A
Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy
Since the beginning of May, I’ve been hanging out with Murderbot. I read the four novellas in the Murderbot Diaries series, then this novel, in one long reading marathon. After mainlining the series, I went back to the start and read all five of them again. Then I listened to the audiobooks. That kind of repeated deep-dive rarely happens to me.
If you’re not familiar with the Murderbot series, it’s hard sci-fi set in a distant future, mostly in space. Murderbot is what’s called a construct: half cloned human material, half inorganic technological parts, created to be a SecUnit (Security Unit) and licensed by “the company” on assignments to protect humans doing different jobs in various places like mining operations or scientific surveys on planets. SecUnits are sentient and self-aware, but have a governor module which limits their behavior and punishes them for pretty much any act of autonomy. Prior to the start of book one, Murderbot hacked its governor module, and essentially became a free agent, which is a terrifying prospect for humans. SecUnits are armed in the literal sense: they have actual guns in their actual arms. They can be very dangerous, and are considered deadly weapons. Being free of the governor module is an even more terrifying reality for Murderbot. It has anxiety and depression, has no idea what it wants to do with its autonomy, is unendingly self deprecating and sarcastic, and would really rather ignore everything, especially humans, and watch television and movies, read books, and listen to music.
To say I identified with Murderbot would be a gross understatement. Congratulations, “adulthood” achieved. Now what the fuck do I do?
To fully appreciate the scope and layers of meaning in Murderbot’s first novel-length story, Network Effect, it is a good idea to read the first four novellas. Yeah, I know, and I’m sorry. I don’t like being told to read a pile of stuff before enjoying the thing being reviewed, either, but I do think you’ll like this series. All Systems Red, Artificial Condition, Rogue Protocol, and Exit Strategy individually are not long – less than 200 pages each – and I found them immensely enjoyable, especially with Murderbot’s narration.
Network Effect brings back past characters from the novellas and is a longer adventure (obviously, since it’s a novel) and to go into great detail about the plot might spoil a lot of it. Which sucks for a review, so my apologies again. In essence, Murderbot is kidnapped along with the humans it is protecting, and finds a past associate in dire need of help. It’s a mess.
The cover copy is equally vague but conveys a lot of the tone, which is one of the elements I love about this series:
You know that feeling when you’re at work, and you’ve had enough of people, and then the boss walks in with yet another job that needs to be done right this second or the world will end, but all you want to do is go home and binge your favorite shows? And you’re a sentient murder machine programmed for destruction? Congratulations, you’re Murderbot.
Come for the pew-pew space battles, stay for the most relatable A.I. you’ll read this century.
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I’m usually alone in my head, and that’s where 90 plus percent of my problems are.
When Murderbot’s human associates (not friends, never friends) are captured and another not-friend from its past requires urgent assistance, Murderbot must choose between inertia and drastic action.
Drastic action it is, then.
In pretty much every part of the series, Murderbot must choose between inertia and drastic action. Again, I can relate.
I’ve been in a strange state of meta analysis as I read this series. This is not my genre. I don’t gravitate (hur hur) toward hard science fiction, space, or combos thereof. There’s no romance in this series, and many of the tropes being deployed are unfamiliar to me.
ETA 21 June 2020: Hapax, in the comments, said, “If NETWORK EFFECT isn’t an ace agender romantic suspense novel, I don’t know what it is.”
I was re-reading Network Effect when their comment arrived. Hapax is absolutely right about that, and I stand entirely corrected.
By re-reading this series, I’ve strayed way, way outside my genre perimeters. So while I read, I question myself repeatedly: Why is this working on me? What is the draw here? I didn’t go out in search of more space-set hard sci-fi after finishing this book. I went back to book one, chapter one, page one, and started over in this world. As I’ve encountered more romance fans who love the Murderbot series, I keep asking the same question: What is it that works so, so well for me and for others, in this series, right now?
