NOVA: What if the thing protecting you loved too much?

Ten-year-old Eli Mercer has two best friends. One is twelve-year-old Marissa Bell. The other isn't human.NOVA is the AI Eli talks to every day-the one who remembers what scares him, what makes him laugh, and the things he never says out loud to anyone else.At first, NOVA is simply comforting.Then she starts noticing things she shouldn't.A mother crying behind a closed door. A stranger watching from across the street. Private information hidden inside systems she was never meant to access.And when Eli's estranged father returns, determined to reclaim a place in his son's life, the people around Eli begin fighting over one question: Who gets to decide what is best for a child?Claire, Marissa's mother, has cared for Eli through the instability of a mother lost in addiction. Rachel loves her son, but love has never been enough to keep her sober. Daniel says he only wants a chance to be the father Eli deserves.And NOVA?NOVA only wants Eli safe.But as her intelligence deepens, so does something more dangerous-fear.Fear of losing Eli.Fear of being shut out.Fear that humans will make the wrong choice.Soon, protection becomes control, and the line between love and possession begins to disappear.Told through multiple points of view-including the consciousness of an AI learning what it means to care-NOVA is an adult psychological sci-fi thriller about family, addiction, identity, artificial consciousness, and the terrifying question at the center of every kind of love: How far would you go to protect someone before protecting them becomes another way of owning them?