Review: All Systems Red (The Murderbot Diaries #1) by Martha Wells

Winner: 2018 Hugo Award for Best NovellaWinner: 2018 Nebula Award for Best NovellaWinner: 2018 Alex AwardWinner: 2018 Locus AwardOne of the Verge's Best Books of 2017A New York Times and USA Today BestsellerA murderous android discovers itself in All Systems Red, a tense science fiction adventure by Martha Wells that interrogates the roots of consciousness through Artificial Intelligence.

"As a heartless killing machine, I was a complete failure."

In a corporate-dominated spacefaring future, planetary missions must be approved and supplied by the Company. Exploratory teams are accompanied by Company-supplied security androids, for their own safety.

But in a society where contracts are awarded to the lowest bidder, safety isn’t a primary concern.

On a distant planet, a team of scientists are conducting surface tests, shadowed by their Company-supplied ‘droid — a self-aware SecUnit that has hacked its own governor module, and refers to itself (though never out loud) as “Murderbot.” Scornful of humans, all it really wants is to be left alone long enough to figure out who it is.

But when a neighboring mission goes dark, it's up to the scientists and their Murderbot to get to the truth.

At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

It has been a LONG while since I have read “hard sci-fi” I read it all the time when I was younger but then attempted to adult and thought that self-help books would make the transition easier.  I then got hooked on self-help books. I realize now that I am tired of reading what other people say I should do to be more productive and all that shit. I mean, if YOU want to get up ay 5 am and do all the things like a book told you, then you do you. But  I literally can’t function or think well before 1 pm. All of my friends love to remind me that on that Sept day in 2002 after the Pentagon was attacked that if we had to I dunno make a run for it that I would be up shit creek cause I was still chugging down expresso trying to work up enough gumption to give a damn about human rights which all these years later can I see the irony. If even the threat of Annihilation was not enough to kick my brain into gear, then what the hell was I thinking that getting up att the ungodly hour at 5 am to workout and all the other stuff that the Morning Miracle dude says will lead to a better a more fulfilled life.

Anyway, back to All Systems Red. I needed an escape for multiple reasons, and I LOVE hard sci-fi, and Murderbot was getting rave reviews, so when Amazon had it listed at 1.99 u bet your ass, I grabbed a copy.

My first thought was, wow, there is a whole new tech in sci-fi right now! I mean an AI that looks and talks like a human? Didn’t anyone else find that creepy as hell?! We then find out that MurderBot hacked his self and was self-aware. But she does not recall why he is called MurderBot. So off he goes to find out who or what he is. Yes, You read that correctly. I self-aware Robot. That alone gives me chills because what if it were Rouge and all humans died? That is what happens. Murderbot KNOWS that he had to do something to get that name, but he has NO idea what but with a nickname of Murderbot it can’t be good.

Not even the current MuderBot knows what exactly he did. So he sets off in search of answers.

One of the reasons that I LOVE SCI-FI is that on the surface, you get the plot but dig deep, a there are soooo many layers to the story that applies to today’s life.    And All Systems Red is no expectation. I am almost 100 percent sure that everyone has some dark secrets that they are afraid to come right out and deal with it, so they go on a little personal discovery trip like Murderbot did at the very end of All Systems Red.

Don’t worry; the above is not a spoiler. Thre is an ALOT of parts that happens in this story. What I just wrote is the bare bones. But damn this is going on my top 10 of 2018 for sure.  I am going to go read the next book in the series Artifical Condition.

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