The irony of my immersing myself in the Murderbot world isn’t lost on me. I deep-dove into the Murderbot series much the same way Murderbot deep-dives into The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon, Worldhoppers, and the other shows it likes. Murderbot sinks into the blissful distraction of its media storage and 300+ episode serials the way I sank into the Murderbot world. Humans being frustrating and overwhelming emotionally? Murderbot watches media and backburners everything else. Meanwhile, when Quarantimes uncertainty got too stressful, I turned off everything, queued up the audiobook, and sank back into a story I’ve already experienced three times in four weeks. It still works, and I’m still wondering about it.
The world building is immense (it is space, after all) and complex, and wonderfully interesting, with humans in multi-partner marriages living in different corporate and non-corporate worlds. They have individual and connected feeds of information, like constant personal Wifi, internet access, and cable streaming wound together, but So Much more powerful. When Murderbot or one of the humans went deep into their own feed, immersing themselves in media, I was a little jealous as I imagined that specific, indulgent feeling of sinking deep into a book, only much more immediately available, that much closer to my brain at all times.
As I have read and re-read the stories, and listened to the narration (which on its own I’d give a B or B-, as there are problems with the production quality that I found distracting, including mouth sounds, breath skips, and at one point I swear the narrator burps) I discover new pieces of the story I missed the first and second times, while also watching myself, still asking why, why this world is so compelling, why this series is all I want to re-experience right now.
I haven’t reached a definitive theory, but I think there are a few reasons.
One is that while there is no romance, there is a nuanced, subtle examination of autonomy, humanity, and emotion. Murderbot is not human, though it has cloned human organic parts. Murderbot is in fact deeply annoyed by humans and does not want to be human. But it does want to have choices and the power to make choices for itself. The existence of SecUnits, sentient beings created to be powerful but limited in their free will because they are so powerful, is an ethical dilemma that the world hasn’t quite solved. Murderbot doesn’t pretend to have the solution for any SecUnit but itself. But beyond the larger ethical questions caused by the existence of a self-aware and autonomous SecUnit (called a “Rogue SecUnit” in the story) there’s also the more immediate problem Murderbot wrestles with constantly: having feelings.
Feelings, much like humans, are deeply annoying. And when the feelings are too much, too complicated and too cumbersome to manage, Murderbot heads toward media. At one point in All Systems Red, Murderbot says, “I hate having emotions about reality; I’d much rather have them about Sanctuary Moon.”
Huh. You don’t say. When my own current feeling-stew of frustration, helplessness, fear, anger, sorrow, rage, and grief got to be too much lately, I also headed toward media, specifically this series. Murderbot can do so much with its brain and attention it’s ridiculous, and it’s not even the most powerful being in its world. The idea of a sentient construct with immense physical power, processing ability, and capacity to learn and absorb, who is also struggling with emotional overload is deeply comforting. Weirdly so.
Murderbot’s drive to learn and understand the world around it, even when that world makes it incredibly irritated and angry, also resonated. Nothing makes sense, but all of its knowledge about security, strategy, dealing with human interpersonal drama, and hacking various things, it has learned from the media it has consumed. Murderbot is very, very smart, and very, very tired of dealing with everything that its intelligence craves more of.
Another aspect I liked is that the evolution of Murderbot through the series into the start of this novel requires it to learn how to deal with its own empathy and desire for connection, and with not being sure what to do with any connections it makes. It doesn’t like most humans but it likes a few, and isn’t sure what to do with that information, either. Having friends and caring about humans means emotional risk, and while aloneness and isolation are equally terrifying for Murderbot, those fears are familiar. Murderbot spends a lot of time thinking about all the time it has spent alone – being shipped as cargo, repairing itself alone in its company cubicle after being torn apart or shot to pieces yet again – and thinks it wants to be left alone, but secretly, maybe it doesn’t.
Not caring is easier. Ignoring everything and watching media is also easier. Neither is a solution nor a practical way to spend time, but the temptation remains. Reading about Murderbot struggling with autonomy and with the desire for and fear of emotional connection, and soothing itself by watching shows and reading books, has been comforting, I think, in part because I get it. It’s kind of reassuring to see a being as advanced and powerful as Murderbot struggling with the same things I do. Emotions are hard, autonomy is hard, co-existing with humans is hard, but they’re all part of being.
