The first of six post-apocalyptic science fiction novels, a community of humans now live in a 144-floor underground silo many hundreds of years after the air above became toxic. Those unwisely wishing to go above ground are subject to the punishment of ‘cleaning’. They wear a suit designed by the IT department and have to clean the cameras which show the humans to state of the world above. However, the suits are designed to be faulty and the wearing always dies. The sheriff, Holston, volunteers to do the cleaning after his wife did the same, and dies. Juliette is named the new sheriff after working in the Mechanical department. The head of IT opposes the appointment and Juliette investigates Holston’s death. As such, she is sent for cleaning. However, she doctors her suit, does not clean the cameras and disappears when finding another silo where all had died but one survivor and some wild children. She repairs that silo and can communicate with her home silo by radio. Mechanical revolt against IT and are holed up. Lukas IT finds that there are 50 silos, built by those who destroyed all other human life. Lukas is found out and is himself sentenced to cleaning. Juliette returns to save him.
Imaginative, readable and somewhat pessimistic as all these dystopian novels tend to be, this is a long read which maintains interest but is let down by a weak ending. The involvement of the bad guy in the story is somewhat distant, but otherwise the characters are three-dimensional and consistent. The depth of the story is such that the whole thing could have been told in half the length, probably to its advantage.