The Twin
Lisa Stone

What would you do if you kept seeing your double but something told you it wasn’t real? This is Lisa Stones eleventh thriller with a difference, a fast-paced narrative that is 71,000 words in length.

We are living in an age where everything you need is bought and delivered by Emporium. Lily meets Thomas in The Moon in Coleshaw. She is shocked by how much he knows about her from Emporium. Unknown to her, her computer has been saving all her details for anyone to view.

Lily goes online and signs up for the Emporium dating app. During the night her laptop, open on her bed, takes photos of her sleeping. They are not flattering. She phones her friend who tells her which boxes to untick. She subsequently receives more information about herself. She eventually removes her details and contacts Emporium and tells them to delete her account. Their intrusiveness gets worse.

DC Beth Mayes is sitting in her office. She is training Ellis who has replaced Matt who died four months ago. Beth is slowly getting over the loss of Matt. The police are receiving complaints about Emporium. They are escalating.

Thomas come to Lily’s flat late at night. He is being followed by someone who is identical to him. Lily goes out and sees a man in the street who is the spitting image of Thomas. He doesn’t say anything but walks away when she approaches. She is shocked, so too is Thomas.

Beth sees her double standing outside her flat and is deeply troubled. She researches at work but doesn’t find out anything. Lily see hers and Thomas’s double walking together along the road outside her flat. As she approaches they disappear. Others start to see their doubles. Beth has a visitation from Matt in the night. 

Thomas is goaded into jumping off Coles Bridge, apparently by Emporium. New Scotland Yard take over the case and Beth is no longer working on it but nothing seems to be done.

Beth sees Matt’s image in her flat and decides that her and Ellis need to investigate in their own time. They visit Generated Images in Finchley. There is no one in and they enter through the rear window. They see a room full of wall mounted screens, and monitors. Ellis receives a sound recording from the screens – leave now.

DS Scrivener, Beth’s boss, speaks to her about her negative attitude to Ellis and she promises to improve. The hauntings continue. Beth discovers that the two guys who own Generated Images have hacked most of their data from Emporium. They are interviewed and explain the software programme they were working on is now out of control and can reproduce by itself creating these dreadful AI images.

It’s decided that everyone in the word should switch off their phones at the same time on the same day. It becomes known as the big Switch off Day. It is a success, but when Beth arrives home another more sinister version of Matt is waiting for her. This shouldn’t be able to happen now.