I just heard from former Honolulu Star-Bulletin business reporter Tim Ruel, who spent about seven years at the newspaper and is now a senior copy editor at a Washington, DC publication.

“I thought you might like this,” Tim wrote in an email yesterday. “I just published my first book, on Amazon. It’s future scifi and part of a series.”

“Shiny Metal Boxes” is now available on Amazon.com in paperback or in a Kindle digital edition.

It’s available for free reading for members of Kindle Unlimited.

From the book’s description on Amazon.

2079: Humans depend on AI, including eyeGo, a visual implant installed from the age of nine. When an erratic illness known as Jobs Disease incapacitates millions, Emma Jane Castle, an eyeGo health technician, gets reassigned to investigate a possible link between the implant and the affliction. As the disease continues to spread around Earth at an alarming rate, Emma uncovers a potential conspiracy that could rock mankind and technology forever. Teaming up with a private investigator, a hacking guru, a senior member of The Milky Way Library, and a million-dollar AI assistant, Emma races to stop the devastation before it’s too late.

SHINY METAL BOXES, the first installment in The Wormholescope Chronicles, is a science fiction novel that falls into the abyss of technology addiction.

And there’s more information on the website for what Tim expects to be a series, “The Wormhole Chronicles.”

I downloaded a copy and just started reading.

Check it out!