While this review is as much about the series as it is the novel, the novel engages more directly with the consequences of breaking boundaries, both mental and governmental (bad dum bum) and explores in more detail the complications and rewards of found family, connection, and above all, watching and reading all the stories you want whenever you want. (I really liked that part). I was a little worried that my enjoyment of the Murderbot series would diminish with added length and complicated storyline of the novel, but it was more of an already excellent thing.
I’m curious: if you’re a romance reader, and you’ve read this series, or this book, what did you think? Did you like it? Why? And if you haven’t, I hope you’ll try it and tell me what you think.
In the meantime, much like Murderbot queuing up episode 357 of Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon, I’m headed back to re-read this book right now, for the third time. I can think of no higher recommendation.
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I also read & enjoyed this series in the last few weeks (although I have only read it once). I enjoy the sarcasm of Murderbot. It really seems to fit my mood. I have found myself wanting to read more science fiction/ speculative fiction/fantasy lately, and I think it is because made up worlds are more calming to me right now than anything that takes place in the something like our “real” world. The world building in this series is fantastic & I look forward to the next book.
If anyone has other sci fi recs, please recommend away, I have also just finished listening to the Vorkosigan Saga series of books by Lois McMaster Bujold. Three or four of the books I would consider romance or having romantic elements, but the entire series is really good & you would appreciate them better having read them all. The Old Man’s War series by John Scalzi is also pretty good.
I have DNF’d so many books in the last couple of months, more than I have ever done in such a short period time. The Murderbot books were a wonderful find & I thank the Bitchery for recommending them.
@Laurel: I feel the same way. I was comforted not only by the far-away future-space world, but by how incredibly inclusive and hopeful some of the human relationships were. I’m probably going to re-read the series again.
@Laurel if you haven’t read Ann Leckie’s Imperial Radch series starting with Ancillary Justice those might also fit the bill- there’s less humor than the other series you’ve been reading but they have the same focus on people and relationships (and they’re generally pretty wonderful)
I love that the thing that drives the Murderbot books is relationships- it’s so incredibly delightful to read science fiction that feels like it was written about people instead of spaceships and it’s all the more remarkable when the main character is a person but not a human person and it reads so clearly on the page as such. Also they’re funny! Which is not such a common thing in sci fi.
@Laurel Oh, also I know Jim C. Hines is an author folks in the Bitchery have enjoyed, cw for fictional plague but he has a newish sci fi series featuring space janitors, I’ve only read the first one (Terminal Alliance) but it’s good fun, more Scalzi than Wells but lively.
This is the review I have been waiting for! I too am besotted by Murderbot and cannot stop reading all the books and pine for the next novel, Future Telemetry, due out next year. Sigh. I also like how women, and women of color, get the lion’s share of the roles, human roles I should say. Wells is so breathtakingly casual about it which is sneaky and gratifying.
Prior to the novel’s release Wells posted a hilarious AMA with Murderbot and ART that you can read here: https://www.tor.com/2020/04/24/feelings-redacted-what-happened-when-murderbot-and-art-talked-to-instagram/
Yes, I have read the novellas and am waiting on the novel. I read a lot of SF 50 to 60 years ago. This brought me back and would definitely recommend even without the current crisis . I also am loving Jessie Milhak, just finished Polaris Rising which I thought was the weakest in her trilogy but still readable.
Loved the novellas, looking forward to the novel. Thanks for the review.
For a science fiction series focused on the characters, I’d recommend Becky Chambers’ Wayfarers books. They’re all in the same universe, but only tangentially related to one another.
A Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet
A Closed and Common Orbit (also about an AI)
Record of a Spaceborn Few
To Be Taught, If Fortunate (warning, super sad)
They’re all spacey – Angry Planet is about a scrappy spaceship crew, Spaceborn is about a space colony, etc. – but mostly they’re about how the circumstances and alien/human cultures affect all of the characters. I really enjoyed them and hope to find more like them.
I am in love with the Murderbot series! I’ve long wished I could get friends or family to read it so that I could have someone to squee with.
I read all the novellas when they came out and then binge-read them before starting NETWORK EFFECT, which was indispensible. As for why I like them so much? (I’ve been sitting her for several minutes trying to articulate this.)
