The Atlas Six

Nicolás Ferrer de Varona, or Nico, is a medeian physicist who graduated from NYUMA alongside Libby. His powers include levitation, incandescence, force, speed, and shapeshifting, among other ways to influence matter. He comes from a wealthy family and is described as a handsome Cuban young man whose “sun-kissed dimples and charmingly imperfect nose (broken just so) were [according to Libby] enough to make up for his unremarkable height” (9).

Nico lives with his roommates Gideon Drake and Maximilian Viridian Wolfe. The son of a mermaid mother and a satyr father, Gideon is a human-like creature who can walk through dreams. He is Nico’s best friend and, due to his mother Eilif’s criminal tendencies, Nico has been helping Gideon stay off the grid to protect him. As for their friend Max, he is a shapeshifter who can turn into a black Labrador retriever. They are Nico’s closest friends, although he also develops a tentative friendship with Libby and Reina.

Despite his powerful physical abilities and successful endeavors (e.g., fighting back the intruders, creating a wormhole, and repairing the house’s security wards), Parisa describes Nico as “the least capable of guile” (254) among the house’s inhabitants. He is honest, sometimes reckless, and has made it his mission to access the Society’s archives to find a way to keep Gideon safe.

Nico and Libby’s abilities are inextricably intertwined and, although they despised each other throughout their academic career at NYUMA, their rivalry gives way to a reluctant alliance at the house. When Libby is abducted at the end, Nico is the most invested in searching for her, and he is the one who makes the other initiates swear they will work together to find her.

Reina Mori is a young Japanese woman who grew up in Tokyo. An illegitimate daughter of a rich family, she was raised in secret by her grandmother. She went to school in Osaka to escape her family and, although a gifted medeian naturalist, studied mythology to avoid using her power. Fascinated by ancient texts, she only accepts Atlas’s invitation with the promise that she will gain access to long-lost archives. In short, Reina is a recluse who is mostly unconcerned with making friends or being liked. She has been exploited her whole life and now only wants to be left alone.

Reina’s power is unlike other naturalists, who need to try to make plants grow. Nature seems to feed off her raw power, depleting her energy against her will. For the most part, she keeps a tight leash on her life force to not end up drained by the plants in her vicinity. But she still influences nature unwillingly: flowers bend and whisper pleadingly when she is around, and they react to her strong emotions. Parisa describes Reina as “the naturalist with the nose ring and a short, blunt swath of liquid-black hair, [as] easily the most threatening presence in the room. She [radiates] raw power, which in Parisa’s experience [is] the mark of someone who shouldn’t be messed with” (39). Reina was also trained in hand-to-hand combat and demonstrates her fighting abilities during the intrusion, which leads her to develop a tentative friendship with Nico when they start practicing together.

Although Reina can be blunt, she is a keen observer of people and spends time cataloging others’ reactions during their meetings. She also has a nuanced understanding of the philosophical concepts discussed in Atlas’s lectures. Having “had the benefit of being raised amid Eastern philosophies as opposed to Western, which meant she was more willing to trust general policies of dualities” (263). Reina can grasp the balance of life and death more quickly than her counterparts. Morally speaking, though, her stance is simple: she refuses to be exploited and is content to play the Alexandrian Society’s game to serve her interests. She is not cruel, but she is self-centered and does not work well in a group.

The son of crime boss Adrian Caine, Tristan sought to escape his father’s abuse by working in London for billionaire venture capitalist James Wessex, who has all but declared him his heir. He is described as a handsome Black Englishman, and he takes up a casual relationship with Parisa, then Libby, as well as an ambiguous friendship with Callum. Ambitious and meticulous, Tristan tends to repress his anger under a layer of cynicism. He deals with l anxiety and self-loathing, but his calculating demeanor is often misunderstood by the others. The narrator says,

Tristan was more than simply witty or clever or knowledgeable; he was quick, and always the first to see when something was wrong. At first Reina thought he was nitpicking, being contrary just for the sake of contradicting something, but it had become increasingly obvious that unless Tristan knew exactly what to correct, he didn’t bother speaking (146).

At first, Tristan is unsure of his role in the house, but Atlas points out that he has been misclassified as an illusionist. Tristan’s medeian abilities lie somewhere else, as he learns by practicing and reflecting on his powers. Not only can he see through illusions, but he can also see magic, time, and other dimensions.

