The cover of Bad Sector by Cy Dethan in a Valentine's Day heart against a red loveheart background.
The text on the top of the image reads "When it feels you're two halves of the same person..." in reference to Permanent Mark, the main character.
A quote from the book "Every moment this close to her reads like the last heartbeat before the attack..."
It looks like it was typed on an old typewriter on notepaper and stuck on with tape.
Up the side, vertical letters say "Get between the covers" and the author's website www.cydethan.com to find out more.
Book map showing the cover of Bad Sector by Cy Dethan with these words around it
Dystopia
Punk noir sci fi
The Expectation Office of Justice
Silicon and Scar tissue
Dead man's handle
Sentient City
A murderous cyberpunk identity crisis
Existential ultra violence
Augmented assassins
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DXCFDL2R
The first part of the back cover blurb which reads in full
Bad Sector by Cy Dethan
In the sentient city of Expectation, an augmented executioner hunts the murderer of Everyday Carrie, the Woman who Couldn’t Be Killed. Permanent Mark is going to solve this case if it kills him – again.
In Expectation, virtually all forms of criminality carry the same penalty: complete neurological rollback to the perpetrator’s last known ‘uncorrupted’ state. For offences beyond conventional remedy, offences against the mechanisms of justice itself, there are the Hangmen.
Erased from every surveillance and record-keeping system in Expectation and sharing his brain with a secondary consciousness known as an Advocate, Mark’s investigation sees him spilling blood in every corner of the self-building city, from its molecular reconstructions of Las Vegas and Paris to the scratch-built slums of East End London.
Stalked by allies and enemies alike, increasingly questioning the true nature and motives of the stranger in his skull, Mark finds himself lost and hunted in the organic rubble of the First City, the Precursor City, the living ruins of Aspiration.
Did you know @cydethan.bsky.social dedicated Bad Sector to me for #ValentinesDay?
Now you can share the love with who - or what - ever holds your heart, too
Or snuggle up & feel it for yourself
Or show me your love by sharing my post ❤️
In hardback, paperback & Kindle.
www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DXCFDL2R
12.02.2026 20:03 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
So by now I'm well used to bits of @cydethan.bsky.social's writing leaking into the world & causing mischief but having an a week long fight with an actual *bad sector* in his PC is beyond the universe having a bit of a laugh!
You can find the troublesome thing here
www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DXCFDL2R
21.01.2026 19:42 — 👍 4 🔁 4 💬 0 📌 0
Working title of the one I'm writing now is Scratch Space. It's a semi-direct pre/sequel to Bad Sector, featuring new characters - along with a few familiar faces. Beyond that, there's at least one more Expectation novel in the works, but that one's still very much in the planning phase for now.
07.01.2026 14:26 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Here is the last of my heated wax "paintings" inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
Here's a link to buy/download the book if want a bit of murderous punk sci-fi existentialism in your stocking - and to make our xmas wishes come true🎄
www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DXCFDL2R
14/14
#sci-fi #xmas
23.12.2025 20:42 — 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Since February I've been using heated wax to "paint" a series of pictures inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
I'm sharing one a day til Christmas Eve.
Here's a link - makes your Christmas shopping easier, right?🎄
Or treat yourself - you deserve it
www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DXCFDL2R
13/14
22.12.2025 19:37 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Since February I've been using heated wax to "paint" a series of pictures inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
I'm sharing one a day til Christmas Eve.
Here's a link to grab the book - makes your Xmas shopping easier, right?🎄
www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DXCFDL2R
12/14
#sci-fi #books #gifts
21.12.2025 20:24 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
"Silicon and Scar Tissue" a wax painting by Nic Wilkinson inspired by the sci-fi thriller Bad Sector by Cy Dethan
In the sentient city of Expectation, an augmented executioner hunts the murderer of Everyday Carrie, the Woman who Couldn’t Be Killed. Permanent Mark is going to solve this case if it kills him – again.
In Expectation, virtually all forms of criminality carry the same penalty: complete neurological rollback to the perpetrator’s last known ‘uncorrupted’ state. For offences beyond conventional remedy, offences against the mechanisms of justice itself, there are the Hangmen.