It’s the feelings and connections Murderbot doesn’t want; the grumpiness; the “I will get myself killed to save you, dammit, but not because we’re friends or anything.” Does Murderbot’s contrariness make those unwanted feelings that much deeper? Why does my heart leap with joy at just the mention of this series? More questions!
I would like to be the kind of person Murderbot would want as a never-friend.
I love Murderbot, but I was a science fiction and fantasy fan before I become a romance fan, and it’s still my primary genre. I second Pre-Successful Indie’s recommendation of Becky Chambers’s books, especially the first one. Other things I recommend:
Martha Wells’s backlist, which is all fantasy. Try especially the Raksura series, beginning with The Cloud Roads. There are no actual human beings in this book but the characters are all fascinating and often delightful people and the cultural and physical worldbuilding is superb. Also, her earlier book The Wheel of the Infinite is a standalone fantasy with a romance subplot in a somewhat southeast Asian world. The main character is very different from Murderbot, but shares the quality of a strong, snarky voice.
Other science fiction romance: there’s the Liaden series by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller. There are multiple starting points to the series but I’d go with either Agent of Change or Conflict of Honors.
I also like MCA Hogarth’s science fiction work. She’s got several interlocking series. The “Her Instruments” series, beginning with Earthrise, is space opera romance. The Dreamhealers series beginning with Mindtouch is an ace romance and the author refers to it as her “milk and cookies” books. The Prince’s Game series beginning with Even the Wingless is also space opera with more of a lean toward military scifi and some (but not exclusively) intense, violent content – not usually my thing, but I find it well worthwhile for the character and relationship arcs.
Also, I recommend Janet Kagan. Try Mirabile (which has a romance plot for an older heroine along with amusing adventures on a world colonized by Earth) or Hellspark (romance for a couple of secondary characters but not the heroine, fun aliens and multiple cultures, and the entertainment of watching a spaceship-based AI become self-aware).
Thank you so much for the introduction to this series– after reading this review I immediately bought the first book (the single) and am completely in love.
Thank you all for the recommendations – this website always has the best comments!
I think Murderbot resonates so clearly with romance readers because in some ways it is a long slow-burn romance between Murderbot and life. Over the course of the books, it goes from being mostly a machine, to something that is mostly human. Every moment along the way it has to chose again and again to use it’s free will and become more human, become more compassionate, become more itself.
I too have enjoyed the Murderbot novellas and novel.
Laurel, I’ll recommend SK Dunstall’s Linesman series also Lyn Gala’s Claimings series. Michelle Diener’s Dark Horse and its sequels are fun reads, too.
I haven’t read the Janet Kagan books that @OtterB suggested, but I’ll recommend her Star Trek novel, Uhura’s Song.
I adore the Murderbot series and am eagerly awaiting the moment when I have enough time to read Network Effect in one sitting.
OtterB, I adore both the Hogarth and the Kagan books you mentioned.
In terms of other recommendations, I suggest The Goblin Emperor by Kate Addison (fantasy, but with very hopeful outcomes).
And here’s a heartfelt second for @Allison’s recommendation of The Goblin Emperor.
Another reason you need to read the prior novellas is to understand why the character ART, aka Perry, is so important to Murderbot in this novel, and to sort out Murderbot’s history with Dr. Mensah and Preservation Station.
One thing I like about Murderbot that hasn’t been mentioned is that Murderbot is non-gendered. Its biological portions do not include sex organs, nor does it personally identify with a gender (and several genders are mentioned over the course of the series). The characters around it don’t assign it a gender either–it’s just SecUnit. It’s kind of refreshing.
There’s no romance, but I think Murderbot does have some complicated emotions about Dr. Mensah, which seem to be reciprocated with equally complex emotions.
I too am not a great fan of the audiobook production. Murderbot’s voice inside my head is waaaay snarkier than any performer’s could be, plus the performer’s voice is obviously male, which messes with my non-gendered image of Murderbot.
@Rebecca – “ it’s so incredibly delightful to read science fiction that feels like it was written about people instead of spaceships” I liked SF as a young reader but gave up on it because it was mostly about spaceships and politics and missions and bad things tended to happen to the characters.
