''Zero History'' is a novel by

William Gibson William Ford Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian speculative fiction writer and essayist widely credited with pioneering the science fiction subgenre known as ''cyberpunk''. Beginning his writing career in the late 1970s, hi ...

published in 2010. It concludes the informal trilogy begun by ''

Pattern Recognition Pattern recognition is the automated recognition of patterns and regularities in data. It has applications in statistical data analysis, signal processing, image analysis, information retrieval, bioinformatics, data compression, computer graphics ...

'' (2003) and continued by ''

Spook Country ''Spook Country'' is a 2007 novel by speculative fiction author William Gibson. A political thriller set in contemporary North America, it followed on from the author's previous novel, ''Pattern Recognition'' (2003), and was succeeded in 2010 by ...

'' (2007), and features the characters Hollis Henry and Milgrim from the latter novel as its protagonists.

Plot

Hollis Henry and Milgrim find themselves in London working for Hubertus Bigend, unaware that their lives previously crossed in ''Spook Country''. One of Bigend's current interests is fashion, particularly the intersection between streetwear, workwear and

military clothing A military uniform is a standardised clothing, dress worn by members of the armed forces and Paramilitary, paramilitaries of various nations. Military dress and styles have gone through significant changes over the centuries, from colourful and ...

. Milgrim is sent to South Carolina to take photographs of a pair of Army BDUs where he gains the notice of a federal agent named Winnie Tung Whittaker employed by DCIS. Winnie photographs Milgrim and intimidates him into working as an informant. Bigend asks Henry and Milgrim to investigate a

secret brand A secret brand is any design or manufacturing company that does not advertise or overtly label its products. The products are generally considered luxury goods intended for exclusive clientele. Marketing strategy The idea of a secret brand works ...

, named Gabriel Hounds after the English legend. At the same time, he becomes aware that a coup is being plotted within his company, Blue Ant. When Milgrim realizes his cell phone is being tracked by rogue elements in Blue Ant, he slides the phone into a pram belonging to the moll of a member of the Russian mob, which leads to one of the mercenaries involved in the coup, who followed the pram, being captured and beaten. Revenge against Milgrim then becomes the top priority of the mercs. A parallel subplot follows Hollis as she tracks down the Gabriel Hounds designer. Joined by her boyfriend Garreth, the mysterious daredevil featured in ''

'' who had been severely injured in a BASE jump, Hollis Henry offers to help Bigend gain the release of Bobby Chombo, who has been captured by the mercenaries to force Bigend to swap him for Milgrim, but as part of the deal, Bigend must allow the Hounds designer to remain anonymous. Garreth, because of his knowledge of tradecraft, assists Hollis in this, and in doing so calls in favors from an old man, implied to be the same person Garreth worked with in ''

'' (who, via implication in both books, might be Cayce Pollard's father), to help ensure secrecy. Bobby Chombo is critical to Bigend's plan to gain the ability to foresee stock market prices by a number of minutes. Events reach a climax at night in

Wormwood Scrubs Wormwood Scrubs, known locally as The Scrubs (or simply Scrubs), is an open space in Old Oak Common located in the north-eastern corner of the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham in west London. It is the largest open space in the borough, ...

(an open space in London) where the mercs demand the prisoner exchange take place.

Collaboration

Gibson acknowledges the help of other authors: *

Cory Doctorow Cory Efram Doctorow (; born July 17, 1971) is a Canadian-British blogger, journalist, and science fiction author who served as co-editor of the blog '' Boing Boing''. He is an activist in favour of liberalising copyright laws and a proponent of ...

provided the description of a

smartphone A smartphone is a portable computer device that combines mobile telephone and computing functions into one unit. They are distinguished from feature phones by their stronger hardware capabilities and extensive mobile operating systems, whic ...

. * Bruce Sterling provided the concept of a T-shirt that is not recorded by CCTV.

References

External links

''Zero History''
at WilliamGibsonBooks.com (official website)
"Prepare for ZERO HISTORY by William Gibson"
excerpts from the novel read by the author accompanied by promotional images at

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

Portal of Reviews of Zero History
2010 American novels Novels by William Gibson 2010 speculative fiction novels Novels set in London Techno-thriller novels Viking Press books {{2010s-specf-novel-stub