Erased from every surveillance and record-keeping system in Expectation and sharing his brain with a secondary consciousness known as an Advocate, Mark’s investigation sees him spilling blood in every corner of the self-building city, from its molecular reconstructions of Las Vegas and Paris to the scratch-built slums of East End London.
Stalked by allies and enemies alike, increasingly questioning the true nature and motives of the stranger in his skull, Mark finds himself lost and hunted in the organic rubble of the First City, the Precursor City, the living ruins of Aspiration.
Bad Sector is noir-inflected punk science fiction, an existential anthem of silicon and scar tissue.
“Bad Sector is the future you didn’t see coming. It’s not just the future of resisting urban oppression, augmented human consciousness and extreme ultra-violence…it’s the future of ever genre you’ve ever loved. Grab it with both hands, before it takes you down without you ever seeing it coming”
Jasper Bark
Now available on Amazon in hardback, paperback and Kindle.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DXCFDL2R
Since February I've been using heated wax to "paint" a series of pictures inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
This one is probably my favourite (ssh, don't tell the others)
There's a link pinned on my wall if you want to buy it and make a friend's Christmas, your day or me happy🎄
11/14
20.12.2025 20:26 — 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
"Like murder, like music, like home" wax painting by Nic Wilkinson inspired by a quote from Bad Sector by Cy Dethan
Since February I've been using heated wax to "paint" a series of pictures inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
I'm sharing one per day from now til Christmas Eve.
There's a link on my wall if you want a taste.
Kindle, KU, paper or hardback- you can even read a few preview chapters
10/14
19.12.2025 19:19 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
"Hangman's Medicine" encaustic wax art by Nic Wilkinson, inspired by the sci-fi novel Bad Sector by Cy Dethan
Since February I've been using heated wax to "paint" a series of pictures inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
I'm sharing one per day from now til Christmas Eve.
There's a link pinned on my wall if you want to get a dose
Kindle, KU, paper or hardback
8/14
#BooksForChristmas #scifi
18.12.2025 19:24 — 👍 3 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Encaustic wax art "No one leaves here in any body but their own" by Nic Wilkinson, inspired by the cyberpunk novel Bad Sector by Cy Dethan.
Bad Sector by Cy Dethan
In the sentient city of Expectation, an augmented executioner hunts the murderer of Everyday Carrie, the Woman who Couldn’t Be Killed. Permanent Mark is going to solve this case if it kills him – again.
In Expectation, virtually all forms of criminality carry the same penalty: complete neurological rollback to the perpetrator’s last known ‘uncorrupted’ state. For offences beyond conventional remedy, offences against the mechanisms of justice itself, there are the Hangmen.
Erased from every surveillance and record-keeping system in Expectation and sharing his brain with a secondary consciousness known as an Advocate, Mark’s investigation sees him spilling blood in every corner of the self-building city, from its molecular reconstructions of Las Vegas and Paris to the scratch-built slums of East End London.
Stalked by allies and enemies alike, increasingly questioning the true nature and motives of the stranger in his skull, Mark finds himself lost and hunted in the organic rubble of the First City, the Precursor City, the living ruins of Aspiration.
Bad Sector is noir-inflected punk science fiction, an existential anthem of silicon and scar tissue.
“Bad Sector is the future you didn’t see coming. It’s not just the future of resisting urban oppression, augmented human consciousness and extreme ultra-violence…it’s the future of ever genre you’ve ever loved. Grab it with both hands, before it takes you down without you ever seeing it coming”
Jasper Bark
Now available on Amazon in hardback, paperback and Kindle.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DXCFDL2R
Since February I've been using heated wax to "paint" a series of pictures inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
I'm sharing one per day from now til Christmas Eve.
There's a link pinned on my wall if you want to get a copy and make all of our Christmases better.
8/14
17.12.2025 20:16 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Encaustic wax art "Thinking about Iris" by Nic Wilkinson, part of a series inspired by the cyberpunk thriller Bad Sector by Cy Dethan.
Since February I've been using heated wax to "paint" a series of pictures inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
I'm sharing one per day from now til Christmas Eve.
There's a link pinned on my wall if you want her in your head, too.
Kindle, KU, paper or hardback
7/14
16.12.2025 19:16 — 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
I've been using heated wax to "paint" a series of pictures inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
I'm sharing one per day til Christmas Eve.
