The Zeroth Day
by Daniil Rozental
Genre: Science Fiction / Dystopian
ISBN: 9781035842490
Print Length: 200 pages
Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
Reviewed by Andrea Marks-Joseph
A grumpy, grieving man who lives analogue in a VR-obsessed digital society is sent on an errand that throws his concept of reality into question, over and over again.
This constantly-twisting tale is told from various perspectives—including scientist General Pyotr Loginov and AI Research Institute Director and classic film lover Yakov Stavarsky—but primarily from the perspective of Nikolai, a grumpy man who prefers to keep to himself and stays away from the high-tech implants and oversaturated digital world most of society seems content to inhabit. Nikolai is an “old-schooler” in a world where most people believe that “reality only distracts and degrades us,” by which I mean that he has no cerebral implants.
Nikolai is a former actor who starred in a film prolific enough that when he’s run up a tab at his local shop and unable to pay his debt, the owner offers the option for him to pay for groceries by performing a popular scene with him. This same owner, named Suren, asks Nikolai for his help to deliver a wooden case to his cousin, as he’ll be out of town while she visits. When Nikolai meets Suren’s cousin, he notices a striking resemblance to his ex-wife, Vera, including all the characteristics that made them annoy each other.
Initially, Nikolai believes he’s at home using in-world VR-goggles of sorts, but when he uses his secret word to exit the artificial realm and becomes fully aware of his physical space and reality, nothing changes, and suddenly scenes from an inpatient hospital ward appear in front of him. Is Nikolai experiencing a mental break, or has the AI technology progressed further than he’s been aware? The answer may be both. When the code word to end the VR experience doesn’t work, he is told: “To get out of here, you must remember who you really are. Above all, you must deliver the wooden case to the right person.”
The Zeroth Day feels like a bizarre dream. You’re in and out of following what’s happening, and it changes forms slightly every time you begin to feel a sense of stability. When Nikolai meets two characters who help him break out of the hospital ward and accompany him to Venice as part of the big mysterious ever-expanding errand, they tell him the double of his wife he saw was a hallucination.
Just when he finally gets comfortable on the plane to Venice, he finds himself back in the ward, injected with something by a medical team. Distressed and upset, he’s suddenly woken up by his fellow plane passengers, who are upset that he was disturbing them. Was that just a dream, or is this flight not real?
The worldbuilding is clear, concise, and fascinating. This is a world where people complain about having to communicate verbally with characters who don’t have an implant, the method of communication everyone else uses. The Zeroth Day is also set in a world where people are willing to pay a “retro” hotel’s nightly fee (which constitutes the average annual salary) for the privilege of spending the night in a room where the technology can switch off.
On his way to stay at this hotel (at his benefactor’s expense), Nikolai is approached by annoying digital adverts selling him bizarrely targeted products and services like a “biologically pure beer” that is filtered within his own body. This annoyance leads him to explain to us why most people move swiftly from enclosed space to enclosed space, avoiding the once-busy city streets. In a world where we are increasingly served adverts as part of our daily life, it’s easy to imagine that determined companies in our own world may utilize these kinds of horrifying sales tactics soon.
A few content warning-worthy scenes that readers should know about before they dive into the story: There are instances where one of our main characters is “guilty of the indiscretion” that is being openly racist. I left the uncomfortable moments of racism wondering what role they played in the plot. Also worth informing readers about: There is a scene set in the lab of an isolated “mental hospital” where the “incurable” are sent. It depicts a man (referred to as “the patient” and “the madman”) bound and gagged in a chair, where he is being electrocuted as treatment. We are warned ahead that it’s “not a pleasant sight,” which is an accurate description.
This story explores grief, guilt, and the bounds of death in some heartfelt but heart-wrenching ways. Nikolai mostly refers to Vera as his ex-wife, but she’s really his late wife who died suddenly one night after an argument with him. There’s a really beautiful scene where he confronts the grief of her sudden loss, and the painful fact that he was drunk the last time they spoke.
The Zeroth Day is worth praising for the way author Daniil Rozental manages to use devices like the protagonist questioning his reality and true physical location in a way that only appears in flashes to heighten the tension, suspense, and confusion. As someone who has been in hospital wards for mental illness treatment and has experienced the panic of questioning my reality, Rozental hits the perfect sweet spot of never being gratuitous with details that could be triggering or distressing to readers who live with these illnesses.
The author makes sure to keep the story moving, pulling us back and forth from certainty with Nikolai, and providing new information about the future society. We’re right alongside Nikolai, being carried through this chaotic, perplexing mess of a quest. Your mileage may vary, of course, but I found the story moved too swiftly from one shocking new setting to another to ever feel steeped in trauma or sadness. We’re too busy trying to guess what may happen next, what the quest Nikolai is on truly is, and being amazed at the various technological advances—evil as they may be.
It’s remarkable how much story—thrilling, thought-provoking, plot-twist rich story— author Daniil Rozenthal is able to achieve and draw the reader into in such a limited number of pages. When I began reading this book, knowing that it was only 80 pages, I could not have fathomed (and even when I was in the heart of the story, I was genuinely astonished) how deeply the writing would pull me into it. From sharing my contempt and anger on Nikolia’s behalf, to being so intrigued by the technology that I had to sit fully upright, The Zeroth Day is an engrossing, ever-evolving story well worth escaping into.
I gasped when it’s revealed who the side-characters really are, and I cheered when we learned what their plan was—then I gasped again when the story shape-shifted into another new reality as if by VR goggles right in front of my eyes. I couldn’t help but say “woahhhhh” out loud while reading the next few pages after that. The way The Zeroth Day unfolds and reimagines itself, especially in its later pages, is truly a thrill.
This is a story that values human-made art, that matches my rage against AI-driven and algorithmic, machine-produced art being hailed as more advanced in any way. It’s also a love letter to fans of filmmaking, and people who rewatch their favorite films so often that they know them by heart.
I’d recommend The Zeroth Day for readers who enjoyed the technology and plot twists of Prime Video’s series The Peripheral (which was loosely based on the novel by William Gibson); for anyone who still thinks about Black Mirror episodes they’ve seen throughout the years; as well as for readers who are concerned by the rise of “AI” technology in our society. World-hopping, shape-shifting adventure doesn’t even begin to describe the strange but marvelous experience of reading this story.
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