Every Version of You

In late twenty-first century Australia, Tao-Yi and her partner Navin spend most of their time inside a hyper-immersive, hyper-consumerist virtual reality called Gaia. They log on, go to work, socialise, and even eat in this digital utopia. Meanwhile their aging bodies lie suspended in pods inside cramped apartments. Across the city, in the abandoned real world, Tao-Yi's mother remains stubbornly offline, dwindling away between hospital visits and memories of her earlier life in Malaysia.When a new technology is developed to permanently upload a human brain to Gaia, Tao-Yi must decide what is most important: a digital future, or an authentic past. Never Let Me Go meets Black Mirror , with a dash of Murakami surrealism thrown in, this is speculative literary fiction at its best.

Grace Chan is an Aurealis and Norma K Hemming Award-nominated writer and doctor. She was born in Malaysia and lives in Australia. Her writing explores brains, minds, space, technology, and narrative identity. Her short fiction can be found in Clarkesworld, Lightspeed, Space and Time Magazine, Aurealis, Andromeda Spaceways, and other places. Every Version of You is her first novel.

In late twenty-first century Australia, Tao-Yi and her partner Navin spend most of their time inside a hyper-immersive, hyper-consumerist virtual reality called Gaia. They log on, go to work, socialise, and even eat in this digital utopia. Meanwhile their aging bodies lie suspended in pods inside cramped apartments. Across the city, in the abandoned real world, Tao-Yi's mother remains stubbornly offline, dwindling away between hospital visits and memories of her earlier life in Malaysia.When a new technology is developed to permanently upload a human brain to Gaia, Tao-Yi must decide what is most important: a digital future, or an authentic past. Never Let Me Go meets Black Mirror , with a dash of Murakami surrealism thrown in, this is speculative literary fiction at its best.