A Select Group — Blaine C. Readler

Divorced, broke, and jobless, Caleb believes he's found a reprieve from a life on the streets when he answers an ad calling for volunteers in an extended university study. Along with a dozen others, he trades his clothes for a simple uniform and boards a bus for an undisclosed destination. As the driver takes them higher and higher into the remote California mountains, the hapless volunteers debate what exactly they've signed up for. Just before their phones are confiscated, they find a paper published by the study's sponsor professor, predicting the effects on groups when confronted with dire dangers. As Caleb watches miles of wilderness glide past, he wonders if he should have settled for a life under a city overpass. A Select Group is a taught thriller that explores the tribal tendency within us all--and the dark potential of a few--when groups are threatened. Against the doomed us-versus-them defense, stands one woman determined that people can rise above primal instincts to cooperate and persevere against those that seek to capitalize on human frailties.