This is not a book review in the proper sense of the word. Rather, it takes off from the assumptions this book is based upon and relates some of them to trends present in the world when the book came out and present even more today.

The book speaks of a world divided between the very numerous and poor humans and a smaller group called the Elites who have taken over the whole world.

The humans live in squalor, poverty and neglect and are ruled by the Elites with an iron fist. Hatred is rampant between the two and, when the book begins, the humans are beginning to fight back.

Now it might be objected that this is not like the world we know but let's go slow with hasty judgements. 

In the United States the gap    between the wealthy and the poor has been widening since Reagan's time and the collapse of the health system. Systematically, successive Republican administrations allowed the rich to get richer and encouraged the trend.

Under Trump, especially in the second term, this process has become an ideology, the Maga ideology which rubbishes the tenets of the Social Contract of the past New Deal years on which America was built.

It is not a divide on the class system, such as one would find, for instance, in the UK between the nobles and the workers.

In Trump's America one can find workers with a Maga ideology as much as billionaires such as Elon Musk, the creator and owner of Tesla.

At this point, we have no idea what will happen in the coming years. All we can come up with are hypotheses.

At the beginning of this book we meet Hays Baker and his wife Lizbeth. Both have superhuman strength, extraordinary intelligence, stunning looks and two beautiful children.

They are Elites, endowed at birth with the very best the world can offer them. The only problem in their perfect world are the great unwashed, the humans.

The top operative for the Agency of Change, Hays has won the fiercest battle of his career.  He has been praised by the President and is a national hero.

But before he can enjoy the triumph, he receives an unbelievable shock. He is not a real Elite.

Suddenly, he finds himself on the other side of the great divide. He is next forced to leave his perfect family and fight for his life.

Now a hunted fugitive, Hays is thrown into an existence he never imagined - fighting to save humans from extinction. 

But he soon recognises that the humans have values too and that his place is with them.