewhat new way to transmit brand vision" through "a certain genuinely provocative use of negative space." (Translation: You can't buy it in stores or even on eBay; you really do have to know the right people and be in the right place at the right time.) This search may be related to Milgrim's other Blue Ant assignment, which involves bootleg copies of apparel from special forces units--a project where the lines between industrial espionage and paramilitary operations are quickly blurred.
As with any Gibson novel, the window dressing is as important as the characters, and Zero History is packed with interesting details like the decor in Cabinet, a private club where Hollis's room features a birdcage stacked with books (including, with undoubtedly significant specificity, Geoffrey Household's 1939 novel Rogue Male), or "the ugly T-shirt," which is emblazoned with a design that's actually programming code: "Surveillance cameras can all see it, but then they forget they've seen it." It's easy to miss some of these details, given the frenetic pacing of the story, but their accumulative subconscious effect is strong. "The future is already here," Gibson once said in an interview. "It's just not evenly distributed." Zero History, like its two predecessors, shows us where it's landed first.--Ron Hogan
Shelf Talker: Fans of Gibson's last two novels will find plenty of Easter eggs to reward their loyalty; newcomers won't be completely lost, but the background reading might help.