Will be published November 14th 2023 by Tordotcom…
Everyone’s favorite lethal SecUnit is back.
Following the events in Network Effect, the Barish-Estranza corporation has sent rescue ships to a newly-colonized planet in peril, as well as additional SecUnits. But if there’s an ethical corporation out there, Murderbot has yet to find it, and if Barish-Estranza can’t have the planet, they’re sure as hell not leaving without something. If that something just happens to be an entire colony of humans, well, a free workforce is a decent runner-up prize.
But there’s something wrong with Murderbot; it isn’t running within normal operational parameters. ART’s crew and the humans from Preservation are doing everything they can to protect the colonists, but with Barish-Estranza’s SecUnit-heavy persuasion teams, they’re going to have to hope Murderbot figures out what’s wrong with itself, and fast!
The wandering Cleric Chih returns home to the Singing Hills Abbey for the first time in almost three years, to be met with both joy and sorrow. Their mentor, Cleric Thien, has died, and rests among the archivists and storytellers of the storied abbey. But not everyone is prepared to leave them to their rest.
Because Cleric Thien was once the patriarch of Coh clan of Northern Bell Pass–and now their granddaughters have arrived on the backs of royal mammoths, demanding their grandfather’s body for burial. Chih must somehow balance honoring their mentor’s chosen life while keeping the sisters from the north from storming the gates and destroying the history the clerics have worked so hard to preserve.
…and the conclusion to Adrian Tchaikovsky’s The Final Architecture series, Lords of Uncreation (Orbit, May 2)… Martha Wells, author of the Murderbot Diaries, starts a new fantasy series with Witch King (Tordotcom Publishing, May 30), and James Rollins continues his epic Moonfall series with The Cradle of Ice (Tor Books, February 7)…
Tchaikovsky is an instabuy, I will get it as audio. I‘m a maybe about Witch King, my mood at the time will decide if I want to get and read that book right away. James Rollins is interesting—a few years ago I read several of his adventure novels. I did not follow him after that, so finding out that he writes an apparently successful specfic series was total news to me.
… and an Arkady Martine novella called Rose/House (Subterranean Press, March 1).
Hm, not sure… the description does not convince me just yet:
Arkady Martine, the acclaimed author of the Teixcalaan Series, returns with an astonishing new novella.
A house embedded with an artificial intelligence is a common thing: a house that is an artificial intelligence, infused in every load-bearing beam and fine marble tile with a thinking creature that is not human? That is something else altogether. But now Deniau’s been dead a year, and Rose House is locked up tight, as commanded by the architect’s will: all his possessions and files and sketches are confined in its archives, and their only keeper is Rose House itself. Rose House, and one other.
Dr. Selene Gisil, one of Deniau’s former protégé, is permitted to come into Rose House once a year. She alone may open Rose House’s vaults, look at drawings and art, talk with Rose House’s animating intelligence all she likes. Until this week, Dr. Gisil was the only person whom Rose House spoke to.
There is a dead person in Rose House. The house says so. It is not Basit Deniau, and it is not Dr. Gisil. It is someone else. Rose House, having completed its duty of care and informed Detective Maritza Smith of the China Lake police precinct that there is in fact a dead person inside it, dead of unnatural causes—has shut up.
Book blurb, shortened
I really liked the first Teixcalaan novel, A Memory Called Empire (my review), but the sequel was just ok. I missed the Netgalley for Rose/House, so I‘ll wait and see what my reading buddies think of this novella.
… and a continuation of Edward Aston’s sci-fi thriller Mickey7 titled Antimatter Blues (St. Martin’s Press, March 14).
Edward Ashton’s Antimatter Blues is the thrilling follow up to Mickey7 in which an expendable heads out to explore new terrain for human habitation.
Summer has come to Niflheim. The lichens are growing, the six-winged bat-things are chirping, and much to his own surprise, Mickey Barnes is still alive—that last part thanks almost entirely to the fact that Commander Marshall believes that the colony’s creeper neighbors are holding an antimatter bomb, and that Mickey is the only one who’s keeping them from using it. Mickey’s just another colonist now. Instead of cleaning out the reactor core, he spends his time these days cleaning out the rabbit hutches. It’s not a bad life.
