Revised Armistice Day now on Kindle

I'd forgotten how much I hate formatting a manuscript for publication. Nevertheless, the new version of Armistice Day is now available on the Kindle.

How much has changed? The cover is the major difference. A couple of paragraphs changed, but there was some capitalization issues with the phrase "my lord" that I finally got figured out. There were some layout issues encountered when I re-uploaded the manuscript. I don't know if they existed before.

Other eBook versions are in the process of being made. Once they're set, I'll be commissioning the print copy of the cover.

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DED

Book Review: The Pluto Files

Basically, this book explores the history of humanity's relationship with Pluto. From discovery, to Disney's hopping on the new planet (at the time) bandwagon, to the AMNH's scandalous reclassification in its exhibits, and eventual demotion to dwarf planet. Offers a look into how people can get let emotion get the better of them on even such mundane matters as the scientific definition of celestial bodies.

As this book was written and published several years before New Horizons' encounter with Pluto, you won't get any of the really cool photos that probe produced nor speculation as to what it all means.

This is the first book by Tyson that I've read despite my enjoyment for how he talks about science. His normally prolific enthusiasm seen during interviews is tempered here, though you can catch glimpses of it from time-to-time, including the essay he wrote defending the AMNH move that landed him in hot water with Plutophiles. The addition of the satirical cartoons was a good move.

3 stars

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DED

New Cover for Armistice Day

Hi all,

I hope everyone is healthy and safe.

Here's the new cover for Armistice Day!

It was designed by the good people over at Goonwrite.com. It's a legal adaptation of a work done by the fabulous artist Tithi Luadthong.

Next week I hope to get the cover uploaded for all of the ebook formats so that all new ebooks will have this cover. After that, I'll pony up the dough for the dead tree version.

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DED

Book Review: Artificial Condition

It has a dark past—one in which a number of humans were killed. A past that caused it to christen itself “Murderbot”. But it has only vague memories of the massacre that spawned that title, and it wants to know more.

Teaming up with a Research Transport vessel named ART (you don’t want to know what the “A” stands for), Murderbot heads to the mining facility where it went rogue.

What it discovers will forever change the way it thinks…

Artificial Condition picks up right where All Systems Red left off. Murderbot has a need to know what happened that fateful day on RaviHyral when it dubbed itself with that moniker. It hops from one transport to another until it encounters ART, a transport AI who sees through Murderbot's thin disguise. The two are initially suspicious of each other's motives. Their back and forth quips and probings takes up a good chunk of the beginning of the story.

Murderbot needs a pretense and a better disguise to get to the surface of RaviHyral as the news is filled with reports of a "SecUnit gone missing." It answers an ad for a group of researches in need of a security consultant/bodyguard as they're dealing with a local corporation that's stolen their data from a parallel project and bilked them out of their pay. We know that Murderbot is a softie for naïve humans who are in grave peril and can't help but take the job to make sure they don't get slaughtered.

Unlike All Systems Red, which hits the reader from the start, the pace starts slow and doesn't really get going until Murderbot reaches RaviHyral. Once there, the pace picks up as Murderbot has to simultaneously conduct its investigations into its murky past and keep its clients from walking into traps.

There's an interesting peek into the hierarchy of individual freedom based on levels of physical augmentation or processing power. SecUnits (murderbots) and ComfortUnits (sexbots) are at the bottom of that list, not really more than property. Even an emancipated bot like our protagonist doesn't truly enjoy freedom the same way that heavily augmented humans have. Even AIs, with vastly more processing power than shuttle pilots (a task handled by computers not humans), are constrained to an extent by their programming. For example, while ART is free to interact with Murderbot and others through the feed and is entirely capable of many things, being a transport ship for humans is still its raison d'être.

The interactions between Murderbot and other machines (a lump all term I'm using here for anything not mostly human) is notably different than the first story. Every computer or machine in All Systems Red were things for it to hack, which it did with ease. Other SecUnits had to be defeated in combat. In Artificial Condition, Murderbot has to actually converse with other machines. Murderbot needs to know why the sexbot is following it. What does it know? And ART is way too powerful for Murderbot to attempt any violent act. It has to negotiate from a position of relative weakness, albeit a bit sullenly. It was refreshing to see that Murderbot could have complex, non-violent encounters with other machines.

While this one didn't have the feels of the first, it was still a highly enjoyable story.

4 stars.

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DED

Facelift

I confess that the cover for my 2010 novel, Armistice Day, looks dated. It was the best cover I could commission back then. I have no regrets about it (My regrets only pertain to my lack of publishing, but that's another matter).

These days, one's dollar goes so much farther as accessibility to high quality pre-made covers has greatly improved and the price for commissioned book covers has come down. Yes, there's still garbage out there, but the market has improved by so much.

In the days ahead, I'll be posting the new look for Armistice Day.

In other news, I've now launched a Facebook page for my writing news. Marketing, cross promotion, yadda yadda yadda. But if you already read this blog, there really won't be anything there that isn't posted here. I have plenty of complaints about Facebook's content, but I'm also not a fan of the layout/interface. But that's where everyone is so what choice do I have?

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DED

Book Review - Great Sky River

Galactic Center series book #3.

According to the timeline in the back of my copy of the book, 35,000 years have passed since the events in Across the Sea of Suns. The survivors of that book were joined by expeditions from Earth in the central region of the Milky Way. Humanity enjoyed a second Renaissance that lasted thousands of years, but it ultimately caught the attention of the Mechanicals, who proceeded to methodically fight a war of attrition against them. Six years ago on the planet Snowglade, where this story takes place, the Mechanicals overwhelmed the Citadels and forced the survivors into a nomadic lifestyle, feeding off the scraps of the fringes of Mechanicals' civilization.