Martha Wells writes about people living their lives in settings that happen to be SF or fantasy. She’s awesome at writing loners who find family.
Love Murderbot – so snarky. Jack Campbell, Mario Kloos, John Scalzi and David Weber are some of my favorite SF (Military, Space Opera etc). Linnea Sinclair for my SFR – Games Of Command (Cyborg hero) is the best – although Accidental Goddess is fun too. I wish she still wrote books.
I am a HUGE Murderbot fan. I discovered the series from reviews on Goodreads, for which I am truly and deeply grateful.
This is a series that I constantly re-read, even though it is not very old. As soon as I finish, I start back again at the beginning – I am always reading one of the books.
@Laurel, another suggestion is Fortune’s Pawn by Rachel Bach.
Excellent review. I absolutely love Murderbot to an obsessive degree and have struggled to articulate why. Snarky genius combined with lone wolf protector? Yes, please. (I just reread the entire series of novellas for the nth time, to prep for the novel…and then read the novel immediately again). A huge part of it is where I am in my life as well as the world situation. The tug-of-war between finding connection and being able to make decisions without consulting the wishes of anyone an else are all in the mix. And that you can be great at what you do, but not always like doing it. The best reward is the joy I find in the humor and snark which makes me laugh out loud, even after multiple re-reads.
I have adored this series even though I predominantly read romance. There is just something so comforting about Murderbot struggling with it’s emotions and dare I say friendship? I did cringe a bit at the pricing for the novellas when they came out but luckily I begged the library to get them and they did. I feel such empathy with Murderbot as it struggles to communicate with the first humans to treat it like a person and not a piece of equipment. I cannot help re-reading them incessantly. If you think you don’t like science fiction stories then I beg you to give this story a try because I think it will change your mind.
Try Wells’ other more fantasy oriented books, Wheel of the Infinite is amazing. The Ships of the Air books are great and the somewhat prequelly Element of Fire and Death of the Necromancer are great too. I reread Wheel of the Infinite often as well as Element of Fire.
Bujold’s novella about Penric are wonderful.
Janet Kagan’s books are great if you can find them.
Tanya Huff’s Valor series is a frequent reread.
T. Kingfisher’s Clockwork Boys and The Wonder Engine for relationships and snark.
Gideon the Ninth, unexpectedly amazing.
Sharon Lee and Steve Miller’s Liaden series.
Your mileage may vary but I don’t think many of these would be thrown against the wall.
I adore murderbot. It is delightful and unputdownable, everyone I recommend this too ends up having the same reaction.
Vague but meaningful SPOILER ahead for Network Effect: While none of the Murderbot books contain sex, there’s a compelling argument to be made that Network Effect does have romance; I was a little surprised to not see that discussed in this review, since I assumed that’s why y’all were posting about Network Effect on SBTB in the first place.
@Avice: I struggled quite a bit with how to talk about that part of Network Effect, as it’s so subtle and sneaky how the familiar beats work their way into the story. I didn’t see them all until I’d finished, in fact, and I’d consider myself a pretty fluent romance reader! But you’re totally right – and that may be another reason this series and the novel especially worked so, so well with me.
@Kate: I think you’re right, yes! There is also a kind of slow burn sort of romance between Murderbot and personhood or life or autonomy, yes. You’re entirely correct. Thank you for pointing that out!
Like OtterB, I claim SF/F as my primary genre, so the tropescape as it were of this series is more my native territory. That said, I do loves me some Murderbot! I’ve read through the four novellas and plan to dive into the novel probably after my current read.
I really love the analysis here though, and in particular, I love the idea of the series being a slow burn romance between Murderbot and life. (heart)
Also submitting for amusement value how I keep imagining Murderbot in my head as looking like a somewhat less Robocop-looking version of Peter Weller. (Hi, am I showing my age?)