Callum Nova is a blond South African young man, heir to the Nova Corporation, a “global media conglomerate that secretly or not-so-secretly [specialize] in illusions” (83). Parisa describes him as “too handsome, maybe. Hair too prettily golden, clothes too beautifully tailored, face too abnormally striking” (38), but it is later revealed that he is wearing cosmetic illusions to enhance his appearance (which Tristan can see through).

His medeian specialty is empathy, although Callum can not only feel other people’s emotions, he can also influence them. This makes him extremely dangerous, as he proves when he convinces another medeian to kill herself and later manipulates Parisa into jumping off a balcony. Callum is selfish, cruel, and unbothered by others’ dislike of him. Not only does he know how to get what he wants, he more importantly knows no one can deny him anything. It is noted, however, that “his lack of ambition, [...] paired with his love of finer things, meant that he never aspired to world domination, or to anything even close” (72).

Despite his long-standing alliance with Tristan, the other candidates distrust him so much that they eventually decide to eliminate him. Tristan, who loves Callum (although he also resents him), is chosen to kill him. When he cannot follow through, Callum threatens to kill Tristan instead but is interrupted by Libby’s scream. It is unclear whether Callum would have done it, but it is clear that the other initiates fear and loathe him. In the end, however, he swears to Nico that he will help him find Libby.

Parisa Kamali is a medeian telepath who studied in Paris after escaping her family’s abuse in Tehran. She is described as a woman of extraordinary beauty, which she uses to her advantage. Confident and independent, Parisa uses sex to manipulate people into lowering their guard so she can glean useful information from their thoughts. She has a relationship with Dalton, as well as more casual encounters with Tristan and Libby.

Parisa is manipulative and self-serving, but she also appears to have a semblance of a moral code, unlike Callum. When they have a contest to test their specialties, she manipulates Callum into believing he won, but in fact demonstrates to the others how cruel he is, prompting him to think that “she was a better medeian than [him], who had never been a very devoted student, and she was immensely calculating. Fatally, even” (134).

Parisa’s motives are ambiguous, though, as she is very secretive. As she remarks to Reina, “You can’t begin to know the sum of my parts, and you can stare all you like, but you won’t see a damn thing until I show you” (148). Her feelings for Dalton, for example, appear genuine, and she eventually endeavors to free him from his mental prison.

Atlas Blakely appears less often than the other characters, but he has a central role in the story as a Caretaker of the Alexandrian Society, mentor to the six newest candidates, and mastermind of a years-long plan to take over the Society.

When Nico and Libby first meet him, he is described as “dark-skinned, his head shaved and slightly gleaming, and [he] appeared to be somewhere in his forties […] being exceedingly British from mannerisms to dress (tweed; very much tweed, with an accent of tartan) and quite tall” (16). Atlas appears smart, polite, and measured. He is also a gifted medeian, having been part of the same class of potential initiates as Ezra, and his specialty is telepathy (although, except for Parisa, it is unclear whether the candidates know it).

In the last chapter, it is revealed that when he and Ezra met as young men, Atlas was “wolfish and lively and so sharp it sometimes made the others uneasy” (355). They shared a desire to fight back against the Society’s limitations and destroy it from the inside. They set a plan in motion years before and are now watching it come to fruition as the newest group of candidates reaches initiation, but Atlas’s ambition gradually overshadows Ezra’s, causing him to rebel against him at the end of the narrative. Atlas’s secrets are still well kept from his six recruits when the story ends, but foreshadowing suggests that they may come to light in the next book in the series.

Dalton Ellery is a researcher and lecturer at the Society who was initiated by Atlas in the previous class of candidates. His medeian specialty is animation, which means he can create a semblance of life by animating illusions. He is described as a “narrow-hipped, elegantly angular man [usually] dressed in a clean, starched Oxford with lines as precise as the sleek part of his raven-black hair” (40).

Dalton is quiet and composed, not prone to outbursts of excitement, but he falls for Parisa when she seduces him to extort information from him. She also develops feelings for him, and when she accesses his thoughts, she learns that Dalton’s mind appears fragmented, with an animated version of his conscience trapped in his memories. Dalton is not aware of it, but Atlas seems to know more than he is saying. At the end of the book, Parisa vows to free him when Dalton reveals that he is the only animator capable of fabricating the illusion of Libby’s death, but he does not remember whether he did it.