The novel is a taut, often brutal exploration of personal trauma, moral ambiguity, and the slippery ethics of modern power structures. It begins with Salam al-Fayed, a paralyzed ex-SEAL and disgraced CIA operative, executing a violent defense of his crumbling life before collapsing into a coma. The story then spirals outward to include Matt Egan, his estranged ex-colleague turned security director for a shadowy nonprofit led by billionaire Jon Lowe. As Fade (al-Fayed’s nickname) awakens, the book knits together an intricate web of past regrets, technological threats, and creeping philosophical dread about who really holds the levers of power and what they’re willing to do to keep them.
I genuinely admired Mills’s writing here. The prose snaps and hums. It’s not showy, but it carries a dry wit and emotional weight that catches you off guard. Dialogue flows naturally. Action scenes are chaotic in the right way. Characters are drawn with surprising depth, even the morally gray ones. Especially them. Salam al-Fayed is one of the more complex leads I’ve read in a while. He’s part burned-out killer, part philosopher, and all broken glass. Mills doesn’t sanitize his flaws. He’s cruel and tired and numb. But somehow, you keep rooting for him. And that says something about the strength of the storytelling.
What stuck with me more than the plot, which is entertaining, don’t get me wrong, was the unease that seeps in around the edges. The way Mills writes about elite power brokers like Lowe, who believe they can save the world by controlling it, chilled me. Their boardroom meetings are colder than most war zones. There’s an arrogance to their attempts to reshape the world, and the novel doesn’t flinch from showing how that kind of thinking breeds both innovation and disaster. Mills is asking big questions here: What happens when people with good intentions also have godlike tools? Can morality exist in a world built on surveillance, drone strikes, and AI weapons? I didn’t always like the answers, but I couldn’t stop thinking about them.
Fade In is a gripping, violent, and often heartbreaking book. It’s for readers who like their thrillers with a sharp philosophical bite. If you’re into authors like Don Winslow, Greg Hurwitz, or even the darker seasons of Homeland, this one’s probably up your alley. If you’re looking for a novel that’s tense, angry, thoughtful, and undeniably timely, this is it. I didn’t walk away comforted, but I walked away wide awake.
Pages: 331 | ASIN: B0DKPHWLB6
