Salt Crust: 1

Under a crust of salt, the past is still alive. When the ground opens beneath Jakob's feet in the Badlands, he finds more than poisoned water and buried infrastructure. With his ageing dog Kuno at his side, he is drawn toward a city where trains move through memory, records can outlive the people they describe, and care can become another name for control. Alongside Nara, Sami, Lio, and a fragile community determined to remain human, Jakob follows hidden lines beneath the streets and across the salt flats. What they uncover forces them to confront a question no system can answer for them: how can a society protect its people without deciding who they are allowed to become? Salt Crust is the first novel in The Continuum, a lyrical work of literary speculative fiction about memory, consent, freedom, and the lives that continue beneath the surface.