RR#35: All Systems Red

I’ve been testing out Copy.ai for some work-related stuff these days. I know one shouldn’t be surprised with anything these days but GPT-3 is a real marvel. Marketing folks reading this should totally check out the tool, be wowed, and also wonder about the fact whether their careers have been potentially halved. I had the same feeling, so there, there. There’s very little overlap with the book I’m about to talk about but is a conversation about AI complete without having said AI?

Martha Wells’ All Systems Red is the first of the Murderbot series. It seems I’ve been living under a rock because there seem to be a lot of fans of the series on the interwebz. Our protagonist starts off by stating that as a heartless killing machine, it was a terrible failure. A SecUnit by function, (a cyborg security agent), it seems to be living by its own rules, having dismantled the governing module that would enforce certain actions otherwise. Tasked to accompany and protect a team of scientists conducting surface experiments on an alien planet, the SecUnit is named Murderbot via self-proclamation. The scientists, the PresevervationAux survey team are wary of the unit but rely on it to keep them safe. Midway through the expedition, they realize certain zonal mapping is absent from their feed which results in reconnaissance only to find out some of their colleagues have been brutally murdered by rogue SecUnits. What follows is a race to get back to their home base while dealing with the evil Greycris team who are hellbent on getting their way on this planet. Murderbot and the team of scientists led by the extremely solid Mensah lie, deceive, fight and grapple their way around this fix, with Murderbot’s sense of responsibility coming to the fore. I’ll leave it at that for you to find out what happens on your own.

The Read: Murderbot is a helluva character. Quite frankly, I was really distracted while reading this book but the way his narrative is crafted keeps pulling you back into the text. The entire proceedings take place in Murderbot’s head, almost like we were watching his helmet’s feed. He’s self-deprecating, sarcastic, a team player, and responsible while ignoring his previous murderous tendencies. He tries his best to not make it uncomfortable for the humans he’s accompanying, extremely awkward that he himself is. I don’t know how to describe this but the action’s not in your face which is quite unusual. You’d typically see a lot of supporting text to describe violence and action scenes but Wells’ writing is as smooth as Murderbot’s kills. My biggest qualm with the book is the length because I’d like things to develop with a slow burn, also because the plot is something we have seen before. In this case, I want more of accompanying Murderbot as he cribs about his existence and details his soap opera viewing. But my nitpicking is well shut out by the fact that this is the first book of a series of 6. More Murderbot, more mirth.

35/365.

Trivia: Martha Wells has won the Nebula Award, the Hugo Award, the Philip K Dick Prize. Basically, she’s a modern sci-fi behemoth. But quite interestingly, she has an interesting take on Neville Longbottom, the unsung hero. You can read that here.

Documentation:
Book: All Systems Red

Author: Martha Wells

Year of Release: 2017
Publisher: Tor.com