This bit made me cry.
There's a link pinned on my wall if you want to see what it does for you.
Everyone gets a bit emotional at Christmas 🎄
4/14
13.12.2025 22:09 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
"Go in fifth, you'll make it out alive" an encaustic wax painting by Nic Wilkinson, inspired by the sci-fi thriller Bad Sector by Cy Dethan
Since February I've been using heated wax to "paint" a series of pictures inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
I'm sharing one per day from now til Christmas Eve.
Is this advice you'd follow?
See how it turns out at the link in pinned post.
#Treat yourself for #Christmas
#scifi
🎄
3/14
12.12.2025 18:15 — 👍 3 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
An abstract encaustic art piece by Nic Wilkinson entitled "Put Together Wrong", inspired by the cyberpunk novel Bad Sector by Cy Dethan.
I've been using heated wax to "paint" a series of pictures inspired by Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social
I'm sharing one a day til Xmas Eve.
This one's inspired by the Hangman Gracious Victor.
If you want to to see if how he feels to you see pinned post.
Or share it...it's nearly Christmas
2/14
11.12.2025 19:29 — 👍 4 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
I have waxed two more pieces inspired by @cydethan.bsky.social 's Bad Sector.
They are
"Fall Without Fear"
And
"BOOM, BOOM, BOOM"
To understand them and their titles you'll have to read the book...which you can find pinned on my feed.
09.11.2025 18:25 — 👍 1 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
Look at Polar Star!
He knows a good thing when he sees it.
Be like Polar Star and get your paws on Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social now!
Link pinned on feed
14.08.2025 19:46 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Some anonymous clown seems to be going to a lot of trouble to get me to answer calls from unknown numbers this week. Two in the space of a minute this morning alone.
Mate, I barely even pick up for people I know. I'd basically forgotten my ancient Galaxy S10 still retained that vestigial function.
23.07.2025 10:00 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
That's my boy @cydethan.bsky.social! ❤️
Link in pinned post if you want your own brain melting.
10.07.2025 06:58 — 👍 1 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Cy Dethan’s new novel, “Bad Sector” in the spotlight
Cy Dethan’s latest projects investigated
What's this over on Down The Tubes?
A round up of @cydethan.bsky.social 's latest projects downthetubes.net/cy-dethans-n...
Also an interview about his recently released novel "Bad Sector" on Sci Fi Pulse www.scifipulse.net/cy-dethan-ta...
It's just past pay day...you know what to do...
03.07.2025 21:15 — 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 1
Slick prose, dense world-building, brutal and brilliant. #BadSector is conceptually packed yet remains deeply human at the heart of the story. Seriously, folks, get on this.
18.05.2025 16:59 — 👍 4 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Powers Fearful and Divine 1-4 - A New Extraordinary League
Houdini, Lovecraft and Conan Doyle battle for control of the 20th century, embodied by a twisted, half-mechanical Victor Frankenstein.
Roll up, Roll up!
The next issue of Powers Fearful and Divine by @cydethan.bsky.social RHStewart and me is finally on Kickstarter!
It's all complete & it was fully funded before I got the chance to type this!
There's bundles with the previous issues as well.
www.kickstarter.com/projects/sim...
12.05.2025 16:54 — 👍 0 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
My brain just loudly interrupted my day to remind me about telephone engaged tones. We've had no landline since about 2010, and use mobiles as phones so rarely that the idea of needing a specific sound to tell you that two people were trying to ring you *at the same time* feels like science fiction.
28.04.2025 12:03 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Freaking awesome book. Very much enjoying the read. What are you waiting for? Cyberchristmas?
13.04.2025 20:59 — 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 0
Thanks, Dion. Really glad you're enjoying it.
14.04.2025 16:56 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
The Last Free Mind In Expectation.
My wax painting done today.
I am emotionally exhausted by it.
If you want to know what it all means you'll have to read Bad Sector by @cydethan.bsky.social, which inspired it.
(Link in pinned post)
30.03.2025 18:14 — 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 1 📌 0
Being Human in Dehumanising Worlds
I’m always drawn to outsiders and outcasts in fiction. Unreliable narrators at odds with their worlds and themselves, struggling to come to terms with an everyday existence that alienates them. The wo...