The humans on Snowglade are augmented, their bodies implanted with and connected to so many cybernetic parts that they're vulnerable to electromagnetic attacks and computer virus infections. To compound the problem, the humans on Snowglade have been regressing over the centuries. They've become so dependent on their technology to do everything for them that they no longer possess the knowledge to create anything new. Sure, they can fix some things, but they typically don't seem to be much more than cybernetic cavemen. They can't even understand the information that appears in their HUDs. Distant dead ancestors were digitized, and its every adult survivor's responsibility to carry their share of these personalities around with them in their personal computer memory. But rather than make the most of the knowledge that these digital ancestors still retain, they're often brushed aside because they're annoying.

The story is told from the POV of Killeen, a member of the Bishop family (tribe). His father and wife died when their citadel was destroyed. His son, Toby, is all he cares about now. We witness the raids on Mechanicals' manufacturing outposts and attacks on the family by Marauder machines through his eyes. He comes to realize that the nature of the attacks is changing. There's a machine out there that possesses a cunning, ruthless intelligence that is unlike any Marauder. He names it the Mantis.

The Mantis has taken a perverse interest in humanity, and it is up to Killeen and his tribe to figure out its motives.

Benford has made some dramatic improvements in this series. First off, the arrogant protagonist of the first two novels, Nigel Walmsley, has been pushed into the historical record. Secondly, but no less important, female characters are finally treated as equals. Fanny is the captain of the Bishop tribe at the onset of the story, and Killeen greatly respects her leadership. Shibo is a survivor from another tribe who impresses Killeen with her knowledge and skill. No damsel in distress here.

The dialogue took some getting used to. Benford grants the Snowglade denizens a dialect that comprises several slang words and new terms ("yeasay", "suredead", "mechtalk", etc.) and modifies their grammar to help craft an image of them as hillbillies. That's not meant to be an insult.

There are some scenes in the lair of the Mantis that appear to be inspired by H.R. Giger. In many of his works, Giger blended humans and animals with machines to create disturbing biomechanoid images (the creature in the movie Alien being his most famous work). Benford puts his own spin on the concept. Whether or not the descriptions will disturb the reader is up to said reader's ability to visualize what Benford writes. I give him points for the effort.

While not a reboot of the series, Benford in effect wipes the proverbial slate clean. With a new protagonist and solid supporting cast of characters, the Galactic Center saga takes on a fresh new look.

3.5 stars.

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DED

Book Review - Woken Furies

In a world where real and virtual are one and the same and the dead can come back to life, Takeshi Kovacs was once a galaxy-hopping Envoy. Now he battles against biomachines gone wild, searches for a centuries-old missing weapons system, and endures the betrayal of people he once trusted. But when his relationship with an imperiled woman pits him against an enemy specially designed to destroy him, he knows it's time to be afraid. After all, the guy sent to kill him is himself: only younger, stronger, and straight out of hell.

When we reunite with Kovacs, we find him back on Harlan's World, the place of his birth. He's hunting priests of a local patriarchal religion—Knights of the New Revelation—in a damaged synthetic sleeve, but we don't know why. After the events in Broken Angels, it seemed like Kovacs was done with the mercenary life. But things spiral out of control pretty fast. Soon Kovacs is so hot from pissing off the New Revelation crowd and the Yakuza that he's in the outback fighting rogue biomachines with a local mercenary outfit. That's his way of laying low.

After re-sleeving, he learns that a centuries-old backup version of himself has been illegally acquired by the planet's ruling family and is on the hunt for him and Sylvie, the tech-head leader of the mercenary group. She apparently caught a computer virus and has been steadily getting worse. They split off from her merc band and hide somewhere else. That doesn't go well either, and now Kovacs is hanging out with some surfers looking to get the revolutionary band back together again.

There's also stuff dealing with the Envoys, the lethal Martian orbital stations, and Quellcrist Falconer—the long dead philosopher leader of a rebellion three centuries ago. Confused? Yeah, I was too. However, I can assure you that by the end of the book, the convoluted plot and storylines all make sense. The pieces start to come together midway through when Kovacs finally explains why he's hunting down priests. I'm not going to spoil it for you, but I'll give you a hint: It's not business; it's personal.

Kovacs has learned the hard way that you can't go home again. He's been gone too long. Places are familiar, yet different. People change; friendships falter. As for ideologies: "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss." Kovacs is angry at everyone and everything, especially himself. The internal dialogues with himself reveal a level of inner conflict that wasn't present in the previous two novels. A particularly cathartic moment comes when he's forced to fight the younger version of himself. The younger Kovacs is highly critical of the choices that the elder Kovacs has made in his life. Nearing exhaustion from all of the mental and physical battles, he responds, "You know what, let's see you do it better."

But before we get there, we have to endure a whole lot of aimless wandering, a lot of misplaced anger, too many disposable minor characters, questionable sexual choices (and graphic sex scenes that neither reveal hidden plot clues nor develop character), and one betrayal after another (What happened to all that Envoy intuition?). There was little in the way of rewards along this journey, and the end payoff was a bit lacking. With the success of the Netflix adaptation of Altered Carbon, Morgan has hinted that he's thinking about revisiting Kovacs. If it means a better send off for the character, I hope so.

3.5 stars

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DED