Cas Russell is good at math. Scary good. The vector calculus blazing through her head lets her smash through armed men twice her size and dodge every bullet in a gunfight, and she’ll take any job for the right price.

As far as Cas knows, she’s the only person around with a superpower…until she discovers someone with a power even more dangerous than her own. Someone who can reach directly into people’s minds and twist their brains into Moebius strips. Someone intent on becoming the world’s puppet master.

Cas should run, like she usually does, but for once she’s involved. There’s only one problem…
She doesn’t know which of her thoughts are her own anymore.

Let’s talk about math.

It’s terrible, right? Just awful. I mean, I guess it’s important. For like, the world. And stuff. But it’s not for me. Saying I was terrible at math in school is dramatically underselling the point. I was SO BAD at it. Still am. I probably comprehend math at no more than a 7th-8th grade level, real talk.

So, does reading a book about a badass woman who is a walking human calculator appeal to me? Hell yeah, it does! Especially when some of my favorite Bookstagrammers/bloggers have been raving about this series!!

Cas Russell exists in that nebulous zone you might put Travis McGee in. McGee always called himself a “salvage consultant”, while Cas “does retrieval,” finding things (or people) that have been…misplaced in one way or another. Either way, you go to people like Travis McGee or Cas Russell when you’re in some kind of trouble & can’t involve the police.

Cas Russell has a very special ability: she’s really good at math. Like, insanely, stupidly good at math. She sees the whole world in angles & numbers & trajectories, and she uses that to her advantage when she’s retrieving things or beating the shit out of bad guys twice her size. Because she knows exactly where & how hard to hit someone to eliminate them as a threat. But it’s so much more than that…like…you could be standing around the corner from her, hiding behind a dumpster. And with all the numbers floating in front of her face, she could throw a baseball at just the right angle that it would ricochet off a building & break your fucking face.

In the current case that Cas is working, what should be a simple “retrieval” quickly becomes a tangled web of conspiracy theories, shadowy government organizations, and bodies…just…dead bodies, everywhere. Cas is someone who is mistrustful of people by nature, and so she’s incredibly selective about who she is willing to work with or ask for help. But her current gig is going to require her to take many leaps of faith, otherwise she might not live to see another day.

Zero Sum Game is a complete blast…absolutely breakneck pacing, a lot of quippy/bantering dialogue, and one of the coolest doesn’t-give-a-fuck-but-actually-she-does-just-don’t-tell-anyone protagonists this side of Miriam Black. While this book felt completely fresh & original to me, I think it would for sure appeal to fans of things like the Miriam Black series & The X-Files…there’s even a story element here that had a bit of a Stranger Things vibe to me! But it’s all wrapped up in this super gritty & grimy techno-thriller package, with a very unglamorous Los Angeles as its setting.

Also, I was today years old when I realized that the first four books in this series were previously self-published prior to S.L. Huang signing a deal with TOR! The series was originally called Russell’s Attic (which I gather is a math reference/joke of some kind), and what’s really interesting is, some pretty big editorial changes have occurred…so for instance, the second book, Null Set, was originally the fourth book (with a different title) when it was self-published. But it got reworked & moved around, and now it’s book two! I’m making it sound more confusing than it is (and Huang does a great job walking readers through it all on the FAQ of her website), when it would really only impact you if you had previously read the self-published versions. If you’re like me & starting your Cas Russell journey with the TOR versions, there’s nothing to worry about!

All told, Zero Sum Game had me completely hooked from the first page. Cas Russell is a very unique protagonist, and I think this is the start of a wicked cool new series!