Network Effect (Martha Wells)

Network Effect
The Murderbot Diaries, Book 5
Martha Wells
Tor.com
Fiction, Sci-Fi
**** (Good)

DESCRIPTION: A lot has happened since the half-organic, half-artificial security construct SecUnit, who still calls itself Murderbot, hacked its governor module to attain free will. At first, it mostly used its freedom to stream media and silently judge the stupidity of its clients, until it was found out. It finally has nominal freedom under the protection of Preservation, humans outside the powerful Corporate Rim that runs much of the known galaxy... but even an artificial being has to be useful, so it still works security for Dr. Mensah and her family. (Even in Preservation, humans are incredibly bad at keeping themselves alive without a SecUnit on hand.) What started as a routine survey mission goes wildly askew, however, when the return trip is interrupted by unknown hostiles - hostiles who have apparently taken over and destroyed an old friend, ART, the AI pilot of the university ship Perihelion. Now, in addition to keeping his human charges safe, SecUnit has another objective: figure out who these unknown people are, and make them pay in blood. Fortunately, as a self-described Murderbot, making humans bleed should be easy. Figuring out what's behind the unusual attackers will be the hard part. Hard, and potentially lethal...

REVIEW: The first novel-length adventure of SecUnit, a.k.a Murderbot, maintains the snarky narrative voice and breakneck action of the rest of the series. SecUnit is still figuring out what it wants to do with its freedom, and whom - if anyone - it wants to serve. It still isn't used to being cared about or having friends, and its reaction to ART's presumed deletion drives home just how deeply it has learned to care for others... and how dangerous it can be when those others come to harm. Hints have been dropped throughout the series of the dangers inherent in "alien remnant" tech and contamination, but not a lot has been mentioned about specifics; this adventure deals more with that aspect of Wells's future world, and just how dangerous the remnants can be. As in previous installments, sometimes the names and tangled loyalties and relations can be a bit thick, as can the action (given that SecUnit can monitor multiple situations simultaneously thanks to drone feeds, events can be complicated), but it sorts itself out by the end, as SecUnit takes another step toward creating its own path in a complicated universe.

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