"The Passengers" couldn't be more different, whether it's pretty, young Claire Arden, who is eight months pregnant; Sam and Heidi Cole, a not-too-happily married couple traveling in separate cars; Jude Harrison, a suicidal man living in his car; Sofia Bradbury, a wealthy, elderly movie star who is desperate to become relevant again; Shabana Khartri, the non-English speaking immigrant wife of an abusive human trafficker; Victor Patterson, an elderly war hero; and finally, Bilquis Hamila, a widowed asylum seeker from Somalia.
"The Hacker," as he soon comes to be known, has selected this particular day because once a month, a secret panel meets to essentially hold court and determine whether deadly accidents involving driverless cars were the fault of the person(s) killed or the auto itself, and today happens to be one of those court days. The panel consists of a member of the government, a representative of the General Medical Council, a legal professional, a member of a large religious order, and a generic member of the public to add in some spice. Today, that person is Libby Dixon, a quiet young mental health nurse who happened to witness a deadly accident with a driverless car a few years before and she's never quite gotten over it.
As the proceedings begin to take shape, The Hacker interrupts and presents the situation - eight people are headed to their explosive deaths by driverless car collision, all the while their terror-filled moments from their cars are broadcast for all to see on the internet. The Hacker has tampered with the supposedly "unhackable" software to make this happen, but the panel can save one person. They, and the public at large, have to decide on who to save and it can only be one person. But who to save?
The choices might seem obvious, but then The Hacker starts allowing the victims to be interviewed, and releases information that could truly cloud the decisions of who should be saved. Is it the full story? No, of course not, but there's some pretty earth-shattering information for each individual, including the fact that Jude Harrison is the man Libby Dixon met in a nightclub six months before and fell head over heels in love with, but due to unforeseen circumstances and fate, she never got his name. She's been searching for her soulmate all this time, and now that she's found him, he's careening to his death and can only be saved if other people die.
The Hacker proves his ultimate control over The Passengers' cars, as well as those in the panel room, and pretty much the internet at this point by starting to pick off certain Passengers to insure total compliance, and naturally panic ensues with those remaining. Will The Hacker kill them all to drive home his point of the dangers of driverless cars? Before the day plays out, he'll have definitely made an impact.
For me, personally, The Passengers was about what I expected when I read the pitch for it. I suspected it would be an interesting yarn, but it would definitely have at least one "message." It actually had several, though. Of course, it warned of the dangers of driverless cars, but it went on further to touch on immigration, financial and social status, and the measure of worth. While it was an interesting book, I felt like it was a tad predictable, and for me, it didn't keep me on the edge of my seat. If books focusing on social media annoy you, this probably isn't the book for you.
