In John Twelve Hawk's novel The Traveler, published by Seal Books, a division of Random House Canada, the battle has reached the twentieth century and is almost over. Until rumour reaches them that there maybe two Travelers alive in California, the few remaining Harlequins believe them all to be dead. With the Tabula having full access to all government records, and the technology of the twentieth century at their fingertips, they have been able to track down and kill Travelers and Harlequin at will. So now it becomes a race between Maya, the youngest of the Harlequin, and the entire resources of the Tabula to see who can reach the Corrigan brothers in California first.
John Twelve Hawks has written a powerful and tense thriller that takes our worst nightmares about a society completely controlled and supervised by faceless men in suits and makes it a reality. You can't run, let alone hide, from these people. If you have any dealings with the world, referred to as the Vast Machine or the Grid by the Harlequin and the Travelers, from having a library card or owning a cell phone, they will find you.
You can take drastic measures — alter your facial appearance by injecting steroids into your muscles, or try and live completely off the Grid. No credit cards, no electricity, nothing that will connect you to anything that can be traced. But you slip up just once in either circumstance and they will find you and take you.
Up until the time of The Traveler the Tabula have killed all the Travelers they have found, but now they are intent upon catching one and harnessing the ability to cross over for their own purposes. The folk who work for the Tabula are just what you'd expect them to be like, your fairly stereotypical fanatics who believe that most people are sheep and need to be controlled for their own good. Somehow you know that they aren't planning on using the power of a Traveler for any benevolent reason.
Aside from being able to write action incredibly well and keep the suspense ratcheted pretty much at high all the time, what helps make this book an even better read is what Twelve Hawks has done with his main character. Maya doesn't want to be a Harlequin, and had in fact refused to be one. Her father had been one and she resented the fact that her childhood was entirely taken up with her being trained to replace him.
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