It’s not going to last.
Book blurb
Now this is tempting! The first book (my review) was not a total hit, but I liked it well enough to be interested in the sequel…
Following the events in Network Effect, the Barish-Estranza corporation has sent rescue ships to a newly-colonized planet in peril, as well as additional SecUnits. But if there’s an ethical corporation out there, Murderbot has yet to find it, and if Barish-Estranza can’t have the planet, they’re sure as hell not leaving without something. If that something just happens to be an entire colony of humans, well, a free workforce is a decent runner-up prize.
But there’s something wrong with Murderbot; it isn’t running within normal operational parameters. ART’s crew and the humans from Preservation are doing everything they can to protect the colonists, but with Barish-Estranza’s SecUnit-heavy persuasion teams, they’re going to have to hope Murderbot figures out what’s wrong with itself, and fast!
Goodreads blurb
Maybe I should add another rule to my 2023 plans: only buying of new book allowed, if it‘s the continuation of an ongoing series or something by a favourite author.
Six days before the money ran out, Enceladus kicked Medusa right in the ass.
Onboard thermistors registered a sudden spike—80°, 90°, 120°—before the seabed jumped and something slammed the probe from the side. A momentary flash. An ocean impossibly boiling. A rocky seabed, tilting as if some angry giant had kicked over a table.
Beginning of the story
You can tell that Watts is a zoologist and marine-mammal biologist. I really have to get back to reading all his stuff, although it usually does a number on my brain. I have to confess that I only have a vague idea of what happened in this story, but it was good regardless. AI and illegal propagation? ★★★★☆
“A Utility Maintenance Avatar is vaguely humanoid, but only about three feet tall fully stretched out and no more than fifty pounds in weight.“
Our hero piggy-backs one of those to save some people… This one was fun! Very fluently written, it really pulled you in right away. ★★★★★
Can be read for free here — please follow the link to look at the illustration accompanying the story. I love it. A small part of it is shared at the top. Initially I had it uploaded fully here as well, but I was unsure how the illustrator feels about sharing, I couldn‘t see any info about it. So I took it down again. .
I really enjoyed all of Ken Liu‘s short stories so far, much more than the one novel I tried to read, The Grace of KIngs.
This was a pretty wacky story. I am not even sure how to summarize it. Lydia arrives at a planet with a job to do, ends up in an unusual place and meets even more unusual beings. She is in a pickle and needs to rescue herself and the others… I loved the alien and the world was definitely interesting. Hoot hoot hoot! ★★★★☆
“The city is full of cracks,” Yan said. “They heal, but then they break open again. People fall through.”
Gil is a priest of Muu, a alien intelligence, who has „abilities that seem to defy known physical laws of nature.” In other words, Muu is a god. Gil awaits a new pupil, because his last pupil was taken (died?) during worship. Gil struggles to come to terms with loss and his entrapment by Muu. ★★★☆☆
– KNOCK, KNOCK SAID THE SHIP by Rati Mehrotra Deenu works on a trading ship with a slightly disturbed AI. She is a survivor of a destroyed colony and indebted to the ship’s captain. When the ship is attacked, she has to decide where her loyalties lie and also come to terms with the fact that not everything is black and white.
Nothing deep, pretty entertaining, well written. The relationship between Deenu and the AI is funny. ★★★★★
– YOUR BOYFRIEND EXPERIENCE by James Patrick Kelly — Dak’s boyfriend Jin asks him to go on a date with a playbot that Jin designed. I wouldn‘t call this romance, although Dak‘s relationship with Jin plays a major part in the story. It‘s more about Dak‘s self-discovery with the help of an AI. He ends up in a difficult position. The ending had a very ominous and creepy vibe for me. I could imagine this turning into a horror scenario, but that‘s just my imagination running wild, I think. Good plotting and pacing, well developed characters for a short story. Well done. ★★★★★
– LONE PUPPETEER OF A SLEEPING CITY by Arula Ratnakar — probably not bad, but I couldn‘t work up any interest for the story. ★★☆☆☆
Clarkesworld Magazine #177, June 2021 by Neil Clarke (editor)
BOTS OF THE LOST ARK by Suzanne Palmer, 11080 WORDS, NOVELETTE
⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4 out of 5.
