“Agency, definition. A person or thing through which power is exerted or an end achieved.” Merriam Webster.

“One's agency is one's independent capability or ability to act on one's will. This ability is affected by the cognitive belief structure which one has formed through one's experiences, and the perceptions held by the society and the individual, of the structures and circumstances of the environment one is in and the position they are born into. Disagreement on the extent of one's agency often causes conflict between parties, e.g. parents and children.” “Agency (Sociology), Wikipedia.

So agency can be thought of as personal freedom, which is always limited by our circumstances, socio-economic status, government, self-perception, etc. Gibson’s book can be seen as a commentary on what is a person, should artificial intelligent beings have agency, and is freedom an illusion. Perhaps AI “persons” have greater agency than we do. Gibson juggles several plot lines, and expects the reader to pick up scant breadcrumbs and make connections with few links. Full disclosure: this is my first read of Gibson, not having read The Peripheral, or even Neuromancer (some day I’ll get to it.) Perhaps Agency would be clearer if I read The Peripheral first, but I believed reviewers who said this could be read alone.

Verity Jane (truth?) takes a job as a tester of a new AI, who calls herself Eunice (UNISS?). She does this after a mutual breakup with billionaire boyfriend Stetson Howell. Eunice is a software agent, developed at the Naval Postgraduate School, but now acquired by Tulpagenics, a company that appears to be owned by Cursion. Eunice and Verity interact via glasses and an earpiece (think Google glasses). They seem to have an immediate bond. Eunice begins taking over Verity’s life, networking here and there, not even certain of her personal motivation, or if her motives are programmed or independent (agency?) It seems as soon as Eunice is powered up, that Verity’s life is endangered by agents of Cursion, and Eunice mobilizes her network to protect Verity.

More plot lines, however— a group of characters 100 years hence have the ability to travel to this present time, and influence events. Hobbyists, wealthy oligarchs known as the klepts (short for kleptocracy, corrupt leaders who exploit people or resources to become richer) alter past circumstances for either personal amusement or gain, and are leading the present world toward “the jackpot” or all out nuclear war. Another group, led by Ainsley Lowbeer, is trying to thwart their plans and avoid war. Verity’s place in time is 2016, with the election of the first female president in the United States, and Brexit not happening. Stubs of time branch off the main flow of time, and Verity lives in a stub where Turkey and Syria are heating up at their border, with nuclear conflict dangerously close.

Somehow, Eunice and Verity are related to events in Asia, but it is never clear to me how. Their fate appears tied up in some way with the conflict, perhaps whether Eunice could exert influence to end the conflict. The novel’s action quickly flips back and forth between Verity’s world and Lowbeer’s, with intrusions of Lowbeer’s emissaries, Netherton, Ash, and Rainey, helping Verity to avoid Cursion’s attempts to kidnap her. War is ultimately avoided, but so much was not made clear to me. What role do Verity and Eunice play in the conflict? Why is Cursion bent on capturing them? As an independent AI, perhaps the klept see Eunice as spoiling their fun and power, and wish to put an end to her. Is Gibson making a case for AI saving humanity, by being independent of us? Is he saying that AI should have human rights?

While Gibson floats some interesting ideas, his plotting is just not coherent. It is too much work for the reader to try to make sense with too scant clues. This novel needed to be tighter, better edited, with more care for the reader. Maybe reading The Peripheral first would have been smart. Or maybe it wouldn’t have mattered. People seem to either love or feel indifferent about Gibson. I wished he cared a little bit more about the reader.