Review of Martha Wells' Award Winning "Murderbot" series
Okay, I avoided reading this quartet of novellas for a while. The name Murderbot Diaries just sort of put me off. That was stupid on my part. The writing is excellent, and though there are many action sequences in the series (i.e. fighting, shooting, and blowing things up) it’s not excessively graphic. And the tech is very cool and well thought out.
More to the point, the main thrust of the books isn’t really the violence, it’s the main character — a rogue SecUnit (“Security Unit”). The SecUnit is a cyborg in the true sense of the word: think extreme enhancement via mechanicals, computational power, communications bandwidth etc… to the point where the resulting creature is something both less and far more than human. Oh, and these enhancements were not voluntary. SecUnits are built and then contracted out by their owners. While they are highly intelligent, they are outfitted with “governor modules” that insure they follow instructions.
You should check these out. Literally my only criticism is that they’re novellas and (hence) too short for my taste.