Bots run amok, aliens threaten, ship and humans need to be saved, little bot to the rescue.
Set on the same ship and following the adventures of the same little bot as HUGO-awarded The Secret Life if Bots, this is a fun and slightly absurd take on the currently abundant stories and novels about artificial intelligences.
I guess it is about time that I pick up one of her full-length novels.
Can be read for free here. Shamelessly stolen from that same page:
Suzanne Palmer is a writer and linux system administrator who lives in western Massachusetts. Her work has appeared frequently in Asimov’s and Analog, and her Clarkesworld story “The Secret Life of Bots” won the 2018 Hugo for Best Novelette. Her next novel, The Scavenger Door (book three of the Finder Chronicles), will be published by DAW in August 2021.
In other news, I am in a bit of a reading slump. Real Life is a little extra hard right now. I turned to comfort reading and spent all weekend and Monday night with re-reading some of my favourite fanfiction. A little Spirk and a whole lot McShep.
Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.
Thisweek‘s topic / January 11: Most Recent Additions to My Book Collection
We don‘t give a lot of Christmas presents in my family (aka my parents) and if I get any, it‘s not usually books. My family doesn‘t know what to give me, specfic is in a whole other universe for them. Plus I do not read in my mother tongue, which makes it even more puzzling for them. And gift cards or vouchers are a no-no. So, here are the last 10 books I gave myself!
We were talking comfort reading / easy reading in my favourite specfic group, aka my online home. And this was recommended. Emergency Room in Space with imaginative, non-humanoid aliens. Sounds like a win to me!
A robot runs into trouble, trying to defend a mining platform orbiting Jupiter.
I just reviewed this one yesterday. It‘s the January Science Fiction group read of my favourite GR group (see above) and I want to try and read at least one group read per month. Done!
It was so good! I just had to get the books. Ok, ok, friends told me that this doesn‘t have much to do with the books. I guess I will find out for myself, once the book gets here. I wanted to support my local and ordered this English-language hardback edition from my tiny German bookstore around the corner. It’s going to take a while. But I‘m not in a hurry.
PS: Lee Pace takes off his shirt A LOT! But seriously, the photography / CGI of the TV adaptation is excellent. The acting is great as well. I hope there will be a second season!
I used to read his books a lot, back when he hit the scene. I really liked his hyperative, high-octane and plot-driven military adventure yarns. Good fun for low brain power. These two shorts/novelettes were for free for Kindle, so I grabbed them to find out, if I still like his style.
In the suspense-charged tradition of Patricia Cornwell, Anna Salter draws from her professional expertise to introduce forensic psychologist Michael Stone, a sharply witty, courageous heroine who champions the victims of the most devastating crimes.
I received a free epub (in German) from my local bookshop for Christmas via their online shop. No idea if I will ever read it. It does sound a bit like Patricia Cornwell, which is not a bad things. I used to like her series ages ago.
Same as above, I received a free epub (in German) from my local bookshop for Christmas via their online shop. I am very dubious about this one.
Sweeping through the pivotal events of twentieth-century America, The Sight of the Stars chronicles four generations of one remarkable family as they journey through years of love, loss, sacrifice, and unimaginable betrayal.
Not really my thing. I am tempted to kick this off my shelf again right away. We‘ll see.
Wow, I got all of those books since Christmas Day. No wonder that my TBR pile isn‘t getting smaller. I checked, before this there were 20 days where I didn‘t get anything new to read… 🙄
Have you added anything good to your shelves recently?
I really hesitated to get this book because of the Murderbot comparison in the blurb. I love Murderbot and don‘t want to read a rip-off. I think they probably did this book a disservice by linking it to Murderbot.
Our robot is brought online on a platform orbiting Jupiter, to protect a mining platform that is under attack by aliens. It turns out that the situation is quite different to what Unit Four was lead to believe.
I liked the beginning very much and listened to the first half of the book almost in one sitting. There was a pretty good reveal towards the end. Good action sequences. The more reflective parts could have been a bit more elaborate. The plot lost a bit of steam in the second part and my interest flagged a little.
