Eric Kay’s Drones Above: Hell Below introduces us to Killian Clear, a spaceship pilot who learns that chasing frontier hazard pay is never easy money. While scouting a brutal world of ammonia ice and suffocating gases, his team is suddenly hunted by their own survey tools. After a daring rescue of his injured crewmate, Killian manages a desperate hyper-jump to escape the slaughter, but the sudden maneuver throws him several years out of human history. Waking up as a relic of the past, he finds Rose, his fiancée, gone, and society governed by a system that docks your social standing for minor infractions. Killian eventually strikes a deal with the new regime to act as an advisor for a tactical retrieval team sent back to the planet. But can he navigate the shifting allegiances of his new handlers while facing the terrors waiting in the dark?

Eric Kay’s Drones Above: Hell Below is an exciting military sci-fi novel that masterfully blends tactical squad combat with an eerie environmental mystery. The stifling atmosphere acts as a legitimate antagonist, making every single scene feel choking and high-stakes. I was totally hooked by how Killian tries to find his footing in this bizarre new regime. This anchors the book's emotional core and makes his confusion feel real. On top of that, the writing is quick and gripping, giving the action some serious momentum while peeling back layers of a deep corporate conspiracy. Kay mixes vintage action aesthetics with creative ideas about automated governance in a way that kept me fully hooked. It is a taut, dark ride that forces a lone pilot to survive both a cold technological future and a harrowing nightmare beneath the sand. If you’re a fan of James S.A. Corey’s The Expanse, I’m sure you’ll love this book.

In Drones Above, Hell Below, what impresses you at first sight is the word “algocracy”. The term is strictly connected to the algorithm dominance. The world that author Eric Kay describes in this science fiction novel is indeed ruled by algorithms and AI. They make predictions, analyze, influence governments, and drive spaceships and drones. Killian and his crew go across interstellar space aboard one of these facilities. Their destination is Plentify, an unknown and unexplored planet where metals are extremely abundant. Killian left his girlfriend, Rose, on Earth, with the hope and dream of a quick return, maybe full of precious stuff to sell and earn the means to live a wealthy existence. Unfortunately, his fantasies clash with an unexpected reality. The scanning of rocks on the planet turns out to be a disaster, with a sudden seismic threat and drones that abruptly start attacking the crew.

At this stage, Drone Above, Hell Below becomes a fast-paced read, with a well-described cohort of characters that reminded me of Sigourney Weaver in Alien. Especially Taryn, the intern who must continue Killian's mission after he was questioned and accused of the disaster, and after the interstellar travel made him 50 years older. But the true meaning conveyed by the author is below the tunnels of Plentify. There, among explorations and deadly threats, everyone will make their personal discoveries and reflections about the ethical and unethical use of algorithms and artificial intelligence. It is not by chance that readers will recognize the metaphor of the ruins in Gaza and Kyiv in the most poignant moments of the tale. Amid a desert planet, an unreal silence, and battered corpses, I perceived just that.