Hey - I got asked to write another booklist. Find out what links Stalenhag's The Electric State with Metal Made Flesh by Jeremy Biggs and Simeon Aston.
booklisti.com/booklist/bei...
...while you're at it, feel free to bag a copy of my transhumanist noir baby, Bad Sector (amzn.eu/d/01ViEGb).
28.03.2025 18:59 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Thanks, mate. Much appreciated.
10.03.2025 15:29 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Meet author Cy Dethan
"I like to play on the narratological intersection where Fucking Around meets Finding Out." Cy Dethan is a British writer and former professional magician, who began writing Starship Troopers comics i...
P M Buchan put out an interview with me on his excellent If You Go Away Substack. It covers my new novel Bad Sector and a bunch of my most ambitiously incoherent thoughts on writing, magic, comics and the ever-amazing @nicwilkinson.bsky.social
pmbuchan.substack.com/p/meet-autho...
10.03.2025 14:36 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 1 📌 1
Sci-fi author
London - UK
Encyclopedist, college librarian, writer, ttrpg writer. I like to talk about Mesopotamia & Vikings. Always outnumbered, never outgunned.
My podcast, "The History of Comic Books in 500 Issues," is at http://500issues.com
He/Him
Artist // Gamer // Star Wars // Vicious Leftist // Ally
Portfolio: sadastronaut.myportfolio.com
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Illustrator, Cover Designer, Motion Graphic Artist & 2D Animator 🖌️💼
| #art | #wip | #motiondesign | #bookcover | #illustration | #vgencomm
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Hire Me: https://vgen.co/aesyrion
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TTRPGs, law, sport, geekdom, nonsense. Trans rights are human rights. Accessibility should be standard. Determined to never receive my comeuppance.
Pay your fucking tax
He/They
Principal Engineer, speaker, gamer, geek. Tattooed, pierced, and bearded. The 'guv' on https://github.com/BrighterCommand Line Editor at Chaosium for QuestWorlds: https://github.com/ChaosiumInc/QuestWorlds
#Tech - tech posts
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He/Him
That ProFesh guy from Twitter.
Writer. Narrative designer. Toy fondler.
Page still underdevelopment. Free from Elon’s cage!
Narrative-driven D&D Actual Play podcast.
Link Tree: https://linktr.ee/dicecompany
Full-time DM of Dice Company. Paper Soze. D&D and TTRPG lover. Amateur twit.
Link Tree: https://linktr.ee/dicecompany
🔮The Official #TTRPG Brain Rot channel🤺
Everyone is welcome here🍻 #LGBTQIA+ friendly🏳️🌈, Human rights enjoyer❤️
⭐🌐 #Dailypost #AltText = languages🗺️⭐
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International Labour Standards Lead, TUC, New Dad
Scottish Science Fiction, Fantasy and Comic Book Author (At least, one day I will be 👍👊)
https://camccroriebooks.wordpress.com/
Co-author of Spec Fic for Newbies 1, 2, 3; author of Neil Jordan: Works for the Page; Sturgeon/BSFA/BFA finalist; Locus Rec List; articles in Irish Uni Review, symplokē, Science Fiction Studies, Irish Studies Review, JGNC; fiction in many venues... He/Him
Dad . Stepdad . Granddad . Husband . Vet . USN . Blue Dot in Red State. Progressive . Democrat. Writer of Horror . Fantasy . Old Dude . No DM's . Can't Dance. Married to @thelisaa81.bsky.social
Freelance illustrator and concept artist
Writer. Cartoonist. Filmmaker. Madman.
Author of Secret Highways, Dead Air, Carnival of Tomorrows, and Strange Places. Co-host of the Schlock and Roll Podcast.
We are all just human soup, wrapped in skin, hurtling through space at 67,000 miles per hour.
Balnacra Pottery. Comics. Croft. The Lochcarron Treehouse. Community. They/them enby. ND. Community resilience. Occasional Pict. 🇵🇸🏴 www.balnacra.com
I watch and live-post AEW wrestling. I also like Stardom wrestling, but rarely see it live. I’m into things like comics and Lego and movies, and sometimes I post about them, too. I also can’t help but talk politics.
Www.imlukefoster.com