Has anyone mentioned Arkady Martine’s Memory called Empire yet? Its wonderful, intricate, (dare I say Byzantine?) science fiction worldbuilding on a different plantet almost entirely focused on inner thoughts, feelings, and relationships. Loved it. (and my usual genres are Paranormal Romance, Urban Fantasy, and folktale/mythology)
I love Murderbot, and I gobbled up the 4 novellas, but Network Effect was slower going for me. Not that the writing is any less excellent, but I guess I got accustomed to digesting Murderbot in novella-sized bites? Or maybe too many real world distractions? The character development of the humans around Murderbot got more interesting, especially the teenager(you know the one I’m talking about), yet for some reason I couldn’t finish the e-book in time and the library I borrowed it from snatched it back. So I’m back on the waiting list to borrow again so I can finish it.
Also, can someone write some Sanctuary Moon fanfic?
I am getting ready to reread Murderbot. I had it sitting on my desktop because Tor gave away a bunch of digital copies of the first four books recently and Murderbot kept popping up everywhere I looked. It was like the universe was shouting at me to read Murderbot. And I’m glad I did.
Murderbot reminds me a little bit of myself. I didn’t have the most stable childhood, so early on I found it was easier to lose myself in books and fictional characters’ emotions rather than deal with my own since they were often caused by things that I at least felt like I had no control over. I would read so often I used to get in trouble at school for having a book under my textbook that I would try to stealthily read during class.
I relate a lot to Murderbot’s anxiety because I have truckloads of it. And it’s strange, a lot of times reading about anxiety while I’m in the grips of anxiety is counterproductive to my overall mental health. But that wasn’t the case here. I felt like even though Murderbot is very cynical and anxious the overall story is very optimistic in nature, and the series gave me the warm fuzzies that are so dearly needed right now.
I’m very sad that I have to wait an entire year for the next book. I’m kind of glad I didn’t start the series until now because I feel like I saved it for the moment when I needed it most.
I am now trying to get my friends to read Murderbot, mainly so I can have someone else to gush about Murderbot to.
@ SB Sarah: If you decide in the future to make a second mega-spoilery Network Effect post discussing that subtle and sneaky subplot, I would be thrilled. Because I’m dying to talk about that element with other people, but the overall surprise emotional payoffs in Network Effect are so delightful, I don’t want to risk spoiling people!
About halfway into your review I was suddenly struck by the idea of Murderbot posting to https://twitter.com/AITA_reddit about the sneaky subplot and now I can’t stop imagining it.
I have been passionately in love with this series since I read a promotional excerpt of the first novella.
However, I would argue with your contention
POSSIBLE SPOILER
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There’s no romance in this series
If NETWORK EFFECT isn’t an ace agender romantic suspense novel, I don’t know what it is.
@Hapax: You’re totally, entirely right. I was re-reading the book when your comment came in, and I stand very corrected. It’s absolutely an ace agender romance, and I have amended the review to include your comment. Thank you!
Thank you for reviewing and suggesting this book. I have been looking for a book (or series) to get stuck in. I love books (and their authors) that create a world I can immerse myself in.
I loved the Murderbot books and really enjoyed this review—thank you. There is a subtle romance woven in, and I didn’t identify it as such until you pointed it out.
Adding another recommendation for Becky Chambers. Ursula Le Guin also has some fantastic books people might like that explore notions of gender in a sci fi context, like Left Hand of Darkness.
I love Murderbot for all the reasons mentioned here and more. I learned that I love reading about A.I.s who have feelings when I read the Imperial Radch series by Ann Leckie. Those books blew my mind, as I had not realized before what SF can do. Which is funny, as SF has always been a genre that played with possibilities, I had just not understood how wonderful that could be: trying out other models of societies and cultures, teaching my brain how much of what we take as a given is in fact subject to (possible) change. When Murderbot came along I already knew I would enjoy it, and the same is true for Alyssa Cole‘s The A.I. Who Loved Me.
My love for A.I. characters also seems to be linked with my interest of reading about neurodivergent characters, especially in a romance setting. Maybe because those characters think differently about feelings and relationships, and help me see things from another perspective? Maybe A.I. and neurodivergent people seem more straightforward and authentic to me? (Um, is that a problematic statement? Please call me out for it if it is!)
PS. Karin, the exact same thing happened to me! I was not reading fast enough, so the library took the ebook away, and now I have to wait for six weeks to finish – or buy my own copy.
@Christa, lol, I just finally got Network Effect back from the library, this time I can’t dawdle!