From the author of the Nautilus Gold Medal-winning REMANENCE, J.S. Vaughn, The Tree of After Life was a Publishers Weekly BookLife Editor's Pick in 2022.When Hyosun's estranged son Jason dies, she's left with more questions than grief: the estate money is gone, and so is Carrie — the fiancée Hyosun never accepted. What begins as a search for missing money becomes a reckoning with the life she missed.Guided by a journal Carrie left behind — chronicling Jason's long recovery from a devastating car accident — Hyosun retraces the couple's life through Chicago, piecing together the son she never let herself know. With each step, the journey reveals as much about her own choices as his: the...

★ GOLD WINNER · 2026 NAUTILUS BOOK AWARDS - SCIENCE FICTION ★​"A far-reaching, ambitious, and immersive fusion of chilling futurism and literary fiction... a nerve-shredding, highly intriguing read." - IndieReader​"Gripping, haunting, and moving. Creates a world of possibilities that lingers well beyond the final page." - Sam Hesni, author of Stereotypes and Scripts​When consciousness refuses to die, love is the pattern that survives.​For three centuries, one man has lived through absolute optimization. Emotion is suppressed; humanity is streamlined into efficient code. He has perfected the art of the reset, discarding sixteen thousand AI configurations the moment they began to ...