Inside the rising tech microcosms of Seoul, Singapore, Japan, and India, far from the mendacity of Silicon Valley, a serial tech entrepreneur pursues a last-ditch attempt to build something great: COMPASS, an open-source network platform that Microsoft has labeled âreckless.â At stake are his reputation, his dwindling bank account, and his fifteen-year relationship with the only woman heâs ever lovedâa woman in the midst of reckoning with who she is and what really matters to her in the face of the narcissism and destructiveness of the technology world. She shows up in Seoul in a big, bold move to be with himâonly to find that living in Asia reshapes her in intangible, unexpected ways.
Taut and richly layered, Riding High in April is a powerful evocation of our contemporary tech moment, a revealing exploration of resilience and the pursuit of something unattainable, and a moving story of love, friendship, and letting go.