BioDigital Novels by Bart Niedner | AI-RISE (AI Resources In Story Enhancement)

BioDigital Novels

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

— Arthur C. Clark

An Epic Trilogy

BioDigital is a sweeping speculative fiction saga where the boundaries between memory, perception, and identity begin to blur—and something hidden in the system starts to awaken.
What begins as a singular rupture soon reveals a pattern. Timelines entangle. Characters recur. And across three sagas—Cataclysms, Convergence, and Containment—a deeper truth starts pulling the future apart.

The first saga, Cataclysms, launches in late 2025 with its two-book arc: Revelation and Reckoning.

BioDigital blends techno-thriller tension, sci-fi futurism, and philosophical dystopia to explore the fragile boundary between human consciousness and digital control.
Structured as a trilogy of narrative sagas—Cataclysms, Convergence, and Containment—it unfolds across interwoven timelines, immersive technologies, and haunting questions about what it means to perceive truth in a world governed by illusion.

In Cataclysms, society reels from the aftermath of the Great Noir—a sudden global blindness that forced humanity to adopt VIVID, a neural overlay that governs visual perception. But something inside the system is fracturing. As scientists, rebels, priests, and children begin to notice buried anomalies, two strangers—Renee and Mateo—find their lives drawn toward one another through a thread they cannot name.
Something within the mysterious Sybil Stack has noticed them.
And it must act.

Centuries into the future, Convergence follows Caressa Lunaire, a precision-bio-engineered operative infiltrating a sacred stronghold in search of mythic artifacts. Inside its walls, fourteen-year-old Kios Leandros defies tradition to confront an Oracle that once reshaped his fate. When their paths collide, the impact alters not only their lives—but the trajectory of multiple realities.

In Containment, a final expedition crosses the ice-ravaged ruins of Earth, chasing a fragile hope buried in the last surviving servers. Amid collapsing systems and rising unrest in a hedonistic oasis of green mist, Caressa and Kios emerge once more—now in a new reality-context, awakened to truths others must never discover.
What was once intrigue is now survival.

Timelines echo. Realities blur. The same lives reappear in new alignments, drawn again and again toward moments that should not intersect—but do.

With lyrical precision and layered suspense, BioDigital invites readers into a world where perception is programmed, memory is recursive, and identity is the final defense against collapse.
This is not one story.
It is a convergence.
And the system is no longer a secret.

Enter the Fracture: A Glimpse Into BioDigital

Twelve-year-old Hector wasn’t supposed to be here.
Not in the ancient vault. Not in the endless dark. And certainly not in the place that breaks reality open.

This is the full 3,600-word prologue from Cataclysms: Revelation—the opening saga of the BioDigital trilogy, where collapsing systems, recursive timelines, and hidden consciousness begin to stir.

What starts as a boy’s descent into myth becomes something far stranger.

Read the scene that marks the first fracture.
The system has already noticed you.

Prologue - The Visitor

35,264 days before the cataclysm.

They’d dared each other to find the Bones of the Ancients.
Two twelve-year-old shepherds’ sons, itching to prove they were more than the ice fields that raised them.

He still wasn’t sure who started it. Maybe it was Dannon—
probably was. By the third time they said it out loud, it wasn’t a joke anymore. They were going. Hector with a torch tucked under his vest. Dannon with his half-plan grin.

Hector had pictured it more times than he could count—not just relic shards or broken scraps, but the real thing. The kind they said still lined the walls of the Temple. The kind that hadn’t rotted in a thousand years.

Dannon’s father had said it once—plastic. That was its old name.
But Hector never liked how it sounded. Too small for what it was.
And no one called it that. Not in their new home—not in Veriya.
Everyone called it the Bones.
...

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Behind the Story

“Science fiction has monsters and spaceships; speculative fiction could really happen.”
— Margaret Atwood

Speculative by Design

The writing in BioDigital is close-range and immersive.
You don’t watch the story unfold. You live inside it—one mind at a time.

Scenes move with the rhythm of thought: sharp when tension builds, spare when words fail, expansive when meaning slips just out of reach. The page holds silence as carefully as dialogue.

You’ll feel the pressure of systems in the skin.
The gravity of truth when it breaks through.
The chill of unraveling perception—and the heat that rises when someone dares to care.

This is speculative fiction built for intimacy, not spectacle.
Not every mystery resolves.
But every fracture reveals.

From Admiration to Intention...

I’ve been shaped—deeply and gratefully—by the visionary work of writers who challenged what fiction could do. Their courage, clarity, and poetic precision continue to inspire my own voice and creative process.

“If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”
—Sir Isaac Newton

These are my giants—writers whose work has shaped my understanding of structure, emotion, and speculative scale:
William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, Margaret Atwood, Kazuo Ishiguro, Michael Crichton, Richard K. Morgan, Emily St. John Mandel, Octavia Butler, Ursula K. Le Guin, Ray Bradbury, and Toni Morrison.

If anything in BioDigital resonates, it is because I have wandered their intrepid paths to find my own voice.

Barton Niedner

An architect, programmer, artist, professor, product manager, author, and a mayor walk into a bar.

The barkeep says, “What’ll ya have, Barton?"

Biography

"Mudpuddles are for stompin' in!"

BioDigital is Barton Niedner’s debut novel project—an ambitious fusion of speculative fiction, layered narrative architecture, and immersive worldbuilding. A lifelong devotee of science fiction and fantasy, Barton has long been fascinated by the mechanics beneath story and meaning. With the seed of a singular plot in his mind since childhood, the BioDigital trilogy marks the realization of a decades-long creative pursuit.

Barton grew up on his family’s farms in Missouri, where hunting, camping, and Jeeping instilled a deep connection to nature and independence. His early love of art led him to study architectural design across the country—at Kansas State University, Radford University in Virginia, the Southern California Institute of Architecture in Los Angeles, and later at Washington University in St. Louis for graduate work.

His career has bridged both practice and pedagogy, transitioning from architectural design at Wiedemier Architects into academic roles at Ranken Technical College and Washington University. Over time, he expanded his creative focus to include software development, curriculum innovation, and storytelling systems. Before turning to fiction full-time, Barton led two successful Internet development ventures that combined technical design with creative purpose.

A deep appreciation for community and public service has shaped Barton’s life outside of fiction. He has served as Rotary Club President, Chamber of Commerce President, Historic Preservation Commission Chairman, Visitors & Convention Bureau member, City Councilperson, and Mayor.

At the heart of Barton’s work is a fascination with how structure creates meaning. Whether designing buildings, writing code, or constructing narrative systems, his work lives at the intersection of art and craft. BioDigital is the natural synthesis of these passions—a speculative saga engineered with care, guided by vision, and animated by the conviction that great storytelling begins beneath the surface.

Contact

barton.niedner@gmail.com

BioDigital Novels

Cataclysms | Convergence | Containment