I am still trying to decide if I like the rather convenient ending. I find it almost impossible to talk more about this book without spoilers, so I leave it at that. I largely enjoyed this book and might give it another go in printed form to pick up all of the nuances.
This is my first book by the author and I got the audiobook. The audiobook narration was good, but I didn‘t love it.
I liked this a lot and, differently to my first review, I think I liked it better than the first book. Breq is more reflected and emotional. I really liked the addition of Lieutenant Tisarwat, Translator Dlique was a delight and the locations of Underworld and on the planet were well imagined and lively.
I do love the narration by Andoh, although it is a bit over the top at times.
Review from April 2017 *some spoilers*
I liked it. It was very laid back in between the more energetic action sequences. A lot of drinking tea. I liked the plot of the first book more, I think (still debating with myself). The alternating timeline made it more vibrant and suspenseful. It was proper space opera.
However, the relationships of the various characters in this sequel were more intricate. The dynamics of the people on the station and down on the planet were well done. The disenfranchised in the Undergarden (brilliant idea) and their revolution, the serfs on the planet, the ruling class and its notions of entitlement and righteousness… Good stuff, I will be going over it in my mind for quite a while.
“You take what you want at the end of a gun, you murder and rape and steal, and you call it bringing civilization. And what is civilization, to you, but us being properly grateful to be murdered and raped and stolen from? You said you knew justice when you heard it. Well, what is your justice but you allowed to treat us as you like, and us condemned for even attempting to defend ourselves?”
Very talkative prose, sometimes a little too much for my taste. But only a little. Seivarden’s role was sadly diminished in this, the addition of Tisarwat added a good character into the mix. Breq’s Kalrs pretending to be ancillaries was another great idea. She herself mourning for her lost connectedness with all that she was as Justice of Torren… I am not usually a friend of character driven narratives, but this was good.
Looking forward to Ancillary Mercy. Can’t wait to read, what they find on the other side…
A re-read. This is not a love story, it’s a story of revenge.
“If that’s what you’re willing to do for someone you hate, what would you do for someone you love?”
Breq is willing to do quite a lot. A lot of subtle tones that I missed the first time around and almost missed again during my second read. A many layered narrative, where you have to peel off layers to get to the heart of it all. My favourite part is still the evolving relationship between Breq and Seivarden. And the parts of the story set on Ors. Good stuff and worth the awards this book won.
“Choose my aim, take one step and then the next. It had never been anything else.”
Review from my first read in March 2017:
The beginning was a little confusing. Might be due to it being an audiobook, it’s a fairly new medium for me. Here are my slightly spoilerish thoughts.
Breq’s voice in the audibook works well for the character. I didn’t find her too neutral or emotionless. In the beginning she almost felt childlike, exploring and getting to know her world. As the book went on, she gained more emotions and more of a personality.
I found some of the dialects of the other characters a bit weird. Some of the voices in the audiobook also sounded a bit “too much” and not natural to me. But they all grew on me eventually.
It’s interesting that Breq used a female pronoun for all other characters, until she could figure out if they were male or female. And even then she often stuck to the female version. It made for an unusual reading experience. Ultimately it made no difference, if a character was male or female. Which was perhaps the point of the whole idea.
What I did find a bit difficult with the audiobook: Telling the other characters apart. And it was slightly annoying that I couldn’t see the spelling of the various names and places.
I liked the timeline alternating from chapter to chapter. The story only really took off for me with the convergence of both plotlines. I liked the story before that, too. But the pace was a bit too leisurely. The last 30% of the book finally picked up speed.
My personal highlight was the development of the relationship between Breq and Seivarden. The conclusion of the book’s underlieing conflict in contrast to that was just ok. Smart, but nothing earth shattering. Nice ending. And I am fairly certain that I will pick up the next book.
Sorry for my fairly lame review, literary mastermind I am not. Bottom line, I liked the book. A bit slow at times. Good plot. Good world building. Interesting characters. Loved Ors, loved Seivarden and the relationship of her and Breq. The last few chapters were fun. One gripping moment full of sadness. Good stuff.
Cathy's Reading Bonanza 