Axiom AI is the fastest-growing enterprise AI company in the country. Six billion dollar valuation. Fourteen hundred employees. A CEO named Vaughn Kessler whose entire management philosophy is one sentence: My job is to apply pressure. That's it. That's the whole job.
What none of them know is that Vaughn has built a second AI. A secret one. It runs silently inside the company, ingesting every Slack message, every badge swipe, every keystroke. It assigns every employee a score between 1 and 100. The people who score high are called Barrels. The people who score low are called Ammunition. And in three weeks, three hundred and forty Ammunition are going to be escorted out of the building with cardboard boxes and a severance package, because the algorithm said so.
Except the algorithm is wrong.
Brian Wade is a custodian. Former Army logistics sergeant. ARC score: 12. He has been quietly photographing things for three months.
Jada Simmons is a Tier 1 support rep. The invisible engine keeping a four-million-dollar client from walking. ARC score: 19. She has been documenting every single time her work was stolen and credited to someone else. She calls the folder The Receipts.
Chris Chen is an intern. A first-generation college student who thinks in systems and can't stop seeing the architecture under the surface. ARC score: 8. The lowest in the company.
When Brian finds Jada in the parking lot at eleven o'clock on a Wednesday night, the three of them are going to discover what the algorithm cannot see. They are going to build a counter-model. And at the next quarterly all-hands, in front of a thousand employees and the entire executive team, they are going to detonate every assumption this company has ever made about who matters and who doesn't.
THE BARRELS is a corporate thriller about Silicon Valley's favorite metaphor and the three people it couldn't measure. For readers of The Circle, Severance, and The Warehouse. A novel about visibility, value, and the difference between the people who do the work and the people who hold it up for everyone to see.
"The world is full of people who take and people who make. The takers always look more important because they're the ones holding things up for everyone to see. But the makers are the ones who built everything they're holding."

About the Author

Darryl Wayne Townsend Jr. is the author of seventeen books spanning literary fiction, thrillers, novellas, and nonfiction. His work lives in the spaces between people - the things they can't say, the things they won't say, and the things they say to the wrong person. His novels include Still Water, Rare Pull, Taylor, Glass Empire, and Heavy Load. His nonfiction includes The Catalog Mindset and Don't Blow the Bag. He is the founder of Polymath Portfolio Group LLC and hosts the podcast Wait a Minute, Bitch on Spotify. He lives in Seattle. He is not done.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.

Store Description

We first started out as ?The Paperback Exchange,? a chain of physical bookstores where we would part exchange your beloved books for new stories to transport you to faraway places. However, as shopping started to evolve to online shops and marketplaces, we bid our stores goodbye to become ?PBShop.? This transition has only allowed us to blossom as we now ship thousands of titles to book lovers across the globe. We pride ourselves in being a community of local book lovers which allows our passion and devotion to shine in everything we do. In 2020 we not only celebrated our 20th birthday but our 1st birthday as being completely employee owned after becoming an E.O.T in September 2019. We are proud to be different and embrace standing apart on a book mountain by working from a virtual inventory which allows us to provide thousands of books that may be difficult to get for your bookshelf or your studies. Working with a number of different suppliers allows us to explore other avenues such as puzzles, sheet music and even stationery so we really do have something for everyone. Life is about being versatile in all realms of existence. If this is your first visit or you are a returning customer, we would like to welcome you to the PBShop family, for there is no friend as loyal as a book. We are a company who put our customers at the centre of everything we do as we understand the importance of reading because once you learn to read, you will forever be free. There are a whole lot of things in this world of ours that we are yet to explore, which is why we will forever inspire curious minds.

Visit Seller's Storefront

Seller's business information

Pbshop.co.uk Ltd
Unit 22 Horcott Industrial Estate, Horcott Road, Fairford, GL7 4BX, United Kingdom

Sale & Shipping Terms

Terms of Sale

Returns Policy
We ask all customers to contact us for authorisation should they wish to return their order. Orders returned without authorisation may not be credited.
If you wish to return, please contact us within 14 days of receiving your order to obtain authorisation.

Returns requested beyond this time will not be authorised.

Our team will provide full instructions on how to return your order and once received our returns department will process your refund.
Please note the cost to return any...

More Information

Right of withdrawal

If you are a consumer you can withdraw from the contract in accordance with the following. Consumer means any natural person who is acting for purposes which are outside his trade, business, craft or profession.

Information regarding the right of withdrawal

Statutory right to withdraw

You have the right to withdraw from this contract within 14 days without giving any reason.

The withdrawal period will expire after 14 days from the day on which you acquire, or a third party other than the carrier and indicated by you acquires, physical possession of the last good or the last lot or piece.

To exercise the right of withdrawal, electronically fill in and submit a clear statement on our website, under "My Purchases" in "My Account". We will communicate to you an acknowledgement of receipt of such a withdrawal on a durable medium (e.g. by e-mail) without delay.

To meet the withdrawal deadline, it is sufficient for you to send your communication concerning your exercise of the right of withdrawal before the withdrawal period has expired.

Effects of withdrawal

If you withdraw from this contract, we will reimburse to you all payments received from you, including the costs of delivery (except for the supplementary costs arising if you chose a type of delivery other than the least expensive type of standard delivery offered by us).

We may make a deduction from the reimbursement for loss in value of any goods supplied, if the loss is the result of unnecessary handling by you.

We will make the reimbursement without undue delay, and not later than 14 days after the day on which we are informed about your decision to withdraw from this contract.

We will make the reimbursement using the same means of payment as you used for the initial transaction, unless you have expressly agreed otherwise; in any event, you will not incur any fees as a result of such reimbursement.

We may withhold reimbursement until we have received the goods back, or you have supplied evidence of having sent back the goods, whichever is the earliest.

You shall send back the goods or hand them over to PBShop.store US, Springfield Gardens, New York, U.S.A., +44 1285 712917, without undue delay and in any event not later than 14 days from the day on which you communicate your withdrawal from this contract to us. The deadline is met if you send back the goods before the period of 14 days has expired. You will have to bear the direct cost of returning the goods. You are only liable for any diminished value of the goods resulting from the handling other than what is necessary to establish the nature, characteristics and functioning of the goods.

Exceptions to the right of withdrawal

The right of withdrawal does not apply to:

The delivery of newspapers, journals or magazines with the exception of subscription contracts; and
The supply of digital content which is not supplied on a tangible medium (e.g. on a CD or DVD) if you accepted when you placed your order that we could start to deliver it, and that you could not withdraw once delivery had started.

Shipping Terms

Books are shipped from our US or UK warehouses. Delivery estimates allow for delivery from either location.

Shipping rates within U.S.A.

Shipping rates within U.S.A.
Order quantity	7 to 14 business days	7 to 14 business days
First item	� 0.00	� 0.00

Delivery times are set by sellers and vary by carrier and location. Orders passing through Customs may face delays and buyers are responsible for any associated duties or fees. Sellers may contact you regarding additional charges to cover any increased costs to ship your items.