Necropolis Alpha

Jayu City Chronicles #2

by Chris M. Arnone

Elise Corto-Intel is an Intel Operative, a thief. Her next heist is tricky, sure. Infiltrate the offices of an evangelical preacher for a rival company and steal some data. But the preacher, Josephine, is much more than she appears to be. She doesn’t just try to convert people to Ibhalism, she might be better at Elise’s job than Elise is.

Now, Elise is up against the greatest threat she’s ever faced, a threat that might unravel the precarious balance of power in Jayu City. And Josephine’s bodyguard, a former professional fighter, isn’t making things any easier. If Elise wants to stop Josephine and survive, she’ll need everything and everyone at her disposal: a brilliant teen hacker, the enigmatic Cloak of Corto, and a rogue AI who shouldn’t exist.

Chris M. Arnone's cyberpunk science fiction NECROPOLIS ALPHA is the exciting follow-up to THE HERMES PROTOCOL, following an Intel Operative with cybernetic enhancements as she tries to stop a plot to tear apart everything she holds dear.

362 pages, Paperback

Published January 22, 2024

About the author

Chris M. Arnone (he/him) was weaned on comic books and Hardy Boys novels, finding his first literary love in Lord of the Flies, though his longest-lasting is a love for Ray Bradbury. He reads and writes nerdy fiction in equal parts with literary fiction and poetry these days, but his imagination still leans toward the magical. As an intersex man, he is particularly interested in gender and sexuality in his writing.

His cyberpunk series, The Jayu City Chronicles, is available everywhere books are sold. My Name Was Baby: An Intersex Memoir is forthcoming on June 23, 2026. He is a senior contributor for Book Riot. He is represented by Metamorphosis Literary Agency.

He has an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Missouri – Kansas City. He also performs on many stages in Kansas City, where he lives with his wife Christy and their cats. ​

Reviews

[pastiesandpages - Gavin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Necropolis Alpha is the second book in the Jayu City Chronicles. I've not read the first book, The Hermes Protocol, but thankfully this book is written in a way that makes it easy to get to know the main characters and the world they live in while also putting the reader straight into an exciting plot full of action, suspense and intrigue.

This is cyberpunk writ large with the future tech, body modifications, gadgetry, dystopian society (the poor live below The Mist, never seeing the sky above them while those citizens from the five companies live above in a world of plenty and flying transport), and AI.

Elise Corto-Intel is an operative for the Corto corporation, one of the five corps that hold the Jayu settlement (somewhere a long way from Earth) in a precarious balance of power. Elise specialises in heists and like most of the population has been fitted with cybernetic limbs.
Having various sets of limbs with different gadgets for situations is full on body mod with limbs being put on charge in the same way we do with phones.

Fitting into the cyberpunk ethos is gender identity. Citizens introduce themselves by giving their name and pronouns and Elise is intersexual, in a non-binary relationship with Quynn.

See the synopsis for a snapshot of the plot. In true action movie style Elise is continually over her head in dangerous situations. The excitement keeps you flying through the pages which are full of clandestine manoeuvres, help from secret AI, mod-enhanced fights, virtual and augmented reality, hacking, and in the form of Vert 'The Hurt' Toinette, one of the scariest badguys you could imagine going up against. And he's just the bodyguard of Josephine who is a lot more dangerous than she looks!

There are twists and turns aplenty and the ending leaves you ready for the next adventure. I'm not only waiting for book 3 but now I need to read book 1 so I can get the full Jayu City experience.

Thank you very much to the author for an eARC of Necropolis Alpha.